Lauren and Don came up from SC to Waxhaw for their engagement session. They are two really happy, fun-loving people! Don is from Australia (cool accent and all!), so naturally I had to tell him that those guys “down under” sure know a thing or two about wedding photography! They are constantly winning wedding album of the year, year after year, at WPPI in Vegas. So, I am honored to shoot Lauren and Don’s wedding that is coming up in May!

They actually picked a photographer that provided them a not so great experience for the bridal and engagement sessions, so they were looking for something a little more artistic and fun this time around! I really tried to get them some cool stuff to make up for the first bad experience!

Hope you guys find some images you love from your engagement session with me!

I love these black and whites right outside the alley way…

We made the most out of downtown Waxhaw, then headed out to an old abandoned farmhouse!

The rusted barn is really popping! This ended up being one of my favorite sets…

After hitting up the wooden barn, we checked out the tracks!

We were rushing to get just a few shots on the train tracks so we would have enough daylight to go to one more spot…I hadn’t ever shot here before, so I wanted to try ending on something a little different…

The field was cool, but whats coming up might even top these…

I think it worked! The last location was really cool! I loved the shots we were able to get…the angle/perspective was really kicking for those silhouettes, the sun was setting right behind them. Lauren and Don were so fun, and such troopers!

Props to Don for going through two engagement sessions all in the quest for some great photos! Hope you guys found what you were looking for here!

I can’t wait for the bridal and wedding!

Shenna and Todd met up with me at Freedom Park a few Sundays back…but as soon as we got there it was a mad house! There was no place to park and kids were running wildly around all over the place. Vendors were set up selling stuff, and even the news crew was there. It was cute don’t get me wrong, but wayyy too crowded for an engagement session!

Shenna made an awesome suggestion, and we were headed off to another park just down the street. We got great shots on some of the bridges in the park, and we were even able to find a few cool trees where I decided to play around with a few sun flare shots!

Good call Shenna!

Next we ventured into uptown Charlotte where we stopped by this simple wall to take a few fun wide angle shots!

We made a good attempt to make the usual uptown places to shoot look anything but like the usual shots you see there… Shenna and Todd are getting married in Charleston, SC so I can’t wait to travel down for their wedding coming up May 29th!

I like the reflection from the wall here…we stopped here pretty quickly so we were out of the way of other photographers who were posing a couple under the Ratcliff Flowers sign…

I found out Todd has a Canon Digital Rebel so I probably talked to them too much about photography…Sorry!

WARNING CAMERA GEEK TALK (for photographers) FOUND BELOW: /end warning

Todd asked me a question about wide angle lenses so I recommended him to check out the Canon 10-22 EF-S lens, which is an awesome wide angle lens for the Rebel (works with all Canon crop cameras…1.3 crop (1D series) and full frame (1Ds & 5D) need to get the Canon 16-35L). My grandfather also has the Sigma 10-20mm super wide for Rebels and other crop sensor cameras, and he seems really happy with it. Also it should be a few hundred dollars cheaper to get the same effect…oh man there i go again…talking too much about photography! Back to some cool photos!

/end camera geek talk

Rocking the ivy and digging the sun flare!

I had to throw in one more photo from the first park Shenna recommended we check out! I am SUCH a sucker for ivy & sun flare in photos! They look even cooler together! I think there is something about having to break the rules and having to just get lucky with a few shots that makes those sun flare shots seem even cooler to photographers!

We also took some fun stuff by the new art museum in Charlotte, but I had to end this post with a silhouette instead!

I met up with Ashley and Chris in Augusta for an awesome engagement session a few weekends back! I didn’t know it, but it was Chris’s birthday. We had to reschedule last minute due to bad weather, yet he was still willing to go out and take some photos on his birthday! Big props for that man!

On top of that, this was a CRAZY windy day!

But it all turned out great once we got a little further away from the water, and went into the town a few streets over…

Ashley gave me a hard time about not updating my blog enough, so I promised her I would blog about their session!

We found some of the coolest spots! I loved this old Coke sign! Chris plays the guitar and sings at Church. He has his own band, so he brought out the guitar for a few shots…

Playing a little tune for his girl…

Take a look at the graffiti to the right of Chris and Ashley in the doorway…it says “Take a picture, it will last longer”! We all thought this was too cool, and we had to take some photos by it! I ended up really loving the industrial look we had going on, so we took quite a few more around that same building…

We ended up stopping by a little cafe with tables to take a few quick shots, then got some pretty cool stuff actually standing in the middle of the street!

I had an awesome time hanging out taking these with you two, and can’t wait for the wedding!