Category: Couples

Monica+Graham: Engaged in Raleigh and Blinded by Science

We get an extraordinary amount of science clients. Maybe our nerdy charm draws them in or the high ratio of dinosaur-to-human photos on our blog. Either way, we love it. I’m secretly terrible at science, but get along really well with scientists because I tend to have the same interests… minus the intelligence. So we were really glad when we booked Monica and Graham’s wedding… and even more glad when we booked their engagement session that was to be half-normal, half-science.

Monica and Graham met at the Governor’s School science camp back in the day and kept in touch as fellow science kids despite long distance. Then they moved slightly closer for college and started dating despite less distance. Then they moved even closer for grad school, where they today are graduate students at NC State; Monica is environmental toxicology and Graham is a physicist (took me about ten tries to spell that word). Engaged and still very much loving science, they came to me with their e-session ideas… a normal shoot first, and then the best. idea. ever.

For those of you who were deprived of the lack of parental supervision that was required to do this awesome experiment in your childhood, you can read about it here… then go try it in your own back yard because you’re an adult now and can blow up all the stuff you want! For everyone else: REMEMBER MENTOS AND DIET COKE!? THAT WAS FREAKING AWESOME.

Brooke+Red: A prehistoric engagement session in Raleigh

Ladies and gentlemen, the first of my primary color grooms!

As some of you on my Facebook page know, I have two primary color grooms. Red this year and Blue next year. We’re still scouting out 2014’s primary color groom, so anyone who has a fiancé whom they refer to as “Yellow” on a regular basis, feel free to book us so we can complete the cycle.

On a normal note, meet Brooke and Red! They met online, but weren’t suggested to each other because they were apparently “only” an 80% match (and we all know 95% of the population is undateable). But Red was very specific about who he’d like to meet, found Brooke’s profile, and messaged her. They had a wonderful first date (being the incredibly attractive and charming people that they are), and then before they knew it they would be standing in a large open field with me and a giant helium dinosaur balloon taking engagement pictures.

Red likes golfing and Brooke likes gardening. They both love cooking, but cook in very different ways so that cooperative cooking at the same time has been ruled out entirely. Red’s first CD was the Wayne’s World soundtrack, and Brooke’s was one of the 6 CD deals from Colombia (bonus 90s kid points if you know what I’m talking about), although she was pretty into Ace of Base back in the day (what self-respecting 90s kid wasn’t?). They also really love dinosaurs. A lot. They’re having their wedding reception on the dino floor of the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences in November, and decided to go that one little step further into dino-love by incorporating the prehistoric awesomeness into their engagement session. And those of you who know me well know that I love me some dinosaur ring shots…

Bethany+Kevin’s Engagement Session in Raleigh

As if landing the sister of your former client isn’t a high enough compliment, Geoff and I apparently won over the future groom at Gwen+Nick’s wedding as well. Bethany told me on the phone that while her fiancé Kevin goes with the flow of wedding planning, he was pretty adamant that he wanted us to photograph their wedding as well. I love when the grooms like us. :) But even if I didn’t already have a soft spot in my heart for these two, they would’ve won me over in about 30 seconds anyway. :) This was the most playful engagement session I think I’ve photographed (Bethany did tell me on the phone that “…Kevin will be fine, we’ll just put him on the playground…” which turned out to be incredibly true), and two of the most happy-go-lucky people I’ve met. I think it shows, which is good considering Bethany told me, “You know those engagement sessions where everyone is all serious and they don’t even look happy to be engaged? Yeah, we don’t want that.” So I told them to just have a good time… and they did. :)

Without risk of ruining their whole meeting/first date/proposal story (let’s save it for their July wedding blog post, shall we?), I’ll give you Bethany+Kevin: fierce Words with Friends competitors, riders of ostriches, conquerors of the sandpit dinosaur rodeo.