My Blog

Mission Savvy | Eco-Friendly Online Fashion Boutique

Over the last few months I've had the privilege of being a part of an exciting, eco-friendly online fashion store. When Jennifer first contacted me, I had to think on her proposal for a few days because until recently I'd been strictly an on-location, natural light photographer. I had some lighting equipment already because it's necessary to be prepared at weddings. But what Jennifer wanted from me required more. Thanks to the generosity of a friend/former boss, I was able to secure the space I needed to pull off the Mission Savvy inventory shoot.

I bought some Alien Bees lighting equipment, made trips to my local home improvement store and photo store, and voila! Studio setup.

But while I'm proud to have stepped out of my natural-light comfort zone, I'm even more excited about getting the word out about this truly fantastic company. The clothes and accessories are all environmentally friendly. Did you know that cotton is the most toxic crop in the world? The industrial side of clothing production is pretty scary. A lot of the clothes Mission Savvy have for sale are made with organic cotton, but there's also sustainable bamboo and modal in the mix. Jennifer is working with eight designers, most of whom live and produce their clothing in the US.

When I first met with Jennifer Miller, all I really learned from her is that she used to rescue parrots in Massachusetts.

I was intrigued.

Then I started to read the press coming out about Mission Savvy and I learned so much more about Jennifer - she's studied avian behavior, worked with orangutans, and traveled all over the world rescuing animals. And now she's using her passion for fashion as a way to spread awareness about animal welfare issues. Her story is a really inspiring one.

I am so deeply proud to be a part of this company and all that it stands for. Please take a few minutes if you can to go poke around the Mission Savvy site/store to see more clothes and read more about the different animal issues Jennifer is addressing.

(And yes, if you think you recognize the gorgeous and adorable model in these shots, it's because you probably do - Alex was one of my senior reps this year and I still can't get enough of the photos we shot last summer! I'm not sure if I'll ever be able to have a blog header without her..)

Ellie | 2010 George Washington High School Senior | Charleston, WV

Ellie's photos are the first of a slew of blog posts I am soooo excited to share!!

When we were first scheduling Ellie's session, we picked a random date before Christmas in hopes that Ellie could get some snowy but non-Christmasy photos. As it turned out, it snowed so much the weekend of her session that I couldn't even get out of my driveway! Little did we know that this was this first of many blizzards in store for us this year.

We shot these photos around Ellie's house and neighborhood. And I was verrrry excited to meet Ellie's gorgeous cat, Belle, who managed to sneak her way into some of the photos -- I love cats.

And here's Belle, the most beautiful and docile cat ever:

Katherine & Sami

One of the coolest things about my job is when I get to work with people I'm already friends with.

I've been close to Sami for almost five years. Our friendship has gone through a lot and at this point I consider him one of my very closest friends in the whole world. So the first time I met Katherine I was thrilled because she's not only just completely amazing and unique herself, but she also is such a compliment to Sami.

Sami's socks are always crazy and mismatched and he shares my love of short doses of things - TV shows instead of movies, short stories instead of novels. He loves jazz. And probably once every few months he'll message me asking for my photoshop "expertise" in making some crazy graphic for a tshirt. Once it was Sarah Palin's face superimposed on a daisy. Most recently he asked me to photoshop a cape onto a picture of Ronald Reagan on a horse.

Their apartment is full of bookcases. Some of them are filled entirely with books on learning different languages because Katherine's brain must always be taking in new information. She studies for fun. Katherine speaks with a thick New York accent and every time I visit her I get treated to the most wonderful of facial masks.

Last spring, we shot a noir-inspired photoshoot for the hell of it. It was a completely different sort of project for me and I still can't believe how much fun we had and how proud I still am of our photos.

Bobby and I drove up to DC to visit them this weekend and shoot their engagement session. Since DC got hammered with snow a few weeks back, there were still mountains of it all over the city and it was getting pretty dirty. I suggested using a museum as a location for their session and they mentioned the Hirshhorn Museum. It was great because there were obviously awesome backdrops for photos. But anyone can stick a subject in front of a gorgeous piece of art and take a photo, so I tried to push myself further and work with them to create a set of photos that weren't just a bunch of shots of two people smiling in front of pretty art. I think we did a pretty good job.

Here are some of their final photos. They make me smile. I hope they make you smile, too.

Sami and Katherine -- I love you guys!!! Thank you so much for being such great friends and letting me be the one to document such a truly special time in your lives. I can't wait for your wedding in May!!

