Marina Baklanova Photography

Words cannot describe how amazing Marina is! She is absolutely the best choice we made for our wedding. There is so much I could say, so I'll outline it in points. 1. Marina's work ethic is outstanding. From the beginning, she was responsive, helpful, and trustworthy. She is a true professional. 2. Her work is extraordinary! She managed to take the most beautiful photos of the wedding/reception. I also love that she made everyone look phenomenal in the photos, without over-airbrushing. The result --- everyone looked like themselves, but better! She has plenty of tricks up her sleeve to get the best photos possible. We ended up with so, so many beautiful shots of the beach, venue, and our guests that we will cherish forever. 3. I received many compliments throughout the night from guests how "amazing" the photographer was. Marina was right in the thick of everything -- dodging dancers on the dance floor and capturing magic moments other photographers may have missed. She even managed to get some gorgeous candid photos of my relatives during the ceremony. Overall, Marina is the best decision you could make at your wedding. She is a true talent!

We looked at the pictures late last night and could not believe our eyes! Your photography is truly beautiful and you captured our special day better than we could have hoped and dreamed!! We thank you so so so much and appreciate everything you did for us! We will cherish these photos for the rest of our lives! Thank you Marina!!!

Marina is amazing! We first met her during an engagement session - she was so enthusiastic about options for the location of the session and really captured our personalities. The photos were amazing! After that, we asked her to do our wedding and once again, we were thrilled. She was extremely flexible (and we had a lot of last minute changes and decisions) and easygoing about everything. She had us fill out a questionnaire and then we had multiple conversations about what we wanted/didn't want and she delivered on everything (she even remembered that we'd said we wanted certain photos that we forgot about by our actual wedding day). She was so professional but is such an awesome person that she fit right in and we often didn't realize she was around snapping photos during the reception. Marina made sure to check in with us regularly before, during and after our wedding to make sure we were comfortable and satisfied. She is so easy to work with and made us feel as at ease as possible. We couldn't have been happier with her services during the wedding or the photos!

Marina, these pictures are amazing, amazing, amazing. I have goosebumps going through them. As Raina mentioned, the quality, the colors (how'd you make our apartment and the hallways look so bright?!!!), the crispness, the detail, all of it. Amazing. I'm really overwhelmed by how great these are. Thank you so much! We can't wait to have another occasion to hire you again.

Marina was my wedding photographer for my wedding and I cannot recommend her highly enough. She took the time to discuss the entire wedding day and went with me to visit the area of my ceremony prior to my wedding to explore the landscape and suggest places of interest for pictures. My pictures were absolutely stunning and I am forever thankful that she captured every single special and touching moment from my day.

Marina is a great photographer, she was beyond what we were expecting! She is a master in her profession. If you choose her for your big day, you will be in great hands (no worries, no stress, no rush -which is so important). Thank you Marina, so much!!!

Marina is not just talented but also really works with you to make shots you didn't know you wanted. Our engagement shoot was just perfect and neither me nor my husband are photogenic in the least and we both hate having our photos taken, but she was so good about not forcing us to pose with stupid smiles but instead just letting us be natural and calm and she made us look great! She made our wedding look incredible too.

I've worked with Marina on many occasions and have always been impressed with her creativity, the quality of her work, and the professionalism of her team. As a florist, I've had the opportunity to see the work of many, many photographers in the Bay Area, and Marina is the only one I refer to my clients. Beyond that, I worked with Marina to let her capture the floral art pieces and the process of the creating the art. You can't go wrong with Marina!

Marina is literally THE best photographer I've ever worked with. I had a unique vision in my mind that other photographers in the area were nervous they wouldn't be able to pull off. After three photographers said they couldn't do the job I wanted, Marina said yes. Her aesthetic vision and talent blew me away. She captured our save the date photo perfectly within the first two attempts and the rest of our engagement photos are so stellar that we struggled to even choose which ones to purchase! Highly recommend Marina.

My fiancee and i were looking for a photographer to capture our wedding and came across this magazine featuring the best local photographers. Upon going through it, a particular picture stroke us as being the most beautiful. No wonder why it was chosen for the cover! The photo was credited to Marina Baklanova Photography. Without hesitating, my fiancee looked at me and said: "I want this photographer for our wedding!"...We got in touch with Marina, chatted with her, and she turned out to be a wonderful person with an easy-going personality in addition of being a highly-skilled professional. All in all, hiring Marina is the 2nd best decision my fiancee has ever made. Of course, her best decision ever was marrying me ;)

Marina was beyond phenomenal as our wedding photographer! From first contact she was amazing, professional, and personable, answering questions before we knew we had them, and holding our hand as we fumbled through our wedding planning. Not only was she a joy to work with, but of course the photos from our engagement shoot and wedding day are gorgeous! She got a wonderful mix of prettily posed and lovely candid shots, perfectly capturing the beauty of the day. No joke: our guests were gushing about how great Marina was DURING the wedding, before even seeing the wonderful photos. The albums we ordered for our parents and ourselves and fantastic; high-quality and delivered with personal touches that went so far above and beyond anything we could have hoped for. We were incredibly, fantastically lucky to have Marina as our wedding photographer, and I would highly recommend her for any photography needs you may have! I can't imagine anyone that could have delivered a more wonderful experience and stellar result as our photographer.

Marina was very professional and super responsive. She took care of all the necessary supplies and accessories. I highly recommend Marina to everyone who is planning to have a wedding, either a small event or a huge one.

Marina was a pleasure to work with, and I couldn’t have been happier with our wedding photos. I would definitely recommend her to others!

Marina is a fantastic photographer. I wish there were more stars on yelp to give her! Her attitude is completely professional with a healthy mix of friendliness and she always has a smile on her face. She very creative and has an eye for shots that the common photographer wouldn't dream of. It was a pleasure working with her, even in the harshest of weather she was fully prepared and smiled through everything. She really did make our experience magical! Highly recommended :)

Marina has taken pictures of several important events in our lives: my then boyfriend's birthday party, our engagement pictures, our civil wedding at Stanford and finally our wedding party in Oaxaca, Mexico. For all occasions Marina was professional, dedicated and produced amazing results. She has a knack for knowing when to guide the situation and when to completely disappear to capture truly candid moments. For our civil ceremony at Stanford, we got everyone together to take a group picture. Another friend of ours decided he wanted to take a picture of the group from the opposite point of view and had everyone turn around- Marina took advantage of the situation and snapped some pictures. These paired photos- everyone facing the camera and then everyone facing away- are my favorite from that day, but they happened spontaneously. Before the wedding in Mexico, Marina sent us a detailed questionnaire and met with us to discuss how the flow of events would go. We had a cocktail the day before the wedding, which presented a special challenge, since we all went out into the wet Oaxaca streets at night and every guest had a torch- but Marina captured the moment brilliantly, and just looking at the pictures, I feel like I am there again. Early the next day, Marina met up with my mother, mother in law and I to go to the hair and makeup session- she took pictures of all of us for about 3 hours- some of my favorite images come from this time. She took fantastic pictures of me while I was getting ready and rushed to where Martin was preparing. I have no idea how Marina was able to be everywhere, but I feel I have pictures from different vantage points and of everyone who attended the wedding. She captured the banda music, the ceremony (she has a great picture where all the guests are laughing), the trio during lunch, the amazing food, the speeches and the party. She captured the fact that it rained all day and that we had a blast despite of it. We could not have been happier with a photographer. Now the only problem is selecting which of the many fantastic pictures to print out!