The Oasis Centre is located in the West of Edmonton and is built on 3.7 acres of land. Having this much space allows for free parking and a spacious garden behind the building. The garden doubles as your family and wedding portrait location so there is no need to travel elsewhere.
When it comes to wedding venues in Edmonton the Oasis Centre is in a class of it's own.
It can hold up to 1000 guests for your ceremony or reception. They are one of very few Edmonton venues that have a balcony with theatre seating.
You enter the Grand Hall through giant mahogany double doors. With marble pillars, golden drapes and rose quartz chandeliers this highly adaptable location will suit anyones needs.
This is the perfect place to get ready before your big day. It has a leather lounge seating area to relax before the ceremony. The private entrance makes sure that none of your guests will see you entering or exiting the building. The marble bathroom is the perfect touch to complete this lounge.
It is very spacious as it is also a 12 person boardroom so there is lots of room no matter how many groomsmen you have. It also has the perfect amount of natural light.
It has a built in aquarium with Koi fish that is 1300 gallons. The decor has a very European feel to it with granite cafe tables, hand crafted mahogany bar and a state of the art Italian espresso machine for you and your guests. The grand piano is a nice touch to create some ambience during your cocktail hour.
It gives you the option to have an outdoor ceremony or is also available for your wedding and family portraits. It has a paved courtyard that can hold up to 300 guests. The raised outdoor stage makes sure that all of your guests will see you from any seat in the garden.
For me personally, the waterfalls and lilly pond really make the Garden like no other venue in the city. The flowers add a perfect balance of colour to your wedding images at all times of the year.
Heather and Yarosla's wedding took place at The Oasis Centre.
This photo is from their first dance. Yaro is a ballroom dancing champion and Heather looked like she could be a champion as well.
First dance photos are always one of my favourite parts of the wedding. When composing this image I was waiting for the moment that both of their faces could be seen.
Based on the way they are dancing this image makes me feel like this photo could be a photo from a royal wedding.
This image was taken during a mild winter in March at about 9:00pm.
I used two Canon 430EXII flashes, with a pocket wizard transmitter, and 2 receivers. The camera is a Canon 5D Mark III and the lens is a Canon 24-70 2.8 L series lens.
The difficulty with this shot was making sure the light is perfect. When you are dealing with flash there are many things to consider.
The other difficulty would be to wait for the perfect moment when I can see both of their faces. My wife Jackie is holding one stand for the lights and the other one is across from me on the dance floor. Jackie is able to move around if need be.
The first dance happened very quickly so it can be a little stressful to make sure that we capture enough great shots of the dance. I created this image because I wanted to make sure that Heather and Yaro had a fantastic first dance shot. I chose to edit this photo in black and white because I felt much more emotion coming from the couple in a moodier darker image than I did with the colour version.