I am hugely busy with editing all the shoots I have done recently, and haven't gotten a chance to post anything in the last while. Here's a sneak peek of the Salt Lake wedding shoot I did for Laura and Jake. I love the way the reflection and the colors turned out in this one.
We got Liz's maternity shoot done up above Sundance right before all the really vivid Fall colors in Utah apparently decided to disappear. She brought her son Hunter along, and he was wonderful with helping out Mom by holding different changes of clothing. We managed to get some nice "almost-a-big-brother" pictures with Hunter as well.
I was especially exited to hear that Liz found me through Google just by searching "Utah Maternity Photography". My husband Thomas has been diligently making improvements to my website and my blog trying to make it more search engine friendly, and so it's great to see that it seems to be working. Plus, it's always wonderful when new clients contact me out of the blue and say "I found your work and I love it!"
I love how Liz's photos turned out, even though it makes me slightly sick that someone can be so close to giving birth and still look as incredibly thin and fit as she does. I mean, there's a baby in there!!! :)
To see the rest of Liz's photos click here.
All right, I guess from the poll a couple weeks ago regarding what to call this type of shoot the consensus was that "Bride and Groom" made the most sense. Thus, this is the term I will begin using primarily to discuss this type of photos... though I still kind of like Mer's suggestion in the comments:
"Or you could always be brutally honest: "Prenuptual Vanity Shots: I wanna have lots of ammo when I show my exes and frenemies how hot my man is and how good I looked in that dress. BONUS! After you've had five children, you'll have proof that you once did, in fact, wear a size 2."
Anyways, here are some of Alexis and Alan's bridal-groomal-formal-bride-and-groom-pre-nuptial-vanity pictures. I think we managed to take these photos at the peak of the fall colors up in Sundance, and I was elated to see how vibrant they turned out. It certainly made editing the photos a breeze, which is always a bonus. :D
Alexis looked beautiful in her wedding dress, and Alan was sporting a very sweet brown pinstripe tux. I think shooting their wedding this November will be awesome!
Check out the rest of this gallery here.
I love finding new places to shoot! As a photographer I always have a list of ideas and locations to shoot in Utah or Salt Lake county that I have done in the past or have been meaning to try out, but it is always awesome when my clients tell me about a place that I have never been to. LJ and Kaylee told me they wanted to take their engagement photos at a location they had heard about in Lehi called the "Da Vinci Doors". I said it sounded like fun, and we set the appt for an early morning session. This location was great! Within the space of two blocks there were 6 or 7 completely different backgrounds and types of walls, an awesome red railroad car, rail road tracks, this vintage red and green store that looked like it was built around the turn of the century, and of course, the doors themselves. Da Vinci Doors is apparently a door and window shop, and they have a lot of examples of their work around their building- which makes for a varied and interesting setting. Best of all? It's just a few miles from my house! :)
We started to shoot just before sunrise, and as this was a weekend, Thomas was able to help out with lighting. Kaylee and LJ were fantastic! As you can see, they are both great looking, and as we began taking pictures and started to relax around each other we began just to joke around and poke fun at each other. I think I laughed pretty much constantly during the entire hour and a half that we were shooting. It was wonderful to see a couple so in love and so happy to just play and have fun with each other. The pictures turned out beautifully, if I do say so myself, with some great candid and serious moments. I look forward to doing Kaylee's bridals and to photographing their wedding!
To see more, click here.
For Kari's bridal photos we headed on up to the Garden Park Ward in Salt Lake City. This beautiful little spot is full of trees, footbridges, neat architecture, and a waterfall. It's also just a stones throw from downtown SLC and where my mother grew up. She used to call it her "secret place" and go there to play and spend time with her friend. They both thought that no one else knew about it. :) Later on, she and my dad got their engagement pictures done there. I was pretty excited to check it out because I had heard so many good things about the location.
Kari was so pleasant to be around and laughed the entire time. I thought it was kind of unbelievable as she had gotten up at FOUR IN THE MORNING to meet the MUA and get her hair and makeup done. Small price for beauty, I suppose. We had a wonderful early morning bridals shoot, and Kari looked gorgeous in her dress. Good times were had by all.
