April & Greg - Wedding

April & Greg, I am so happy for you both! Your Wedding was beautiful and ya'll are one lucky couple! Not only to find eachother, and be so in love, but to have such wonderful friends and family too! And have a beautiful baby girl on the way! It was my pleasure to be apart of your Wedding. Here are some of my favorites from your day!  :]

Magnolia Lakes has such a beautiful facility! See!?

 

Dark vs. Light - My Side

A few posts ago, (entitled - 'Dream State'), I talked about challenging myself and exploring different ideas and forms of photography. This past weekend I had the wonderful opportunity to work with 3 lovely models and a beautiful assistant (Liv), to help out since she is use to me telling her what to do.  :P (That's what sisters are for right? jkjk!)
The project was a success, though incredibly hot and humid outside, we survived. And the finished product (at least thus far) is something I am proud of. I am hoping I am able to grow on this side of photography or perhaps I should say this 'genre'. I am diving in head first into a different artistic side photography, in which I am hoping to tell a story. And I couldn't have done it without models - So thanks Savanna, Belkys and Krissy! Thanks for dealing with the heat, climbing things, laying on trees, wardrobe changes, HAIRSPRAY, BUG SPRAY , and my issues with creepy crawly or buzzing things! Oh and portraying something that I could only describe with a few words. It's like you ladies can read my mind! :]
I am truly grateful for having ya'll be apart of this first step. Hopefully I shall be taking more steps. But here, for now, everyone please see below for your enjoyment and let me know what you think!

Dark vs Light - It's a story that is represented throughout history, but here is my interpretation of it. And perhaps it is to be continued...

Kim - Maternity Session

Kim is having a BOY! And I am so excited! If you don't know me personally, you just need to know I love all things babies. Especially when my friends are expecting and I can talk to their bellies without being labeled as a total crazy person! And Kim has become a very dear friend of mine! We had to have these sessions in 2 parts, thanks to the wonderful rain (thank you baby Jesus for rain this summer) but we were almost worried about part II of the session because the thunder came...and went and not a drop. So we finished up our shoot! Kim is such a beautiful pregnant lady! I only hope I look as fabulous (though my family genes show that that probably won't happen). Kim, I had a blast and and I cannot wait to meet baby Derrick!

Dream State

I wanted to challenge myself. It's been a goal of mine lately. I wanted to try different techniques, different ways of shooting and different concepts.
I ADORE taking photos at weddings and all the wonderful things that come along with weddings! But I also adore many other sides of photography!
Most of you know I love doing my fashion and artistic shoots, but my partner in crime (Mary Turner with MK Inspired) has moved to Colorado. So, lately I haven't really had my fashion/art session fix.  :]

I posted on Facebook about a month ago requesting models and I was surprised about all the feedback and requests I got! My 'muse' lately has been a good friend of mine, Savanna and she is apart of my model group coming up this weekend! But I wanted to work thru some ideas and thoughts I had in regards to the session. Go a little deeper than I normally do. (Thanks again to all you who said you would be models for SPP, I will be doing more shoots like this in the future and hope to contact you all at some point!).

I am sharing this with my readers for you guys to hold me accountable. To keep growing. Keep shooting manually, keep experimenting with techniques and keep growing in photography. It's my love and my passion. 

So - I had this idea. I am a vivid dreamer, and while some might be afraid of the things I dream, I love my dreams. So that was my idea for this session. A dream state. A childlike dream state. I have always had lots of dreams about flying or being just 'weightless'. This was the concept I wanted to use.
Who could I ask to model? OF COURSE - my little sister Liv. She is fabulous at being herself and takes direction really well.
I didn't exactly tell her what we were doing until we started the session. Of course she looked at me like I was crazy for about five seconds then she was like 'That's so COOL! LET'S DO THIS!'

Here is what we came up with. I am no expert at levitation photography. But I am feeling okay about my first attempt at it, and hope to do more with this in the future.

thelastplaceyoulook - Nava's Beardy B-day Bash!

So my fiance, Cody, got me hooked on these guys almost a year ago! We saw them perform again on New Year's Eve, and when we saw they were going to have a live performance for Nava's (lead singer) birthday - we just had to go! They had an open camera policy so I did a first for SPP and took some pictures! I had so much fun, and I know these are not the BEST quality - I am pretty stoked about them! Here are some of my favorites!

You can check out their Facebook page here: http://www.facebook.com/thelastplaceyoulook