My good friends Alexander & Joanne are getting married, and asked if I could do their engagement shoot photos. I was super excited for them!

After planning, and looking for locations, we were able to decide on a couple locations. They currently live in SoCal, and wanted a beach vibe so we decided to go to Laguna beach and Dana Point. They had 2 outfits, a white outfit for midday shoot in Laguna Beach, and an all black outfit for golden hour shoot at Dana Point.

I live in the Bay Area so my girlfriend (Tina) and I made the drive down to SoCal after work on Friday 9/4/20. About a 6 hour drive, we arrived at the hotel around 3am in the morning the next day.

Saturday

Our shoot started at around 4PM, so not the “best” light because the sun was right above us. I’ve never actually been to Laguna Beach, so I wanted to scout some potential spots and look for shade. While we were walking around we found a small bench/patio table. Tina actually pointed out that there were these palm trees that had a chair right in between. Pretty cool looking composition. S/o to Tina! Super harsh light at these locations, so I used a 3-stop ND filter on some photos and CPL on others.

Then we walked down to the beach. We found an area with some rocks that didn’t have too many people.

We left the beach around 5PM. Dana Point was about 15min drive. They changed into their black outfit, just in time for golden hour. This spot was beautiful, the arches looked so good! Lighting was perfect!

Sunday

We decided to head out to downtown LA. The iconic underpass. This was a super casual shoot. We got super lucky when we parked at the location we just had to wait for one group doing a photoshoot. We stayed in the car for a bit, once they left we rushed to claim the “spot” haha. We decided to do a quick car shoot, had to give AJ’s Audi some love too!

Monday

Originally we were supposed to try and do some smoke bomb portraits on Saturday, but it didn’t exactly work out as planned. Joanne was able to get some Monday morning. So we made a last minute decision to see if we could use smoke bombs at Huntington Beach. We spoke with fire dept and police on duty. They gave us the ok, so we did it!

Some BTS. Shout out to Tina for capturing these! (Taken with the X100F)

Gear Used

Cameras: Sony A7III, Fujifilm X100f
Lenses: Sigma 35mm F1.4, Sony 85mm F1.8, Tokina 17mm F3.5
Strap: Hold Fast Vegan Moneymaker in Desert Sand
Not in Photo: Peak Design Messenger 13

One last thing!

I am now booking sessions for Fall. Click “Contact/Rates” above for more details! Feel free to reach out if you have any questions.

Thank you!

Barbershop: Black and Gold East Bay

Had the honor of bothering these amazing barbers while they worked at their new shop in Hayward. Had hella fun taking photos of their shop and their work. Super clean shop, and super clean work. I mainly shot with the 85mm. I liked the tighter field of view and subject/background separation it gave. 35mm seemed a bit too wide at times and I didn’t want to get in their way while they were working. For interior shots I used my 17mm vintage Tokina Lens adapted on my Sony a7iii. It was my first time taking photos for a barbershop.

Let me know what you think!

*Barbershop info listed below.