HEATHER + JASON
“My great hope is to laugh as much as I cry; to get my work done and try to love somebody and have the courage to accept the love in return.”
-Maya Angelou
Our session with Heather + Jason is perfect. The interesting thing about this session however is how different it is from where it began. Heather is a planner and Jason is an artist. These two are pulling together a wedding full of beautiful details with one of our very favorite wedding planners pulling all the right strings. When we first started to brainstorm this session we had settled on a few things : Industrial, Drive in theatre, Classic convertible, black and white. All the ideas were beautiful and all of the conversations were exciting and for some reason it just didn't seem to feel quite right. After weeks of trying to lock down permission to shoot at the theatre and round up the convertible Heather and Jason came in town for a few short days from Dallas in just enough time to get soaked with a long spring rain. Just about the time we were supposed to start their session the first spots of rain on the sidewalk started to fill in and over a quick cocktail we turned all of the plans and ideas on their head.
If you've shot with me at all you know that I'm a huge sucker for the psychology of this whole process. We want you to have to let go and trust us of course, but we also want you to be in a situation where the comfort isn't in how close we are (at least not at first) but the comfort is in each other. I don't want to pose every frame and convince you into emotion but instead put in you a place where the emotion comes easy and it's honest. There's a lot of faith in a complete stranger with a big camera to do that, especially when he shows up to your shoot in a place you hadn't pictured it, the day after you'd scheduled it, with an assistant (to shoot candid moments) and a videographer (to capture the entire shoot moving). This is where I can say Heather became my dream client because with all of the variables she took it all in stride and heard me when I said - "look beautiful and I'll do the rest".
Getting to know these two was a blast. Heather is the kind of girl who really has it together. Super beautiful and confident the only time I saw her look vulnerable at all was ironically when Jason held her really close. She laughs with her entire body, eyes first, and when her and Jason take a moment to just be quiet and still together there's definitely magic. Jason on the other hand is one small step from getting a job offer from me. A cinematographer in Dallas this guy is a natural on camera for us. There's two kinds of photographers (videographers) ones that can be on both sides of the camera and ones that can't. I always laugh because though I feel incredibly awkward on the other end of a camera, I can fake it. And Jason was a rock all the way through the shoot allowing Heather to feel pretty and confident. Walking all over the ozarks with these two was an adventure but in about an hour and a half we managed to catch them more than just a few times being completely themselves. No direction - just connection.
To say I'm excited about this wedding now is a huge understatement. If you want to know our top 8 tips to make YOUR engagement shoot awesome check out THIS POST.
