Matt and Fiona

Carlsbad Beach and Carlsbad Coaster Station - Carlsbad, CA

Matt and girlfriend Fiona were quite the obliging rockstars when they decided to do this little shoot with me up in Carlsbad. They had the idea that it would be an ANTM shoot for a bit, (that’s America’s Next Top Model for those not in the know – I don’t watch the show, you have to be believe me, I swear – Tone taught me that acronym.. sorry Tone I just called you out)... but, it was that and a bit of just plain old shooting for the sake of good practice. Matt was my roommate back at Flandskate for a few years… The guy is like a brother to me, so I will say that it was a bit weird to have to direct him to “okay kiss” Fiona at the appropriate photo-moment.. ah, what we would do for “the shot”… Check out what we got!

The laughter from the last picture was golden – all resulting from my direction “okay, look sexy…” umm, well that’s just way too easy now isn’t it…

See, this next one, complete ANTM material. No question.

Next one is one of their favorites, I kinda like it too – got the mysterious, but not so mysterious vibe goin on… now that’s sexy…

Alright kids, cover your eyes! Even more sexiness follows…

Way too much fun and some really good practice (and lots of sexiness too!). I was glad that we were able to save the shoot with some nighttime train station action, cuz we ran out of light right when we started the beach scenes... It worked out pretty well actually!

They were really helpful with poses and I was really thankful that they were willing volunteers for this practice session… Now I’m a Pro Nighttime-Carlsbad-Train-Station-Matt-and-Fiona Shooter! Just kiddin.. really, it helped a lot… I got to figure more about directing and even got to find what I’m lookin for in future shoots like this… Thanks Matt and Fiona!!!

Wedding - Journee and Judy

Judy and Journee’s homes and Our Lady of Mt. Carmel - San Diego, CA

Journee and Judy seemed pretty calm cool and collected… But, after the smiles that they had AFTER the ceremony was over, maybe they were more anxious than calm. Jasmine Marie and I arrived at Journee’s house at the crack of dawn to capture the guys getting ready. Extremely kind and hospitable the whole way through, you can tell he had a real genuine heart. He even congratulated me on my engagement – dude, it’s YOUR wedding day! Congratulations to YOU!!!! Well, it was no surprise to find that Judy was equally sweet.

Thank you to Ohana Photography (David and Kimi) for allowing me to come along to shoot and to learn. Their style is unparalleled, one that is all their own, and no doubt (foreal) one of my legitimate personal favorites. AND - It is definitely always a fun time with the Baxters. I swear, if I’m not laughing and tearing up from laughter when Kim is talkin – then the world has frozen over. Hilarious!! It just makes the whole experience more fun. And besides, you have to laugh – you’ll live longer! Well, on to the pics! Enjoy!

I don’t think that I ever would have take a guy shoe shot, but…

The guys were lookin fresh and clean, but Judy was a complete Rockstar..

Chinese Tea Ceremony...

But first, the girls made the guys wait outside and “earn” their way in…

The fresh kicks in action..

Okay, now the ceremony can begin…

Now, onto church…

Here come those big smiles…

I was unfortunately unable to make it out to the rest of the day and so I missed the formals and the reception… boo. But, I had a ton of fun and it made it really easy when you work with a really easy going and sweet couple… I also learned a bit about the potential shooting differences I may face inside of a church – just means I need to get some new glass!! Haha – or at least rent some anyways…

Thank you soooo much to Ohana Photography (David and Kimi) for everything… I consider myself REALLY blessed to have photographers that are literally at the top of the game that allow me to come along to shoot and learn. I know that it goes miles and miles for my own expereince...

Our Invitations

One part “work” party, two parts fun times…

Well – here they are! Our invitations, well at least the start of them anyways… A lot of it was a whole day of work, work, and work for a few good (and very giving/sacrificing) friends and some members of our really supportive bridal party... But, more than that – it was a lot of fun times…

And here is the crew that Vaness and I must give many many thank yous to… Starting with Darcie our “envelope-embossing-stamp-expert”…

Here is D.Alaba, Dennis, my best man, using his funnel invention to precisely layout all the gold “dust” necessary for that 3-D effect…

My very good friend, Adam – our happiest worker – mostly due to the great cooking that Vaness’s mom provided for the party!

And of course, his loving wife, Jasmine, whom many of the hand-made ideas of our invitations were inspired from! Thanks Jaz!

Our next crew member, Vaness’s maid of honor, long time friend, and bay-area native at heart, Ginger…

And here she is with Marilou, another one of Vaness’s long-time friends and purveyor of all bay-area vocabulary. Unfortunately, she became the one I “picked on” during our “work” party whenever I fell behind in the assembly line – I needed to deflect! Plus it was too easy! Sorry Marilou!

Here is a very good example – a story VERY ACCURATELY TOLD by my camera’s point of view… Marilou is working on cutting ribbons along with another one of our crew and our good friend Richard, winner of the most precise and supreme maker of invitations and all things involving stationary. Richard's work style, very neat and clean.. Marilou, well, let's just say she had her equally effective way... Observe, as the story unfolds from left to right…

The possible captions are endless! I’ll just leave it for you to make the story… Finally we are joined by Chris, my good friend from High School, and his Fiancee Lisa… I swear they were happy! They were just concentrating on working really hard in the short time they had!

Of course, a shot of my very beautiful Fiancee doing her part to help, taking time from her duties as boss and director of the show… We called her the boss the whole day, but it was only because she had everything so well organized and together!!!

Here are the shots of some of the parts of the final product as the night progressed…

And the final product (minus the embossing done on the seal of the encasing envelope)…

As you may be able to tell, Vaness is very, very happy with the way they turned out! (I am too!!)

Vaness and I are extremely grateful for the bridal party that we have. It is an amazing thing to know that we have the support of our family AND friends in our marriage. Making the invitations was actually a lot of work and in the end they turned out really well – considering it was pretty much done entirely by manual labor!!! For us though, it actually turned out to be a good time where some of our friends were able to meet each other and spend time together.

A huge thank you to Darcie, Dennis, Adam, Jasmine, Richard, Ginger, Marilou, Chris, and Lisa for all your hard work… It really means a lot to us. We hope you had fun!