South African Wedding Photographer
Matt is a South African wedding photographer who was born in Durban, South Africa. His passion for photography started at fourteen when he fell in love with the art form and he has been making creative images ever since. Matt has a Bachelor of Business Administration degree and his knowledge for photography has been entirely self taught, a testament to his passion for his craft. He has a strong love for people which allows him to connect and engage with his diverse range of clients. Matt also enjoys helping and teaching others about portrait and wedding photography.
Matt is primarily a South African wedding photographer but specialises in wedding; commercial; fashion & editorial; and lifestyle photography. His style of creative photography is an organic mix between portraiture and documentary, allowing him exibility while maintaining creativity in each individual shoot. Rather than posed and generic images, Matt cultivates a relaxed and fun atmosphere on his shoots, allowing him to create natural and spontaneous images of superior artistic quality. He is always striving to push the boundaries of photography by creating exceptional images for his clients. With over seven years of experience in the South African wedding photography industry, Matt has produced unprecedented work for his clients. South African wedding photographer, Matt Masson aims to provide his clients with unique images, paired with signature products and professional services.
Matt + Philile
Our Story
We met at a friend’s birthday in Durban. Philile had come straight from her French exam and was feeling tired and hangry – not good! When we were introduced, Matt was his normal friendly self, and Philile…well, she was still hangry. Safe to say, we didn’t chat much that evening. A few weeks later, we saw each other at another friend’s event and struck up conversation. We spent most of the evening chatting to each other, and that’s how the friendship began. Over the next few months, we became very close and, well, they do tell you to marry your best friend!
Matt proposed to Philile at Hex River Valley, during a road trip down to Cape Town. All along the trip, Matt would stop the car, set up the tripod and camera, and take some photos. So it all seemed well and normal to Philile, when Matt pulled over on a small dirt road in Hex River Valley, set up the tripod and D4, and put it on time-lapse. That was until Matt got down on one knee and asked her to marry him. Completely surprised, Philile screamed and jumped on Matt, while passers-by hooted and waved. We absolutely loved this exciting moment in our lives and we are so happy that we have some photos to help us relive it.
Our engagement was quite short – only four months! We figured, since we both have a lot of experience in planning and being involved in weddings, we wouldn’t need a lot of time to plan our wedding. That, and we were pretty keen to start our lives together. We decided to have our wedding in Durban, because our families and most of our friends live in KZN, and we just love Durban – where else can you have highs of 25 degrees in winter? We were married at the courtyard at Ciao Bella. What we loved about the venue was that it was industrial and urban, and we could contrast that by adding some naturals (some penny gum here, a white orchid installation there), and the space became our own. We wanted the wedding to be less formal, and more like a cocktail party (everyone loves those!), so we had canapés floating around, a harvest table mains, and a desert buffet, with all the cake and Twizzlers you can imagine! Our guests could walk around with a glass of wine or bubbly, eat, drink and chat on couches and ottomans. It also helped that we had less than 100 guests, otherwise, we would have run out of Twizzlers fairly quickly!
When Matt proposed, the question we were most frequently asked was, “But who will shoot the wedding?”. Funny enough, that was one of the first decisions we made for the wedding – photography is that is important to us! Our photographer was Britt Tuhi, one of our closest friends and fellow South African wedding photographer, who had been assisting and working for Matt as his second shooter for over a year. Britt was perfect for the job: she is extremely talented and knows us very well, so we were absolutely comfortable with her throughout our day.
After our wedding day was over, after we returned from honeymoon, and work had resumed, we had hearts and minds filled with memories of our happy day, but we were also so happy we could share those memories with friends and family – and each other – just by looking at our wedding photos. The wedding seems to fly by so quickly, it’s so amazing to be able to page through an album and relive all that joy.
This is why we believe that wedding photography is so important, why we are there to capture your moments on your beautiful day – because we know how precious those memories are.
Featured On
We’ve been featured across the web and in several publications. Here are a just a few.
