Whitney Lewis Photography

I made a goal this year to visit 50 temples – 50 temples in 2012.  So far, I’ve been to: Salt Lake Temple, Provo Temple, Timpanogos Temple, Draper Temple, Jordan River Temple, and this one is #6 for the year.  I was so glad we got to stop here right at sunset!, loved seeing the changing colors in the sky!

^My favorite picture from the evening.  In the past, I’ve always tried to avoid the gate in temple photos, I thought it got in the way.  I was excited to find a way to use the gate to add to the photo instead.

Normally, LDS temples have an Angel Moroni with a trumpet on the steeple.  It was interesting to see that the St. George temple did not.  We asked in the visitor’s center and apparently, there are a handful of older temples that still do not.  According to ldsChurchTemples.com, “Eight (8) temples do not have an angel Moroni. They are the St. George Utah, Logan Utah, Manti Utah, Laie Hawaii, Cardston Alberta, Mesa Arizona, Hamilton New Zealand, and Oakland California Temples.”

Check back tomorrow for photos from Las Vegas!

Wow, what a month!  I apologize for my absence from the blog, as the weather got warmer, I started spending more of my time outside experiencing life and less of my time inside telling people about it online :)  So here’s a quick update, then I’ll jump into the photos!

First, I’ve become obsessed with rock climbing.  I love learning about it, doing it, and photographing it!

Still lots and lots of photography!  I’ve done several family shoots, several engagements, a few weddings, many stock photography shoots (I’ll tell you more about those later!), some corporate photos, and quite a bit of travel photography.

The travel is one of the things I’ve been most excited about recently.  See, when I started to get into photography, I dove in head first and it became a business.  I didn’t even take the time to decide what kind of photography I liked, to learn about all the different options.  I just started working and jumped into weddings.  While I love weddings, this point in my life is a time of discovery.  It’s time to see what else is out there, what else I can learn.  Here I am, 3 years after my first wedding and now I’m taking the time to learn about the art of photography – to discover why I really love it.

Most recently, I went on a road trip with my first intern, Justin Workman.  He’s done an amazing job with his own photography business since he worked with me, and it was a great experience to shoot together and see a new perspective.  We left Salt Lake and drove South towards California (the jobs paying for the trip were in San Diego and Los Angeles).  First stop: Zion’s National Park.

I have very little experience with landscape photography, in the past I used to say “that’s nice… but can I put a bride in front of this view?” It was a challenge to go through the park and just see the photo – I can’t pose a mountain, I have to move myself.  Can’t make the rocks laugh, I only have light and angle to change how they look.  But what an experience!  I think I’m finally catching the vision.

One of the things I loved about Zion’s was the road – the asphalt was a dark red color instead of black.

^ And there’s Justin.  Whatever you have to do to get the shot, right?

Next stop: St George Temple at sunset!

Life to me is about perspective.  I love the discovery – learning to see the same old things in my life through someone else’s eyes.  This is why photographing children is so darn fun for me!  They take the normal, everyday object or activities and make an adventure of it.  All these things we take for granted, they get excited about.  I’ve spent all my life trying to be an adult, but not I just want to be young again and see the world the way these little kids do!

This little girl was so sweet, she wanted to get dressed up and wear the pearls (and didn’t want to give them back when it was time!  But I don’t blame her… they looked better on her anyway!).

One of the games she played (below) was “take the pearls off… then put them back on… repeat over and over again.”  Sometimes it was difficult to figure out how to fit her head through, but she was determined!

And then we played on Mommy’s beautiful hardwood floors!  It reminded me of a dance studio.