Abby and Bryan Engagement

Recently, I was contacted by a couple Abby and Bryan from Erie Pennsylvania who is planning their wedding in Myrtle Beach. Both of them have spent several vacations here, going years back, and it has come to have a special meaning for them. As it turns out, I was going to be nearby during their current family trip and we wanted to get some engagement shots celebrating their planned commitment. 

Abby and Bryan were totally up for anything and wanted me to suggest a good venue. All we really knew was that it needed to be in a place that would express the feeling of the South Carolina coast and them as a couple. One of my favorite places that I have been to many, many times is Huntington Beach State Park just south of Murrell's Inlet. Abby and Bryan were staying where they will be getting married, at The Dunes Resort in Myrtle Beach. I figured a popular resort in June would probably prove difficult to find intimate locations without a lot of lookers-on. The trip to Huntington Beach was a bit of a hike for them but it was totally worth it.

While we were preparing for this session, I knew I wanted to shoot late in the day for the most favorable light and to have some relief from the heat. Based on my experience, the beach area is always  nice and breezy but only a few yards inland, this area can be oppressively humid with vulture-sized mosquitos and other fun things. Little did I know, nature had other plans. When we arrived, there was mild cloud cover, it was 77 degrees and breezy and no bugs - it was perfect. If this is what happens when people from Erie visit, we should pay them to come more often and in larger numbers.

We started out on the beach. One of Huntington Beach's best assets is a pristine beach with beachfront buildings only seen in the distance.

Walking on the dunes is strictly forbidden on any of the costal beaches in South Carolina, but there are a few places you can go to give the illusion that you are in them and surrounded by sea oats.

Just off the beach is the former studio for the artist Anna Hyatt called Atalaya. It's a bit of an odd structure consisting of several small rooms and a large open area in the middle. It was closed by the time we were shooting but the outside provides a great range of colors and textures.

The last thing I wanted to do is to use one of the other beach access paths which is almost completely a wooden boardwalk. Just as we got there (all that we did was within a comfortable walk - Abby was smart enough to bring comfortable shoes) the clouds opened up to provide some of the best golden hour light I've ever shot.

Technical Stuff

Once again I overpacked considering what I ended up using for this shoot. I was using my Nikon D700 and shot about 95% of everything with my Nikon 70-200mm f2.8. I just love how this lens can control the background, the sharpness and compress the composition when needed. 

I did use my Paul C Buff PLM umbrella again as my lighting modifier of choice but there are some warnings for other photographers to be learned here. 

While the conditions where, basically, ideal as far as South Carolina beach settings in June are concerned, there were regular/strong gusts of wind all the time. I'm used to battling wind with an umbrella on a light stand, but no amount of anchoring could prevent the stand not only blowing over but traveling down the beach. We estimated that it could easily reach 20 knots and reach the North Carolina  state line by midnight. I had my favorite assistant with me and she struggled constantly with the huge umbrella in the gusts. I could not have used it on my own, it would have just been to unpredictable and, in some cases, dangerous.

Another aspect is protecting your gear. With the wind blowing, that also meant that dry sand was constantly whipping around. Leaving my Think Tank bag on the ground for just a few minutes meant that it was nearly half-buried. You DO NOT want sand in any of your gear, the only thing worse is water (I guess fire is bad too but not a realistic concern). With my bag zipped, all my critical bits were kept safe, the only things that were exposed were items stored in the outside mesh pockets which were not susceptible to the ravages of sand.

Protect your gear.

Ashley & Josh Wedding - Henderson, NC

On June 16th, I had the opportunity to work as a second shooter for someone I have worked with for a while, Emily Rearick. Originally, I thought the wedding was in HendersonVILLE, NC and was excited because that's practically in my back yard. Only a little while before, I found out it was in Henderson, NC. I had never even heard of Henderson and then I found out it was nearly in Virginia. It would be the farthest I've had to drive to a wedding than I ever have before and, if I have to be honest, I wasn't really looking forward to the 11 hour round trip.

Things changed the minute I showed up to meet the groom who was planning on getting ready at his parents home which was also to be the location for both the ceremony and the reception. Their farm was a charming place with a great old farmhouse and a dozen or so working out buildings including several old tobacco cure houses. All this was surrounded by wheat fields and horse pastures. It was picturesque and honest. I was greeted at the house by Josh's mom who made me feel welcome right away and informed me that Josh and his friends were in the back field relaxing by doing some target shooting. Rather than have her call him to return to the house, what a more genuine moment to capture than to join them and capture it.

I was even encouraged to join in and I took advantage of the opportunity and took three shots and got three targets... so there. We established a rapport straight away, which is key when you will be hovering around these people the entire time of one of the most important days of their life.

They did a remarkable job of transforming the property into a genuine and personal venue. The amount of details throughout the grounds was amazing from baby's breath in tin cans hanging from twine on the front porch to the "gift truck" where guests would leave gifts to the new couple. Some of these details probably didn't cost much but it never came across as "cheap".

