there was just no way for me to narrow down shoots to “just one favorite” from them… so sit back and enjoy this. and this is set to complete random mode for your further enjoyment and to keep your eyes on their toes. or your toes on their eyes. or something…

i went into 2011 completely unsure of what was to come. i come out of it completely surprised. i go into 2012 with a couple of new tricks up my sleeve, a couple of definite goals and open arms for even more of what 2011 brought.

here’s to a fantastic year for all of you, whatever it may bring… may it be good! happy new year, and thanks for everything y’all have done for me.

here it is. did you do a little drumroll? oh wait… i forgot to tell you. you can do one now. briefly. cuz you might be looking at the bean already…

i mean. look at it! so so cool. let’s see it from another angle, shall we? we shall…

i could do that all day. but after we were there for some time, we headed off to some nearby places katelyn and i spotted on our quick scouting jaunt.

the best yellow-leafed tree i saw? on an island in the middle of the street. like i said, they were game for anything and everything…

and then we switched places…

as we walked to our next little spot, there were all these couples dancing. maybe a class? not sure. but come on… how could we not?

i often talk about how i dance with the light when i am taking photographs. whether it’s the lights at a concert, or the sun through the trees. another thing my female clients will hear a lot (if we’re shooting outside) is me talking to the wind. no… not like pocohontas. but when the wind is doing its own little dance with my subject’s hair… it can become another one of those truly magical things in a photograph:

as we walked back to the car to head off to our final location, we found one more section of millenium park as well.

and off we went to catch the last bit of sunlight (and the last hour of time before katelyn and i had to be at the airport) at a skatepark. yes. a skatepark. seth is involved with the building of skateparks. so when we originally talked about this TTD session, i was excited that they agreed that skating would be a fantastic inclusion to our time together.

i usually separate things out more when i shoot in this style. but because of the action and the motion, i like how the more clustered feel is on this:

even this was not easy… but seth pulled it off.

in case you missed it, seth and michelle even modeled this bomber hat that i had for betabrand. if you click on the link it will take you right to the page with them on the internet… as models! woo! but here they are in all their glory for your viewing as well:

one last shot from the skatepark, though…

all of my trash the dress sessions this year have been awesome. they have all been so unique and had a good personal touch to them for either the wedding itself, or for the couple. this day was no exception. i feel like this embodied these two as a couple, for where they were married and as individuals as well.

thanks again to michelle and seth for an amazing weekend and a truly fantastic “trashing of the dress” on the day after. you two are brilliant!

we had other plans originally for this session, but we ended up back at what is starting to become my “home studio”, the salton sea. we were mainly targeting a place called salvation mountain, actually. so that is where this all begins.

as we started to head off from the mountain to explore some other places along the salton sea, all of the beams of sunlight through the stormclouds were phenomenal.

i’ll take abandoned warehouses for the win, alex.

sometimes, the jump can be even more about the moment just before or after:

another good and successful trip out to one of my favorite places in the state. stay tuned if you like these from that area… looks like i may be going back again in december or january  :)

thanks again for scheduling this extra session with me, you two. i hope you love what we got from the journey out there!

i will give more detail on their little sneak peek from their wedding… but this all took place on harbour island in the bahamas. after an hour or so of scouting for places to do this session, we didn’t even have time to get to half of them. the small island was a goldmine of cool locations. but, here are my personal faves from the time we spent:

so this tree, where we started, is clearly something that will be an “urban legend” on the island. i think i heard three different versions of stories as to how it arrived there, on the beach. this stretch of beach it is on is perfect for it, too. the water will be up around the tree during the more high tide, and it will be all sand like this during low tide. (in future blog posts, you will see the other versions of this)

we took leave from the tree (get it? took leave… oh man… do i need coffee…) and headed out for some of the local color…

as we left the little scene we were creating on that corner (it is fun when a bunch of people stop to watch you shooting… but i know it can be intimidating or embarrassing for the model/bride, too), we drove past a little ice cream shop and turned back as gina said how long it had been since she had ice cream. when i say “little ice cream shop”, i mean it was someone making it out of part of their house. we had three flavors to choose from, and strawberry seemed the way to go.

