After spending time in San Francisco photographing Megan and Jim, a couple who truly embodies the spirit of San Francisco, I traveled not even two weeks later nearly 3,000 miles in the opposite direction. I arrived in lower Manhattan excited for Laura and Justin’s engagement session. First off, landing back in New York was wonderful! I hadn’t been back there since 2009 and it had been truly far too long. It’s a wonderful city to shoot in, the energy and culture there compels you to shoot and be creative. The area around the Brooklyn Bridge was particularly meaningful to Laura so we centered the entire shoot around there.
People ask me all the time why I travel for engagement shoots. In this case, Laura and Justin’s wedding is taking place in Colorado, so why not just do the shoot out here at some point when they visit? Why make the trip to to New York? There’s several reasons really… first off, their wedding pictures will be here in Colorado, so an engagement session would look similar to the wedding as far as the backdrop of the shoot. But really, the most important reason is that it’s crucial to photograph people in places that are meaningful for them. Not only does this allow them to have their pictures taken in a familiar backdrop and setting , but it allows me the privilege of entering their world, if even for just a short time. The more I understand my subjects, the better I can photograph them and document their relationship. The more that I share in their world, the more they feel that I understand who they are, both as individual people and as a couple, means that ultimately they’ll feel comfortable and trust me on their wedding day.
Ok, now that all of that philosophy is out of the way, here are some if the images from the shoot!
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