Ashley and Josh were smart enough to plan for plenty of time prior to the ceremony for some photo sessions. They didn't want to see each other before the ceremony but that is totally doable with a little coordination.

After the men's session, we sequestered them to the house and then had some fun with the ladies. The grounds of the farm was like a playland for photographers, every corner you turned was a new setting with different textures and colors. Because it was early afternoon, we had to retreat mainly to shaded areas but we still had a blast.

Soon the guests arrive and things kicked off.

With the ceremony and the reception on the same grounds, all everyone had to do is stroll around to the back yard.

After the party settled a little bit we snuck the happy couple off when the light was just right for a nice little session.

When it was all said and done, I'd be happy to come back to Henderson, NC again if it meant spending time with people like this.

Technical Stuff

This was the first full wedding I've had a chance to use my new Paul C Buff PLM umbrella. I have the 64" white model and purchased the optional black outer cover fabric (which I removed and used the umbrella as a shoot-through). I can't say how much I like this umbrella. While it is really big in terms of a portable umbrella, when folded, it is about the length of my 11' lightstands collapsed. It comes with a carrying case that has a shoulder strap. When I bungee my stands and umbrella together, it makes it so much easier than my old setup. 

The best thing I can say about the PLM is the construction. It has so many spokes that are made out of fiberglass instead of the traditional u-shaped metal tines. I have gone through so many of the old type umbrellas after they take a tumble. This umbrella took two falls during the day due to the wind and despite the fact that I had the stand weighted down with my camera bag. The only casualty was that it fell over in a barn and got some hydraulic fluid on the outer edge of the fabric, something I can hardly blame Paul C Buff for. It fell and bounced right back up due to the extra number and material of the spokes.

I only brought one Nikon SB-800 flash on this trip so shooting through the PLM in strong daylight was not going to even come close to competing with the sun. But in the shade (which is a good idea for portraits anyway) it performed marvelously. 

On the gun shooting images, I used the SB-800 at full power and zoomed to 70mm to get some light on them since the sun was so harsh.

Since I only had the one flash with me, as the sun went down and the fun started under the tent, I decided to bungee the flash to the structure of the tent pointed up to the interior of the white roof of the tent which provided some nice, soft, bounced light with an even exposure from one end of the dance floor to the other. It was set at 1/4 power and an aperture of f4 worked out just fine at an ISO of 800.

I shot the entire day with my Nikon D700, my trusted workhorse. I'm finding more and more that I prefer shooting with the Nikon 70-200 f2.8 nearly all the time. When shooting an outdoor event like this with plenty of room to move around, it allows me to stay back and draw less attention capturing more candid moments than right up in people's faces. My next most used lens is the old Nikon 35-70 f2.8 that I purchased used. I love this lens and I use it for portraits and group shots. I only used my superwide Nikon 17-35 f2.8 for wide venue shots.

Crystal and Nick Engagement Session

This past Saturday I set out with a great couple Crystal and Nick to capture some images celebrating their engagement. The location they decided on was Falls Park in beautiful downtown Greenville. Being a photographer wanting to control light as much as possible, I wanted to shoot as late as possible. The best they could do was at 5pm. Experience tells me that trying to shoot in the late afternoon in June here in the south is asking for trouble with both heat and humidity, nothing could be further from the truth. It was a perfect day which brought its own challenges. The fantastic weather couldn't be kept a secret so we would be competing with everyone else wanting to enjoy the park that day.

Falls Park is a photographer's dream with a wide range of settings in a relatively small, and walkable, area from dark wooded secreted places, urban backdrops and, of course, the falls and the trademark bridge. We intended on taking advantage of as much of it as we could in the short amount of time we had available to us.

We first started in shaded areas of the common area surrounded by beautiful flora with stone paths and stairs carving through them.

Next we moved to one of the bench swings under the bridge and snuck a few nice shots. This was a high-traffic area but people coming through were very accommodating and Crystal and Nick never missed a beat.

After several winning shots here, we strolled away from the crowds and crossed the river to a spot I have wanted to shoot against for some time. Near the Governor's School, there is a tree on a bank with a vast array of exposed roots. I thought we could shoot here unimpeded but traffic on this road turned out to be more than I anticipated. I ended up shooting from across the street with a telephoto and I'm glad I did.

We proceeded further away from the main part of the park into the woods. There are great little paths and bridges along a creek that flows into the Reedy River including a small waterfall.

We finally got that hat off of Nick.

We decided to brave the crowds for a shot of them on the bridge.

Lastly we wanted to get some detail shots of Crystal's ring so we looked for some local plants that mirrored their selected colors.

This last shot is one of my personal favorites. Crystal and Nick were easy to work with and were up for anything I suggested and even had some ideas of their own (as Nick will brag that this last shot was actually his idea).