Bays Mountain Hiking
Lilly Pads around the lake at Bays Mountain Planetarium
I'm still on vacation as this hits the site and should be relaxing in the sun or something but here I am. I don't relax well, and I never stop working. Whether that's thinking about blog topics, looking for locations, editing, learning new techniques, or approaching new people. Being a small business owner is hard. Very hard, but I still love spending time doing thing's I love and doing that with people I care about so last weekend we decided to take the kids hiking. We love overnight trips, and the kids are showing interest in joining us so we are "training" for a longer hike. We loaded them up with light packs and headed to Bays Mountain Park. Bays Mountain is special to us, as Natasha and I were married here but love to take the kids to see the animals and hike the trails surrounding the lake. This is exactly what we did. I'm not writing much, but here are the images from our day. All images were taken with my Fuji Xpro2 and my Xf16mm lens. #onelensandgo
Correction, the wifi ended up being so slow that I decided to wait until I was back home to upload this post. I just got in a few hours ago from second shooting a wedding with the brilliant Katy Sergent and uploading some pictures from the beach and remembered it was time to post this. So here it is.
This is not a perfect image, but this is the spot where Natasha and I were married so this means more to me than all the perfect lighting in the world. Amazing how things have changed Sweetpea.
In case you notice my tee shirt and new stickers, I thought I would share that I am currently an ambassador for AwakeThe Soul. Their moto is "Stay positive, be happy and live free", and they share passion for the outdoors and adventure as well. Go check them out.
Prom season is bringing heat
“Never apologize for how you feel. No one can control how they feel. The sun doesn’t apologize for being the sun. The rain doesn’t say sorry for falling. Feelings just are”
― Iain S. Thomas, Intentional Dissonance
I'm a portrait photographer, and love to follow and find light anywhere I can so prom should be easy right? Nope. Think about it, the girls are in tight-fitting gowns with little room to move, and they definitely are not moving as freely as usual. Guess what this sounds a lot like, that I love to shoot, weddings. I also avoid them because I am an over-deliverer and thus find myself working more, delivering more and charging, well not near enough. This has been my usual experience with Prom, and while some of those haven't changed at all, you guess which, something has changed. Maybe it is as simple as the time we live in but the young ladies I had the pleasure of working with last weekend were very confident in who they are. There is a huge difference in confidence in our identity and being conceited and these girls knew exactly who they were and they brought it! I drove from Boones Creek to Flag Pond, back to Boones Creek in the pursuit of capturing the ladies in a fashion I hope they can appreciate for years to come. As Austin is preparing for his Junior Prom tomorrow, this is something much closer to me than in times past. I have includes some sample imagery from my day, multiple sessions in one blog, and not to compete with one another but to illustrate the individuals they are and the diversity I was capable of adjusting to. I hope you enjoy these, and I hope every single one of these ladies also contact me for their senior portrait needs because bonds have been formed and I hope the experience was everything and more. I love how as I returned to finish my evening the girls were yelling my name as I approached like we were lifelong friends. I may or may not have also received an applause from one parent, in particular, today when I walked into her shop to share the images. These are amazing reminders that what I do IS IMPORTANT, and matters on a level most people never stop to consider. So when your thinking of hiring your next photographer, consider contacting me and see how things can be different and how we can write these moments in time together!
Bella looking fierce in this shot
Sydney was very creative and open to any idea I tossed her way
I will end with this image. This deserves a wall spot in my opinion.