To see more of Kari's bridal shoot, click here.
Kelsey and Alec's engagement shoot was the final one in a whirlwind schedule of 4 different fall color shoots in 24 hours. We stopped for a moment at Bridal Veil Falls, and then immediately headed back up to Sundance Stables to get some beautiful autumn-colored backgrounds.
I love Fall! Even though this was the fourth time driving up the canyon that day I kept squealing as Thomas and I drove up the road and I saw all the different colors and shades in the trees. As a photographer I am completely addicted to colors, and the more vivid and varied the better. So while this is definitely my favorite time of year, there's always a slight undercurrent of panic as I try to get in as many photos as possible before they are all gone. It is definitely unfair that Fall in Utah is so short compared to other places in the country!
Kelsey and Alec were wonderful models, and had lots of fun playing among the trees and ferns as we took their pictures. We hadn't met each other until we all showed up at Bridal Veil, but as soon as we began shooting everybody relaxed and we immediately began joking around and laughing as we went along. I love when a photography shoot just flows and it doesn't feel forced or even feel like work. It's just me playing with my friends and doing what I love to do best!
Kelsey and Alec are going to be married in November in Redlands California, so I'll get to escape the cold for Thanksgiving and travel on down there to shoot. I love traveling!
Be sure and keep a lookout for Kelsey's bridals in the next couple weeks! In the meantime, check out more of this shoot here.
I've known Nate Bagley for a couple years now as part of the swing dance community here in Utah. He's an awesome guy, and is always cracking jokes. Until recently he was at Orange Soda as part of their SEO division, and he's provided me with information and technical recommendations for my website and this blog from time to time. As a "thank you" for his help, I did this individual portrait shoot for him so he could have some promotional photos as he is looking to begin some freelance work. We had a lot of fun just goofing around the location, which is right by his condo and where we shot Jordan's ballet bridals earlier that week. Nate's got a lot of personality, so this definitely wasn't your "traditional" portrait shoot.
It's a little known fact that Nate is actually Batman Robin. Don't tell anyone.
To see more, click here.
Kenneth Linge is the photography world’s equivalent of a Jedi master. He was a terrifically acclaimed photographer in Norway before he moved to Utah around 2000. After moving here, he promptly took over a lot of the top wedding gigs in venues like La Caille, Sundance, and Thanksgiving Point. He now works mostly with commercial photography, but still does the odd wedding now and then. He’s a genius when it comes to lighting, composition, and focus, so when he announced he was doing another Photographing People workshop I jumped at the chance to hear what he had to say. Not only is he incredibly talented, he is an extremely kind and open person and rocks a wicked awesome accent to boot. He teaches along with his wife Marylyn who is a superb photographer in her own right, and does amazing Photoshop magic in their editing for the studio. I already feel much smarter having attended this workshop. :D
A couple of highlights from the workshop:
---
One of the biggest challenges for a wedding photographer is that you can’t really dictate when a wedding ceremony or reception should be to get the best natural light. You can do it a lot easier with engagement and bridal shoots, but clients aren’t usually up for scheduling their wedding day events for the first or last two hours of the daylight (generally considered the best natural light by photogs). Thus, wedding photography often takes place during harsh midday or early afternoon light.
Enter the Jedi. Kenneth actually says that around midday is one of his favorite times to shoot as it gives him a lot of options with lighting. He spent quite a while in the workshop explaining and demonstrating with a model different principles and techniques on how to manipulate bright sunlight to give spectacular results. The secret lies in manipulation of reflectors and diffusers (sometimes just one of each, sometimes more than one), along with a better understanding of where the primary light source is, how it will behave in the photo, and how shade will play a factor.
Quote of the day on lighting: “Good light and a crappy background always trumps crappy light and a good background. Make sure the light works, and then work within that to find the right background.”
Incidentally, the “right background” for Kenneth is sometimes just a blanket held up behind the model by an assistant. I loved the idea, especially as it can be a way to bring in more color to the photograph. I will definitely begin to keep an eye out for any awesome blankets that would work well.