i love these next shots. there was a family (and others just on the street) across the way peeking their heads out through their front door watching us. made for some great expressions on gina’s face:

as the sun was about to set, we headed back to the shoreline. unfortunately, there was a cloud cover above the horizon that kind of killed what had been beautiful sunsets that week. but we got some great light and color still:

again, there will be a lot more to come from my week in the bahamas for gina’s wedding with adam. so stay tuned….

so this TTD session ended up being a little different from the norm in two ways. these won’t always have the couple involved, normally focus more on the new bride. and because of where we were and how much traveling we had to do from spot to spot, the actual dress was only featured at the beginning… and the shoot became more of a couples’ romantic shoot from there on.

let’s get started. this first building, just before we began for the day, a guy drove up and i chatted with him for a few minutes. he told me he would be coming out here in a matter of days to tear this structure down. another reason why this area is constantly changing.

for any of you who saw my work from a session with michelle out here from last month, you will get more of a feel for the constant flux of this area from this next set of shots as well. my previous visit was at the beginning of the december rainfall, and this whole area was full of water and mud. so i had no idea that in the dry period, it is like this: covered in salt and looking much like snow.

j & j changed their clothes and we headed back to the road to something jay spotted during our drive to this last location. this was a fantastic find and worked perfectly with my scheme to “shoot big” that day.

thus ends another fun day with clients / new friends. thanks again to the newly (and very happy) weds! you both did awesome and it was great to hang out more with you. i wish you both all that happiness has to offer in every aspect of your lives. hopefully our paths will cross again.

and, jay… maybe we will be rooting against one another this winter if the sox and phils meet in the world series   :)

** for those of you wondering (especially you brides), trashing the dress does not mean actually trashing the dress. basically, it’s taking advantage of the fact that you have worn your gown on your wedding day, crisp and clean and new… and you have not yet taken it to be cleaned and stored. so, why not make the cleaners work a little extra hard perhaps, and get your dress in the sand of the beach, dust of the field, what have you. **

now, remember… 25 comments on this posting awards the happy couple with 2 free 5×7 prints of their choice. so leave them a little love, won’t ya?

we did this shoot on saturday and i just wanted to pull a few of  my faves from the day before i get back into editing.

again… big congratulations to you both, karen & nick. i wish you both the best as your lives continue together. i had a great time this weekend with you. and give your little dog sarah a big kiss for me.   :)

my wife’s wedding gown is still hanging in plastic in our closet… it has not gone to the cleaners yet. so, just a few weeks before our wedding anniversary, we decided to go off to one of my favorite places to shoot. my magical tree spot   :)

i need to applaud my wife… she was quite the trooper out there. this place is clearly not the most fun place to be, in a wedding gown, during the recent So Cal heatwave. she totally pulled it off (said in as much of an un-biased way as possible).

it was quite sunny out, so once we escaped the shade of the trees it was almost impossible to tolerate the sun for long. i plan on going back to this part of the site for sure when the sun is not so high.

one week from today is actually our anniversary, so these have a little more meaning for me. maybe next time we will bring our little girl into the photos as well. i cannot thank my wife enough for not only the daily putting up with a buffoon like me (that is a combo word of “buff babboon”, right?), but for getting herself all glammed out and being a champ through this photo shoot. i love you!!   :)

before we even got to the beach, we took a few shots off (and on) PCH.

this was a happy little accident. i was crossing behind them and had my camera at my hip and just decided to lift it and shoot wildly.

i sent them down to the sand with some vague instructions while waiting to take some shots from afar.

i joined them down on the beach shortly after…

as a photographer, i get all giddy when a bride is willing to get her dress sandy “for the cause”.

this beach had some fantastic and funky little niches to shoot in and around.

sean drew this gigantic heart for them to stand in. unfortunately, the tide kept washing it away.

we returned to where they were staying that first night. they were such good sports, they stood out in the street for a while to make this shot work. not as much traffic in that spot as i had hoped for. but they were loving it because of how many people gave them the “car honk of congratulation” as they passed. who doesn’t love that?

a couple final shots and it was a wrap…

they were so much fun to spend the day with and i was fortunate to have had the opportunity to work with them.

again, i wish you two a life full of happiness and love. from the look of your first hours as husband and wife, there will be no shortage of either!  :)