 

2009 in Review - The Portraits

It goes without saying that this blog post is long, long, lonnnggg overdue.

My last year in review was a pretty intense post, so I will make the commentary on this one short and sweet!

I took almost 100,000 photos in 2009, so narrowing all of those down to my favorite 40ish was really hard.

Here are some seniors:

 

Some animals:

Some families/babies:

 

 

Some musicians/headshots:

This is my dad... I could go on and on about how wonderful this man is and how lucky I am to have such a fantastic father-

Oooh la la, boudoir:

And some photos of friends I love dearly-

From a really fun noir-themed shoot I did with my best friends-

This is one of my top 3 favorite photos I took in 2009-

And, finally, two shots of me and Bobby. I love this man. I love every minute I spend with him. These two photos fill my heart with so much happiness. :)

There you have it -- some of my favorite portraits from 2009. I've already started shooting some favorites for 2010 -- I will start sharing those soon!

 

 

Amanda & Tyler | Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden, Richmond VA

To say I'm excited to share these photos is an understatement.

Amanda and Tyler were a dream to work with from day one. I remember having warm fuzzies after our initial consultation because I knew we were going to get along so well - Amanda is very animated and chatty, just like me!

The day of the wedding was unusually cold for early October. Menacing storm clouds loomed in the distance during most of the day. It was a little nerve-wracking (who wants it to rain on their photos and outdoor ceremony?) but Amanda was so laid back about it all. It never did rain on us, and the dark skies made for some really awesome photos. The temperature was a little on the nippy side (right around 40 degrees F, if I remember correctly), but Amanda insisted that she wasn't cold and I never heard her complain once. In fact, she spent most of the day giggling.

I think once you reach the end of this post you'll understand what I mean when I say that Amanda's very animated facial expressions made for some great photos. When I was editing these photos I burst out laughing a few times! During the ceremony, she started laughing and crying at the same time. It was a really sweet moment.

Ok, I could go on and on about these two, but I think the photos speak for themselves - these two are so so so adorable together and clearly very in love, see for yourself!

Oh, and Amanda and Tyler got married at the Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden in Richmond, VA - it was beautiful!

 

Amanda and Tyler did a First Look before the ceremony -- as always, it was a really special moment.

I always love when people take a few steps back to really take in how beautiful/handsome they're looking:

This just makes me smile-

 

One of my very favorites of the day:

I loved how dark the sky was when we stepped out of the greenhouse:

 

Ok.

Here's the part of the post I've been debating about sharing for weeks and weeks now. In the next set of photos, Amanda is clearly cracking up. The story goes something like this-

It was really pretty cold considering what those beautiful ladies were wearing... so it was extra challenging to get genuine smiles out of them... So...

I yelled "PENIS". Yeah, I just went there.

Part of my job is to make sure that the smiles people give me aren't just the fake, generic, "there's a camera pointed at my face" smiles we so often see. I've done a pretty good job of developing my "Fakesmile-dar", so sometimes I just know that I have to work a little harder. With little kids, I usually talk about farts. With these gals, I went with a reproductive organ. This method doesn't work for everyone, so don't worry, I'm not going to be shouting out the names of reproductive organs at your wedding, but in this situation I did what I had to do.

Amanda's laugh-cry that I mentioned above:

 

Congratulations, Amanda and Tyler!! I'm so happy I got to work with you and experience all the joy you bring to each other and the people you love. Thank you for letting me be a part of such an important day!! :)

 

Winter Special for 2010 Seniors!

 

Bridal expo!

Hello everyone!

I am updating from my phone because my Internet has been out all evening.

Today I had a booth at the bridal expo here in Charleston. It was a blast! I met so many wonderful people and I am really excited about some of the potential weddings on my plate.

If I we talked at the show, feel free to drop me a note so we can talk more. Even if you picked a date I've already booked, I can probably help you to find another photographer.

Thanks to everyone who stopped by!!! It was an exhausting day but worth every minute of it.

2009 in review - Part one

I think everyone probably goes through a handful of really, really transformational years in their lifetime.

2009 was one of those years for me.

With all the happiness that has come with 2009, there has also been darkness.

At this time last year I was learning how to live alone - how to be alone - after being in a relationship with someone for over four years. Also, my family changed in a very difficult and painful way, and it's something we are all dealing with every day. No one died, no one is in a coma, we're all healthy - but our lives have changed and it's definitely been a hard transition.

But the most important parts of this year were the happy parts.

This April, I sat down with my boss at my day job and I gave my two weeks notice. I wasn't going to work anywhere else - I was going to work for myself.


