Candice C. Cusic Photography

I was referred to Candice by a trusted photographer I had worked with in a corporate capacity and knew from the get-​go I wanted to work with her for our wedding. Her style may not be for everyone. She doesn’t do cliched poses, she doesn’t do a ton of portraits and she doesn’t prescribe traditional locations. Instead, she captures moments, reactions and tells a detailed and thoughtful narrative from countless perspectives — her creativity, vision and ability to manipulate different situations and scenery is incredible. While she was a definite investment in our wedding budget, she was truly worth every penny.
We received our pictures less than two months after our wedding day via an online portal and a USB drive. Flipping through them we truly relived every moment and emotion over again. I couldn’t be happier with the engagement shoot, our wedding day and everything in between. Working with Candice was an easy and fun experience, and you can’t help but smile around her quirky personality!

Finding the best is difficult. Finding the perfect photographer to capture YOUR most important moment is essential — trust me i understand. I was put in the same situation as you for our wedding. I spent countless hours researching photographers. But let me ease your mind, you found her and Candice will exceed your expectations. Bold statement right? Well here is the support.
Others have attested to her credentials, Candice is highly accredited and awarded in her community. Though experienced, she hasn’t lost her passion and high energy. After our recent experience, my wife and I couldn’t be more thankful and blessed to have Candice agree to capture our most important moment. Why? because Candice gifted us the ability to RELIVE our moment daily.
«Viewing» and «reliving» are two different experiences, she truly is a photojournalist, someone who tells the story of you (and your guests), capturing real moments as they unfold. Instead of your typical pose here, or scripted locational shot photographers, we have photos filled with treasures, as if nobody realized that a photographer attended the wedding. Each photo shows raw emotion; they show not only what we were experiencing during the wedding, but they also tell a story of our guests’ experience. Her photos truly are works of art and we are forever grateful that Candice shared her gift with us.
BTW: I heard from other couples that they waited months to over a year to receive their photos. Knowing how in demand Candice is, we expected the same. To our surprise, Candice had our photos completed within weeks. Only a true professional can accomplish a task like that.

We retained Candice to shoot an engagement session and our wedding. We couldn’t be happier with the results or with the experience of working with Candice.
So much of the planning and execution of a wedding is stressful and tedious, but every moment spent with Candice was delightful. For the engagement session, she created an atmosphere that was fun and relaxed, but also exciting. We tromped around Lakeview with our dog and found the most beautiful locations in the most mundane places. For the wedding, Candice pulled off this amazing trick of being entirely present and engaging with us and our guests, and yet almost entirely invisible. In both instances, she was able to capture moments of true intimacy and spontaneity. In the end, we were left with a set of beautiful photos, capturing the static beauty of the trappings of the day – our venue, centerpieces, rings, clothes, and so on – as well as the dynamic beauty of our guests joy and our own happiness.
As for the photos, you have to go to Candice’s website and look at her photoblog. Words here can’t do a better job of extolling their quality than they themselves do. Candice will find that quiet moment that, say, your coworker and her spouse, who almost never get time to themselves, share after dinner, or your new mother-in-law’s reaction when your best man asks her to dance, or your officiant going over the reading before the ceremony. If you are looking for truly unique wedding photos, photos that don’t just document, but tell the story of your wedding, Candice is your photographer.
Lastly, you’ll find as you plan your wedding that there are certain qualities that the great vendors share. Candice has all of those qualities. She is a great listener. She is responsive to your needs and generous with her advice. Her contracts and billing system are clear, concise, and simple. She is on-​time and always prepared. She’s professional, but also great fun to work with. Maybe most of all, Candice is a hard worker. That, in combination with her frankly amazing talent (see the photo blog!) means that your photos are going to be something to cherish.

Candice is worth every penny. If you want artistic and interesting photos she is your woman. I kind of loved hanging out with her and was sad when she left after our wedding photos were done! Our original plan to shoot at Riot Fest was foiled, but came Candice to the rescue providing us with an awesome shoot at the MCA-​amid a rocking David Bowie exhibit!

