My story for becoming an award winning and featured wedding/portrait photographer is a little bit different than most stories you'll hear. So many have started taking pictures of their children, realize the magic of capturing a beautiful moment, and through the encouragement of friends and family start branching out and trying their hand at taking pictures of others, and then one day that moment happens and someone pays you for your work. It's a really wonderful way to make a little extra money while testing and honing your skills.

My story is a bit different, my father owned a fantastic studio and when his event/wedding business expanded past the help my mother could offer he officially hired me. My very first job was reigning in the attendees of a 25-Year High School reunion after the bar had been open for about 2 hours. (Yes, it's as tricky as it sounds ;-P) But something amazing happened, my father recognized in me a natural ability to understand posing and composition and the temperment to work with all sorts of people and personalities while helping them to feel comfortable and look great in pictures.

When you're doing event photography you're not really afforded the opportunity to play with a bunch of different camera settings or hope your clients location offers beautiful natural lighting. Outside of the "formal/posed" pictures of the bride and groom you can't even really get your clients to pose a certain way. For the next 5 or 6 years I photographed an incredible amount of weddings with him and it was really a baptism by fire. You have to be familiar with all aspects of shooting, natural lighting, supplemental lighting, artistic shooting, traditional shooting, not to mention your fingers pretty much changing your camera settings on their own through muscle memory.

You can't "wait for that magical moment"; you have to find a way to capture every moment and make it magical. And really, I think life and people interacting is pretty magical.

Taking portraits is great fun for me; I love being able to take a little more time to set up the lighting or to get my subjects just so. (Like this sweet picture from the same session below.) But it also helps me to get pictures like the one above. I took this when we were all done with our session. I was packing up when I saw Mommy giving her little baby a kiss for a job well done. In my mind's eye could see the lighting and composition I wanted and was able to act quickly enough to get it.

I don't think it's something I could do so comfortably without over ten years of shooting weddings.