When I was in college, I remember vividly one Halloween where some friends and I went to a fortune teller. The woman said a lot of very accurate things about me and my life (which was strange in and of itself), and then she told me that my purpose in life is joy. I was still at a point in my life where I was desperately searching to figure out who I was, but I knew I wasn't really all that happy, so having this stranger tell me that my purpose in life was to be joyful and share joy with others -- it shook me up. For some reason, it really, really upset me. To this day, I still get tearful thinking about it, probably because at the time the idea felt so foreign to me. I wasn't happy myself, so how could I possibly be a little joy machine for the world?

It makes sense now.

I really, truly love what I do. I love getting to know the people I work with and capturing them in all their happiness and love. Through my clients, my wonderful wonderful clients, I saw another side to love that I'd never really seen before. Love is so different for everyone, every person and every relationship interprets it differently. So every couple I worked with this year showed me another side to love.

There's really nothing like being a wedding photographer. For one day you are a part of two families, and you get to see them ride a rollercoaster of emotions and everyone looks beautiful because everyone is beautiful, and even if it's 100 degrees or even if it's 30 degrees, underneath the sweat or the shivers, everyone is happy.

This year has been intense.

On top of everything else that happened this year, I also lost 70 pounds. I ate better, went to some Weight Watchers meetings, but most importantly I sweated off a lot of stress and negativity at the gym. Sure, I've gained a few pounds back here over the holidays, but I know I have it in me now to finish what I started. If you have a significant amount of weight to lose and feel defeated, if you feel overwhelmed - you can do it. Start small. Set really small goals. You don't have to drink all the water and eat perfectly and work out 5 times a week straight out of the gate. Start small. Don't hate yourself if you eat a bunch of donuts one day, because you can't go back in time and change it and all that guilt and shame just makes it easier to eat more donuts. I could talk for days about this, so I'll stop here, but just know that if this paragraph resonates with you, you are not alone, and it is not impossible to lose a lot of weight, and it's ok to make mistakes along the way.

 

 

This is a very long introduction to the photos I'm about to share, but it felt necessary.

I took 96,366 photos in 2009, shot 22 weddings, and had roughly 60 portrait sessions. Here are some photos from some of the engagement & bridal sessions and weddings I shot last year. Photos from the portrait sessions will be posted sometime in the next few days. 


 

 

This was my first year shooting weddings. If I could teleport around the world to hug all of the couples I worked with right now, I would. Thank you for trusting my vision and working with me, and thank you for being patient as I learned my way this year.

If you hired me to be a part of your wedding - thank you. If you hired me to take portraits of you, or your children, or your pets - thank you.

If you emailed me or clicked the 'like' button or commented on facebook - thank you.

If you told someone about me and the photos I make - thank you.

I can't thank you enough for all your love and support. I know how busy you all are, so even if you've never said a word but you keep coming back to look at what I've been doing, that really means the world to me.

Thank you, all of you. (Especially to my wonderfully supportive and patient boyfriend and parents/family who had to hear me talk nonstop about my business all year!! I love you guys!!)

2010? Bring it on.

 

Albums, albums, and more albums!

I've gotten SO many gorgeous albums in the mail recently. I think I literally let out a squeal whenever a shipment notification pops up in my inbox from my favorite album vendor (Finao!).

Here are a few of the ones I've received in recent weeks:

I love love love this sapphire silk brocade:

I hope you guys are all ready for the best holiday ever -- Christmas!!!

 

I'll make a whole post about this hopefully tomorrow, but I wanted to mention that you guys made a huge impact in the Cans for Comments drive! I'll be donating a whopping 86 cans of food thanks to you! Once I take photos of all the cans I will write up a whole post, though. :)

 

Dipa + Brian | Wedding at the Confluence in Fayetteville WV

Dipa and Brian got married on an unusually chilly October day in Fayetteville, WV.

This was my 2nd time shooting at the wonderful Confluence Resort. I always have a great time at the Confluence. If you are in WV looking for a wedding venue that is beautiful and flexible, look no further.

Anyway, despite how chilly it got, Dipa and Brian were all smiles all day long.

 

After the toasts were made and the pies were cut, Dipa thought it would be fun for everyone to experience a traditional indian folk dance known as the dandiya raas. It was so much fun watching the guests get into it.

This was one of my absolute favorite weddings of the year - the colors and the warm spirits of everyone present made for a memorable and beautiful day.

Thank you so much for having me be a part of it, Dipa and Brian!! :)