Ivory Films: Three Founders, Five Hundred Weddings, No Formula

Krutarth lost 35 to 40 kilograms before his wedding day - not for the wedding itself, but to win over his bride's grandfather. He's also a pilot, and when it came time for the pre-wedding shoot in Amsterdam, he flew the plane himself.

That story belongs to Ivory Films, the Mumbai-based wedding photography and film studio co-founded by Milan Kanani, Abhishek Kanani, and Suryansh Raghuvanshi. Six years and more than 500 weddings in, the three of them now shoot around 40 weddings a year across India, Thailand, the Middle East, and the United States.

The Editor Who Builds the Systems Behind the Story

Of the three founders, Milan is the one who has spent the longest in the edit suite - a decade shaping footage into finished films - and it shows in how Ivory Films is run. Milan is as invested in building strong teams and repeatable systems as he is in the craft itself, and it's that discipline that has let a three-person creative partnership scale to 500+ weddings without losing its identity.

Weddings remain his favorite canvas. His approach is shaped by a Casey Neistat-inspired belief that the best stories are honest, raw, and human - a philosophy that runs through Ivory Films' work well beyond his own shoots, informing how the whole studio trains its team and structures its process.

A Pilot Who Flew His Own Pre-Wedding Shoot

Asked which wedding has stayed with him most, co-founder Abhishek Kanani doesn't hesitate before naming Dhruvi and Krutarth's celebration in Doha.

There's something rare about a love this pure, and Dhruvi & Krutarth's wedding in Doha was exactly that. What stayed with us most was Krutarth's journey to this day: he lost an incredible 35-40 kg just to win over Dhruvi's grandfather, a gesture that spoke volumes about how much this relationship meant to him.

The pre-wedding shoot added its own unusual detail. "Their pre-wedding shoot took us to Amsterdam, where Krutarth, a pilot by profession, flew the plane himself, and the shots that came out of that trip were nothing short of stunning," he recalls.

The celebrations themselves unfolded across two cities. "From there, the celebrations unfolded beautifully across Surat and Doha, each function more heartfelt than the last," he says.

Not everything went to plan, but the couple's response became part of the story. 

"Even when Dhruvi's wardrobe got held up in customs, she handled it with a calm grace that said everything about who she is. But what truly made this wedding special was how present everyone was - family, friends, every single person invested in making it perfect. It was, in every sense, a wedding built on genuine love."

That same trip to Doha is also where Ivory Films points to its most unforgettable venue: the Hilton Salwa Beach Resort.

Three Different Roads to Ivory Films

Ivory Films isn't built around one point of view - it's built around three that happen to fit together, and Milan's decade of edit-suite experience and systems-first mindset is the throughline that holds the other two together.

Abhishek walked away from a career in Chartered Accountancy to pick up a camera instead, and over ten years has filmed across twelve countries, including celebrity weddings such as Parineeti Chopra and Raghav Chadha's, and Armaan and Aashna's. His approach leans fully into the people in front of him - pulling guests aside for their most embarrassing stories rather than staying at a polite distance.

Suryansh's route into filmmaking ran through travel and music before it ever reached weddings, backed by a Master's in Filmmaking and milestone projects that include the Anant Ambani wedding. What he's after in every film isn't just the memory itself, but the feeling underneath it.

What 500 Weddings Still Haven't Taught Them to Predict

Ask Abhishek what he enjoys most about the work, and the answer hasn't shifted much even after hundreds of weddings. "What I enjoy most is being trusted with someone's most unguarded moments, getting a front-row seat to real emotion, not posed for anyone," he says. "After 500+ weddings, that's still the part that hasn't worn off for me."

What keeps that feeling alive, he explains, is that no amount of experience makes a wedding predictable. 

Every wedding still has that one unscripted moment - a look, a tear, a laugh - that no amount of experience lets you predict. That's what keeps it alive for me after 500+ weddings: I'm not just documenting a day, I'm getting let into someone's most real, most human moment. That never gets old.

A Studio Built to Travel

Ivory Films has been in the wedding business for six years, working out of Mumbai and primarily across India, Thailand, the Middle East, and the USA. 

Within that footprint, the studio returns often to Mumbai, Hyderabad, Jaipur, Udaipur, Surat, London, Thailand, Bali, and the United States - and takes on weddings worldwide beyond that list.