Hiring a photographer was definitely one of the most challenging wedding task we had. It was difficult to find that photographer who would be willing to listen to our needs and wants, even our fears. Candice from the get go impressed us not only with her work, but her personality. I remember calling her on the phone and telling her «Candice, I love you, please tell me you are available on our wedding day, if not, I will cry». She just laughed and set up that meeting with us, and as soon as the meeting ended, we were sold! Candice’s photos are breathtaking, we looked at them, like we were in the events, like we were there to witness them. We asked questions, wondered what the emotion of the photo was about, and the like. Candice was our dream photographer. We got so many compliments on our engagement photos, and our wedding photos were such a gift not only to us but also to our family and friends. We could not stop raving about Candice, she was that one decision we made for the wedding that was well worth it. Thank you for all you have done for us Candice, your photos may be the most beautiful we’ve ever seen but it still won’t top the kind of person that you are. Thank you thank you thank you for such a wonderful job. Thank you for documenting our day the best way we could ever dream of. We love you Candice, here’ s to more ‘important events in life’ documentation with you :)

Candice was our photographer for our wedding and three years later, her photos keep the events of the day still fresh. It’s one of the most important decisions we made planning the wedding and we feel so lucky we chose Candice. Not only did she take so many awesome cool shots (a photo of my husband’s cake topper falling off the cake with everyone’s hilarious reactions was just one of countless examples), but she was/​is just such a genuinely nice fun funny person to be with. and believe me, you spend a lot of time with your wedding photographer so you better like her! she’s a total professional (she did everything we expected, she teaches photojournalism at northwestern and worked at a newspaper so she knows her way around her camera!) and we came away with some beautiful unique photos of a day that was in some ways, a blur during the actual experience, but her photos help us experience it again — and in many ways, to see so many of the people/​things that were going on around us even when we couldn’t personally be everywhere at once — Candice was! She was very fast in getting us our photos. I can’t say enough great things about her. of all the things you can stress about, this is one decision you don’t need to.

We are so thrilled we chose Candice for our engagement and wedding photos. She is so much fun to work with and our photos are GORGEOUS! She captured so many priceless moments, our biggest problem now is picking a few favorites to frame. It rained on our wedding day, and Candice figured out a way to get some outdoor shots because she knew how badly we wanted some city shots. Our wedding photos captured our day perfectly, I love looking at them and seeing how much fun we had. We would love to work with Candice again in the future!
–Heather S.

You guys, stop everything.
Seriously, whatever you’re doing, stop doing it.
And go to Candice’s gorgeous photoblog, and tell me you’ve ever seen anything more amazing in your entire life (and not just because my fiancé and I are currently featured, though its a nice touch!). Because you haven’t.
Candice’s photos are gorgeous, artful, journalistic, emotional masterpieces. From engagement sessions to weddings to baby photos, this woman has a gift unlike anything I’ve seen. She takes moments that were once special (weddings! hurray!), turned banal clichés (everyone, pose like you’re shocked that the bride and groom are kissing!), and turns them back into memories anyone would be honored to keep. You won’t see any choreographed bridal party posing photos, but thank goodness for it: because what you see instead is real. And worth capturing.
I first heard of Candice through a friend of mine who (fabulously, i might add) cuts hair. She offered up her name and suggested that she may not be our style, but knowing we needed a wedding photographer, thought she’d let me know. I didn’t think much of it, but I went home that night and checked out her website with my fiancé, and I knew she was our photographer before ever even MEETING her when I felt myself getting teary-​eyed looking at the wedding photos of people I DON’T EVEN KNOW.
When we met with her, we learned she’s not only incredibly talented, but warm, funny, and incredibly charasmatic — all attributes I imagine you need to weather the bridal arena. Her photography packages are, admittedly, more expensive than other photographers, but you absolutely are getting what you pay for. Candice answered all of my obnoxious questions (and continues to do so every step of the way through this getting married process) and we signed the contract the day we met her.
Two weeks ago, we had our engagement photo session, and she braved the bitter cold with us to take the most engaging, beautiful photos imaginable (and CERTAINLY the most beautiful photos anyone’s ever taken of my fiancé and me. Whoa). She had fantastic suggestions for location and very generic requests for our physical posture (e.g, please take your hands out of your pockets… oops!) but the rest was just her documenting emotions and moments in time. We got the photos back today, and as I anxiously combed through them to see the result, it became SO VERY REAL that we’re getting married. Her photos just brought to life a timeline of events that will end in our wedding, and only made me more excited for the big day to arrive. THAT, my friends, is a true feat of photography.
If you’re looking for more than traditional wedding photos, or if you just don’t want to have to worry about great looking photos, if you wanna brag about how amazing your wedding photographer is, or if you’d prefer some combo of all three, do yourself a favor and hire Candice. I cannot recommend her talents highly enough!

