kristin & tam's engagement at hatley castle in victoria

When I first got together with these two several months ago, we chatted and chatted and chatted, and before I knew it, it had been over 2 1/2 hours! Suffice to say, Kristin & Tam are a couple of pretty cool, nice, fun people who are a pleasure to be around, and I can't wait for their wedding in just a few weeks time! During that first get together, Tam mentioned his special baby, an older Volkswagon that he's done up, and I made sure we were going to include it in some of the photos in their e-session. We spent most of that afternoon in the lush gardens of Hatley Castle, and finished off the night with some flash and light painting photography at Caddy Bay beach, home of the famous Casborosaurus ( which we made sure to include in the pics! ). By the end of the night, Kristin was just pumped, "That was so fun! Can we do it again tomorrow?". Yeah it was, I love my job!

 Above: a 54 image "Brenizer Method" of Kristin and Tam in front of the historic castle.

Above: Another freelensing shot with my 70-200, it's interesting how the light leak gives the photo a "retro" cast.

 
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alison & brendan's engagement in downtown victoria

It's so nice when the weather cooperates in April, and despite it being chilly, we couldn't have asked for a better evening for Alison & Brendan's engagement in downtown Victoria. Current Vancouverites, Alison loves Victoria and knew they wanted to make the trip over on a weekend for their session. Alison's dad was kind enough to put together a beautiful wooden ampersand for their wedding day and it made for an awesome prop during the engagement session ( previously I never knew what this funny little symbol was called despite my daily use of it! ) and fit in beautifully when you consider that Alison is a librarian. Come this summer I'll be making the trip to Van for their wedding on a retired BC ferry turned event venue, so pumped for that! Check out their e session below. Thanks to Nick Van Iersel for his help on this shoot!

luke and krystina's engagement at pacheena bay

What would you do if you were getting married, and the guy who'd you'd normally have shoot your photos also happens to be one of your best friends, and consequently, one of your groomsmen? If you're Luke, you ask your photographer friend if he knows a guy, and that guy happened to be me. Yes, Luke is good friends with my buddy and regular partner in crime Shane, and after meeting with Luke and Krystina I could see why Luke and Shane were such good buddies. Like Shane, Luke keeps it real, tells it how it is, knows what he likes, but is still soft spoken in doing so. And Krystina is that sweet touch to Luke, caring and enthusiastic, and when they're together, it's pretty obvious they're two peas in a pod.

When we got together at their house, I noticed a large picture on the wall of a beach, what appeared to be one from the west coast. I asked them about it and they were happy to share their love for Pacheena Bay on the west coast of the island. It was obvious right from the get go that we needed to go their for their photos, and although it nearly didn't happen, the weather co-operated and we made the three hour journey to this wonderful, quiet beach a few Saturdays ago.

I had never tried freelensing with my 70-200 before, it's tough! I had one image I liked with it though...

Their special log that has their names engraved on it...

elsa & adam's engagement in downtown victoria

Smiles and laughs. They're constant and contagious around Adam & Elsa, as was evident from the day we met. These two are just plain fun, and tie in to that the fact that Adam owns a Qoola ( the most awesome new business to hit Victoria in years and the best and healthiest option to ice cream ever ) and their engagement session was Sweet! ( Zing! Yes, I pun'd that )

We started off downtown at one of their favourite haunts, Habit Coffee, before a quick stop at Government House, the breakwater, a delicious burger dinner and some light painting fun at Fisherman's Wharf. Elsa was freezing for the whole evening but she toughed it out and I'm so glad she did! April is not warm in Victoria when you're by the water that's for sure!

simpson family

Many of us have old family photos lying around that we love to cherish and laugh at, the latter because of the joys of past fashion trends. When Farrah contacted me about doing photos for her family as a surprise gift to her mother in law, she mentioned re-creating a particular family photo from when her husband and his brother and sister were quite young. It wasn't a big thing, but it was a cool way to add a unique touch to the family session and something I plan on doing with my own family!

We went to Beacon Hill Park on a beautiful day and made these images, hopefully someone can laugh at them in twenty years and try and recreate them.

The original:

 

lisa & tom's engagement

A few weeks ago I had the chance to get together with Lisa and Tom for the afternoon for their engagement session. These two are STYLISH, and I knew after we met that we'd be bringing a little more edginess to their images to match their sweet styles. Poor Lisa was freezing in the Victoria March weather, but she persevered and I'm so glad we took some time to shoot in the evening once we started losing the sun. If you look closely you'll even see that the Bat-Symbol made an appearence in one of the shots! Check out the whole session from Hatley Castle and the very cosmopolitan Uptown Shopping Centre!

 

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jamie & ellen's mt. washington engagement

Back in the blog saddle after a fantastic few days away in Las Vegas staffing at the Genesis Workshop and enjoying time with many people I admire. I gotta admit, I'm jealous of the sunshine that people on that part of the continent get to experience daily, but more details will be in another post.

I'm pumped to share my session with Ellen & Jamie, it was so unique and so fun. These two work at a CHOCOLATE factory on the mainland, and the first time I met them they mentioned wanting to use Jamie's family's cabin at Mt. Washington for the photos. I have to preface this, I LOVE it when couples have ideas about where they want to go, or for a specific theme or idea for their photos. It lets them personalize the images and really take ownership of making them happen. This cabin has been in Jamie's family since before the resort was built at Mt. Washington, and it's one big honkin' piece of character on the side of a ski hill.

And no, this is no cookie cutter luxury home built on some exotic spot therefore earning it the title of "Cabin", this is a real, wood beam, wood burning fireplace cool-as-a-cucumber kinda home, and it happens to have a lot of snow around it. We took advantage of it with puzzles, cookies, jumping off the balcony, skiing, climbing and whatever else we could think of while we were there. We made a day of it. After many hours of shooting, we enjoyed dinner together and lots of awesome conversation, and Jamie's interest in photography became very evident. Before I knew it, it was nearly 11PM and I had a 3 hour drive home that night ( not helped by the crazy fog that literally gave me 8 feet of visibility while driving down the mountain at 5 km/h.

We had a blast, and I think the images show it, and I'm proud of that. Enjoy.