Reagan and Rusty have been dating for a while. Reagan is my niece, so I have seen Rusty at family dinners for a long time. When they asked if I would shoot their engagement portraits, they originally just wanted to do something in Phoenix. But, it was August. August in Phoenix averages 120 degrees. Not good. When thinking about engagement photography sessions, people don’t always think outside of the box. One of the greatest things about Arizona is that within two hours you can be in an entirely different climate. So that’s exactly what we did.
Payson, Arizona Engagement Session
Reagan, Rusty and I packed up and went an hour and a half north of Phoenix to Payson. It was still warm, I couldn’t do much about it being August, but nothing over 90. Fortunately, I do a lot of location scouting. I have locations logged in China, Budapest, London, Iceland, and a hundred other locations across the world. But, when it comes to Arizona, I have thousands. So, I took them to a great spot with tree cover all day long. I also brought my Profoto B1 and B2 along to make the light absolutely perfect.
Engagement portraits are best taken in the cool hights of the forests of Northern Arizona, this is one of my favorite spots, just north of Payson, AZ.
The light tree cover is not this dark, but with a little extra light, I can remove the natural ambient light and then fill in exactly what I want, giving the image a more dramatic feel.
Engagement portraits are best taken in the cool hights of the forests of Northern Arizona, this is one of my favorite spots, just north of Payson, AZ.
The lush grass and little spots of sunshine filtering through the trees and onto the grass makes for a perfect backdrop. Lighting is critical on this image to make sure my lights all appear to be coming from the sun so it doesn’t appear to be a flash photo. Obviously, on-camera doesn’t work. So, the flash is off to the left of the camera to follow the natural direction of the sunlight.
Engagement portraits are best taken in the cool hights of the forests of Northern Arizona, this is one of my favorite spots, just north of Payson, AZ.
At the end of the photo shoot, Rusty was skipping rocks like a little kid. He and I finally coaxed Reagan into going into the water. She kept feeling crawdads crawling around her feet, so this was quite a challenging shot for her. But, in the end, I love the drips of water coming off her feet and the reflections coming toward the camera. Without the right lighting, the water droplets would have melded with the background too much. The drips would not show up and neither would the reflections (not that much anyway). You can see in the final shot where that light was that was separating them out.
Outside or inside the Profoto light is a critical part or my photography.
Rusty helped me test the light by putting his head IN it! Good job, Rusty. He won’t be my assistant anytime soon.
Engagement portraits are best taken in the cool hights of the forests of Northern Arizona, this is one of my favorite spots, just north of Payson, AZ.
Engagement portraits are best taken in the cool hights of the forests of Northern Arizona, this is one of my favorite spots, just north of Payson, AZ.
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