Easily one of the most gifted photographers and genuinely kind people I have ever met.
Candice did a photo shoot for my sisters wedding and a private lesson as a birthday present to my dad. For both events her super positive, quirky, light-​hearted personality and exceptional gift for capturing moments in explosive and unique ways made her an amazing person to be around. None of that awkwardness when a photographer you barely know gets too close or cliché, stiff, obviously posed wedding photos. Her photo journalism background is obvious in the way she is able to capture and make you feel apart of every photo she takes.
She is truly an amazing person and photographer and you would be a fool to hire anyone else.

Just recovering from our wedding last week. Candice was a joy to work with. She’s so creative — she finds the coolest shots and angles and moments that noone else would see. She’s a photojournalist and that shows in her work — she captures all these moments in an engaging and creative way. And even though we spent 8 hours with her, she’s funny and patient and surprisingly unobtrusive during the wedding. We loved our engagement photos and felt so comfortable having chosen her to capture our wedding. Although we haven’t seen the wedding photos yet, we know they’ll be beautiful and unique. She’s very responsive and answered all our numerous questions along the way. We’d recommend her wholeheartedly to anyone.

Candice is just splendid and her photographs are breathtaking! She was such a positive and welcome presence throughout our planning and our wedding, and she continues to be now, after the wedding. We received SO many compliments about her after the wedding. «Your photographer took so many pictures!» «Your photographer was absolutely everywhere and yet you didn’t notice her at all.» «Your photographer was so nice.» «Your photographer’s shots are amazing; They look like they should be in a fancy magazine or photography book.» «How did you find your amazing photographer? She really nailed the mood and feel of the day» and on and on!!! I mean it’s crazy, really… But well deserved! She made us feel completely at ease the entire day. She was honest with us every step of the way which helped us plan properly and get amazing pictures. I love photography and researched TONS of photographers. Candice has such an artistic eye. Hiring her was one of the best decisions we made in planning our wedding and we will be forever grateful for her talent with which she graced us, and also for her amazing aura and attitude.

We first met Candice when she did our engagement session in Chicago. At the time, we were only looking for a photographer for our reception in October. We were getting married in Cancun, and had every intention of using the photographer that the resort provided.
After we met her, I knew we HAD to bring her to Mexico. My father is a photographer, and I just knew that if he didn’t trust the person behind the lens, he would be running around with the camera himself!
Candice was amazing to work with. On my wedding day, a million things went wrong… the videographer was late, the sound system didn’t work, and right in the middle of our vows, we had a fifteen minute rainshower!
I think I would have completely broken down if I hadn’t known that Candice was there the whole time, capturing beautiful photos. After the ceremony, the weather cleared up and we got amazing shots on the beach. The next day, she woke up at 5 a.m. to get Trash the Dress shots in the water so that the lighting would be just right. She climbed ladders, got down and dirty in the sand and surf, and stood out in the pouring rain… anything to capture the right moment.
The photos turned out breathtakingly beautiful, but it was Candice herself that made the whole experience amazing. I’ve always felt awkward in front of the camera, but she is so enthusiastic, so sweet, and so friendly that she puts you at ease immediately. Having a photo session with her feels as comfortable as grabbing coffee with a good friend.
After the wedding, I would spend literally hours staring at the beautiful images she created. Her spirit, enthusiasm, and talent are incredible. I can’t recommend her strongly enough!!!

Wow… what can I say that her pictures don’t already tell you. Candice is an amazing photographer and person. We had her shoot our engagement pictures and wedding. I was just amazed with the pictures. She really captures the moment and emotion that is there. She also great to work with. She makes you feel comfortable at all times and has a great sense of humor too. I would definitely recommend her to anyone in need of a photographer. I can’t wait to have her shoot our pregnancy and baby photos. Thank you Candice!!!

candice is a great woman with an amazing eye for artistic photography.
if you are looking for someone who cares about what they are doing with photography, look no further.

super professional, awesome funny lady. book her for your next event now!