I met up with Melissa and Ryan this morning for their engagement session at Nisene Marks in Aptos – an absolute gorgeous redwood forest popular with runners and bikers alike. Aptos was its typical foggy self, so I postponed our 10am shoot by an hour just to get things a little brighter. The sun never came out, but the atmosphere for natural light was really gorgeous. But if you follow my work, you know I usually include off-camera light as well – the trick is to keep it looking natural and not, well, flash-y. 8 of the 26 photos below are using un-natural light, can you tell which ones?
Being UCSC grads, Pat and Carol decided to have their engagement photo session on the Santa Cruz wharf. I've never shot an engagement here, so it was quite fun to explore the creative opportunities here. I'll be honest – it's not the cleanest or best-smelling location, but it's got character, and these two are a lot of fun to hang out with. Enjoy a few photos below!
I have to say this was a first for me – Alex just happened to have a bunch of rope in his truck, so we acted out a little fantasy – rescuing the tied up damsel in distress from the railroad tracks. Before you collectively freak out, dear internet, this is an unused track – not a dangerous situation. Anyways, we could't decide if Alex would play villain or savior, it's really a matter of what order I show the photos (tying her up first... or reverse to show un-tying). For the sake of this blog post and because he is her fiance, we'll stick with the savior story. Even though we ended the shoot with the role-playing, I wanted to show you those photos first.
