David Cruz: The Mixteco Oaxaca Native Film Wedding Photographer in Los Angeles

My family and I immigrated from Santa Cruz Xoxocotlán, Oaxaca to Los Angeles in early 1993. Coincidentally right after the '92 L.A. Riots, and lived in the MacArthur Park Rampart area near the Original Tommy's on Beverly & Rampart for a few years before moving to South Central. And while I'm a proud MexiCANT country bumpkin at heart, I'm a certified Beverly Hillbilly for serving all twelve years in the LAUSD — the second largest and worst-ranked school district in the nation.

From grade school in Historic Filipinotown, to John Muir Middle School on 60th & Vermont, and finally George Washington Preparatory High School on 108th & Normandie, class of 2005. I even did a few years at East Los Angeles College in the decade I lived in East L.A., surviving on $20 a month with random street tacos as I completed both the business administration and commercial photography programs, though I never officially graduated.

On March 11, 2003, at the Crenshaw Mall, after picking up a copy of Sing the Sorrow, while skimming through magazines at Waldenbooks, I read a Men's Health article ranking photographer as the sexiest job for men. It was all the convincing I needed. I was in 10th grade. Not long after, I started documenting high school life on Kodak disposable cameras. Months later, my dad got me a Kodak EasyShare DX6340 from the Best Buy on Pico & Sawtelle, which I then used to photograph the local ska and punk scene.

In late 2004, 11th grade, I asked my mom for a Nikon film camera because when I was in 5th grade in 1997, I saw the Nikon F5 in The Lost World: Jurassic Park at the cinema on Pacific & Gage in Huntington Park. Fast forward to 2005, now in 12th grade, my mom got me the Nikon N75 from Ritz Camera in the Fox Hills Mall. Coincidentally, I ended up working at Ritz Camera in the Beverly Center not long after, where I learned to print and color-correct 35mm film on Fuji Frontier optical printers and scanners. And with that dead-end salary, I was able to get my dream camera, the one I saw on the big screen all those years ago: the Nikon F5. The same F5 I still use today to photograph weddings in Los Angeles.

And while I credit Sarah Harding from The Lost World: Jurassic Park for inspiring the camera I should own, the Nikon F5, with Men's Health later planting the notion to be a photographer, the person who cemented the idea of becoming a professional wedding and fashion photographer as a career — even down to the camera bag I use today, Domke — was Matty from the movie 13 Going on 30. After seeing it in 2004 on the bootleg DVD my dad bought on the street.

Most of what I know on the technical side of 35mm film wedding photography, and most importantly, how I collaborate with wedding clients today, I picked up in retail from 2005 to 2015. I worked at four camera stores: Ritz Camera at the Beverly Center, King Photo Supply in Lancaster, and finally La Cañada Camera and Samy's Camera in Pasadena. And as I mentioned earlier, I was also a photo-lab technician at three of four of those shops, where I developed, scanned, and printed film.

In other words, my obsessive technical confidence in being able to photograph an entire wedding exclusively on Kodak 35mm film today, comes from a decade of experience in solving real world technical issues for other photographers in all genres, and skill levels. I learned by selling the right camera to photographers throughout their careers, understanding their specific needs, and even correcting their mistakes in the lab.

Likewise, my people skills and emotional intelligence — my ability to read and collaborate with clients — also comes from the ten years in retail dealing with every kind of customer imaginable. Because in retail, you never know who's going to walk through that door each day. You have no idea what they'll need, what they're going through personally, what they'll ask for, or how they'll ask for it. You just have to be ready for anything, be a patient listener, never take things personally, and meet them half way. A simple and practical mindset that has stayed with me after all these years.

Sometime after 2013, I spent a few years in the fashion industry in Downtown Los Angeles as a commercial and fashion photographer. Most of the time I was the head of a department of one, so I wore a lot of hats: creative director, talent casting, stylist, branding consultant, photographer, editor, social media manager, and whatever else needed to be done that day. As a result, I learned to visualize and execute the entire process of putting together a campaign from beginning to end, concept to print — accumulated experience across different disciplines I carried over into my film wedding photography today.

This is why I approach weddings as day-long fashion look-book campaigns, photographing them like editorial productions. Meaning, the second a client inquires, I'm already thinking about the visual story, the location, the composition, and ultimately what the finished body of work is going to feel like. Quietly paying attention to details most people miss in wardrobe and styling. Details that actually matter, not the five different angles of the table settings plus one from the drone.

The philosophy — or the WHY — behind The Drunk Wedding Photographer — the street tacos, the Mezcal culture, and even the anti-consumerism stance — was shaped during the decade I lived in East L.A., a block away from the Maravilla King Taco while studying business admin and marketing at ELAC. During the time I was a fashion photographer in Downtown L.A. and photographed weddings on the side. In other words, the foundation for the brand was already there long before the brand name did: like taking wedding pictures on Kodak film with my Nikon F5, and the appreciation for the micro-cultures of L.A. I just didn't know how to bring those influences together into a single identity.

Then one day in 2022, I was hand-selected to assist at a two day wedding in the Hollywood Hills because of my obsessive deep knowledge of Mezcal. The client was of all people, Lee Eisenberg — one of the head writers of The Office — and Emile Jane Fox. And on my way to the welcome dinner at Canter's on Fairfax, while sitting in traffic on the 170, I saw a cardboard sign on the overpass that read Mexican Roofer dot com, and thought: that's stupid genius. Nobody forgets a name like that. Later that night, after several visits to the Mezcal bar, the bartenders seemed impressed and amused that I was drinking Mezcal neat like nothing. The following evening, at the wedding in The Humming Bird Temple, the same bartenders shouted, "Back for more, Mr. Drunk Wedding Photographer!?" after what had to be my twentieth visit to the Mezcal bar with my Nikon F5 on hand.

The wedding was then, of course, published on Vogue. So I guess you could say I've been featured in Vogue — twice removed. And all of this could not have happened at a more perfect time. Because my previous brand had been under a .net domain — my dumb ass had let the .com expire — I was already considering a complete rebrand when lightning struck. I remembered that cardboard sign and what the bartender had called me at Lee's wedding. That's when I knew those four simple words distilled my entire philosophy into a single brand name. And on January 1, 2023, I launched The Drunk Wedding Photographer dot com.