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Nate Mathai is a creative, who specializes in wedding and portrait photography. He is based out of Chicago, Illinois, and is highly regarded for his ability to tell stories throughout his work. Nate takes on a limited amount of sessions per year to provide the highest level of service to his couples.


Nate is married to his beautiful wife, Nithya, and they have a wonderful daughter named Eden.

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Now let's talk about you!

The best way to figure out how well we fit for each other is to have a conversation. So send me a note with the details of your plans and what you're looking for, and we can take it from there.


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Frequently Asked Questions

  • what are your rates for weddings / portraits?
    • Wedding coverage begins at $3250 and portrait sessions are $400. When you send me a note with your details, we can get a more accurate quote to meet your needs.
  • what is required to book a date?
    • If we both feel like we're a great fit for each, a non-refundable retainer and a signed contract is required to book out the date. The remaining balance for weddings would be due at least 30 days before the event. Most couples book between 6-9 months before their wedding day, and some even earlier depending on the popularity of their weekend.
  • how many weddings do you shoot a year?
    • In order to provide high quality service for all of my couples, I accept a maximum of 15 weddings in a calendar year.
  • how many images do you normally provide for a portrait session / wedding collection?
    • I try to stay away from claiming a "quantity" of images, as the raw number is not what matters. The number of images is highly dependent on the events of the day: how long we shoot for, what activities are planned, etc. Every session is unique, and my goal is to provide the right amount of quality images to tell the story of the session from start to finish. With that being said, on average we come away with about 25-30 images from a 1.5 hour portrait session, and about 600 images for a wedding day.
  • What kind of gear do you use?
    • I exclusively use professional Canon bodies, Canon lenses, Sandisk CF cards, and Apple/Adobe products for my digital darkroom.
  • Do you work off of shot lists?
    • I do one better than that- I'll talk to you about your special day. And better than just grabbing a boilerplate list from a wedding magazine, I'll know more about you, your family, your schedule, and what's of most important. And then I'll take that information to make sure to capture those things. We'll work together to come up with a realistic outlook of your day, and get you the best collection of images to cherish and share.

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