---
A key aspect of composition in photography has always been how you are directing the viewer’s eye to your subject. Framing and leading lines are primary ways to help the photographer accomplish this task. Kenneth touched on an interesting phenomenon that he has noticed and I thought it was something to definitely keep in mind in my own work. Historically, people from Europe and the US have always looked at or “read” photos from left to right, and so it was important to make sure any leading lines in the photo would take the eye from left to right directly into the focus of the subject. People from China and the rest of the orient would traditionally look the photo from right to left. What Kenneth has found is that recently, more and more people now are “reading” photos from top to bottom (an apparent effect of the internet with just scanning pages instead of reading them). The point is that it is important to make sure that now you have lines directing the eye to the subject no matter where you look. While this is a fairly subtle distinction in photography, he underscored that keeping in mind the way clients will view the photo and composing the shot accordingly will help produce shots that “just look better” and stand out from the crowd.
---
Wedding photography, whether it’s in Utah or elsewhere, is all about recording moments and the memories they contain. The first time the groom sees the bride in her wedding dress, the bouquet toss, the bridal couple’s first dance…. All of these are examples of moments that must be captured in the exact instant and on the very first try. There are very few “do-overs” in wedding photography. Kenneth stressed the importance of knowing your camera. A professional photographer should know his or her equipment as intimately as a professional musician knows his or her instrument. Kenneth talked about how he would sit watching his cat and practice with his camera almost like a target shooter would practice his quick draw. As quick as he could he would bring up his camera and take one photo, focusing and adjusting as quickly as he could. “You must know every switch, every setting, and every dial by touch. When the moment comes you must be able to SHOOT. You can’t take 30 seconds or 2 minutes to make sure your camera is in the right setting before you are ready- by then the moment may have passed.”
While I LOVE my new D700, I definitely plan on taking some more time to practice my own “quick-draw”.
An additional point Kenneth made in "capturing the moment" that I thought I would pass along is to make sure to photograph everything and everyone as soon as you can; don't procrastinate the shot. If you arrive at a wedding reception and the cake is out, take a few shots of it immediately- you never know if it will melt, fall over, or be crushed by a guest later on. Get the shots as early as you can, even if the light is not ideal, and then if you have time go back and fiddle with it to make it perfect. You never know if "now" is really the only opportunity you will have, so make use of it.
---
After all is said and done, I thought this was a WONDERFUL experience. I highly recommend Kenneth’s workshops, whether you are a professional photog or only have some experience and want to learn some of the finer points of photographing people. The classes are small and intimate, and he’s a blast to listen to. And if you are a wedding photographer, I recommend you look into Kenneth’s Wedding School. It’s an intensive three-day workshop that focuses on technique, business strategy, marketing, and everything else that makes for a phenomenal wedding experience. He did one earlier this year, and it looks like he is doing another one this November.
You can bet I will be there, front and center!
---
There's an increasing trend in wedding photography both in and outside of Utah to include the groom in the traditional pre-wedding bridal shoot. It appears that the old superstition of it being bad luck to see the bride in her dress before the wedding is fading. As a photographer, I love this! It's a great opportunity to get photos of the bride and groom in a comfortable setting, at a time of the day with good natural light, and in different and fun locations. The couple isn't stressed about making it to the luncheon / dinner / reception, there isn't a huge and distracting crowd of people behind me with cameras of their own, and we can often bring along lighting equipment and other setups that aren't as practical on the wedding day.
The problem is, what should I call the photos??? The bridal photos are almost universally known simply as "Bridals". However, when you throw a groom in the mix, it's really not just a "Bridal" shoot anymore. Several photographers I know and other photogs I see around the internet have taken to use the word "Groomals". Other photographers label the pictures as a "Bride and Groom" shoot. I, along with a few others, usually label them "Formals".
What should it be? What sounds the best, and what describes the pictures most clearly? As a wedding photographer I want to be able to label photos in a way that is easily understood. When you see the word "Formals", does it convey what the shoot is about, or does it conjure up images of stilted prom photos in front of an ugly backdrop? "Groomals" seems to be the most common, but it just sounds weird to me. "Bride and Groom" could work as a category, but it doesn't really seem specific enough.
Let your opinion be known! Rock out on the poll and elaborate on your vote in the comments. I'd love to hear what seems the most natural and intuitive label.
-