We photographed Melissa and Chris’ wedding in Salado, Texas in 2007, over 4 years ago and their five year anniversary is coming up next year.   We wanted to do something that is not the traditional type of baby photos that you see everywhere, such as baby in a basket, baby in a luggage (I’ll admit, this one makes me smile), etc.  We wanted to show what their family looks like on a typical Sunday morning and since I had a wedding to photograph in Dallas Arboretum in March I finally get to meet Christopher!

Their wedding photos, engagement session and bridal session wasn’t on this blog because we didn’t start blogging until 2008 – but here is  a short slideshow that has it all:

And here are a few of our favorites from the day:

Love the expression on Christopher.

awwwwww….

Captain America, indeed.

She also has the cutest lab there is, Lexie!   We had a great time photographing her as well as with Lexie in the mix.

Here are a few fun ones of the gorgeous Kira and her pup:

Love how the leaves shows up on the dress.

]]> http://www.kuphotography.com/austin-portrait-photographer-kira-portrait-session/feed/ 0 http://www.kuphotography.com/ashley-bobbys-wedding-day-celebration-the-occasions-at-stone-river-rockwall-tx-near-dallas-tx/ http://www.kuphotography.com/ashley-bobbys-wedding-day-celebration-the-occasions-at-stone-river-rockwall-tx-near-dallas-tx/#comments Thu, 17 Sep 2009 19:06:30 +0000 admin http://www.austinweddingsphotography.com/?p=339 Date: August 22nd, 2009

Wedding Ceremony/Reception: Occasions at Stone River and at Ashley’s Parents’ home.

Weather:  Your typical August weather in Texas, you know, HOT!!!!!!!!  (over 100F….)

Ashley and Bobby are among one of the sweetest couples you’ll ever meet.  I still remember the excitement of her voice as I called her on the way back from Dallas to Austin when my wife Hazel was working in Dallas last year.   We finally met with her and Bobby who flew in from Florida in Dallas, TX a couple of weeks later.  Bobby is an active military personnel in the US army (and served in Iraq).

Their wedding day coverage consists of a wedding ceremony/reception, then a break, then a home reception for their family.   It’s actually challenging to photograph a reception at home because if it’s on a dance floor, you have lots of opportunities for great images – at home, you have to work a lot harder to get the moments because there are simply less opportunity to get great expressions/funny moments, etc.   We also took some time for a portrait session of Ashley and Bobby in between the wedding reception and home reception.

Ashley is wearing her mom’s wedding dress.

We love Ashley’s preacher for letting us THIS CLOSE in the ceremony 99% of the time we can’t get on the altar.

Tears welled up for the guests during the toast…

I got a feeling this might happen

Looks like the the lady on the right got the bouquet…

Nope…

As a joke, Ashley and Bobby decides to spray the guests with strings….

Usually the typical picture is maybe the bride and groom closing their eyes and the guests are all looking happy throwing them petals.. i love shots like these that are out of the ordinary wedding images where the guests are dodging them and covering their eyes to avoid being sprayed

We spent about 20 minutes at the reception for some pics in different locations (the series below probably took 4 minutes to do, just simple fun pictures):

Swans….

Then we drove around in Bobby’s car and trying to find some fields that we can use as background with a nice sky…  They completely opened up when they’re alone by themselves, it’s great – not to mention it’s 100F+ out and they still enjoyed themselves.

In the car she mentioned she has a pair of boots ……

Is it barley?  I dunno

This is actually in their parents neighborhood….

Congratulations Ashley and Bobby!!  What a fun day!

Sometimes, you CAN wear your dress again!

Some of the images from the session – we took these near the water wall next to the Galleria in Houston, TX.

It was pretty misty/rainy in there – and yes, the umbrella says it all

Congratulations Roann and Bryan!  

The day-after session is somewhere between a bridal and an engagement session   It’s a great way to do portraits in their wedding attire without having to worry about the wedding (because it’s done!)

Lauren’s mom knew the owner of a local ranch/resort, so we were able to use the property – luckily since it never rains in the summer, we were also able to get some really nice light going through the session.

]]> http://www.kuphotography.com/lauren-brian-the-day-after-session-temple-tx/feed/ 0 http://www.kuphotography.com/josh-abbott-band/ http://www.kuphotography.com/josh-abbott-band/#comments Wed, 19 Aug 2009 16:30:34 +0000 admin http://www.austinweddingsphotography.com/?p=310 I had the pleasure of working with Josh Abbott and his country music band from Lubbock, TX about a month ago in Round Rock, TX.   His manager, Bruce at KB Talent, got married last year on April 12th with Kelley that I photographed their wedding and asked me if I wanted to do a photo session for the band for their new CD cover. 

The whole session was about Round Rock and Brushy Creek – they took me to places that I didn’t know existed.  They wanted some sceneries for the cover to along with some portraits of the band.

This is THE round rock that gave the name to the town Round Rock, TX (where I live)  I have driven by this round a couple of times throughout the year and never thought much about it (it’s on Brushy creek on the west side of Round Rock), I just thought it was a weird looking rock in the middle of the creek!

We also snuck out to a railroad track somewhere…..

The band wanted to do a jump shot (except Josh)

This is “the” Brushy Creek.   

In the new song he wrote, the “round rock” is actually where they sit – it’s Brushy Creek near his girlfriend’s grandfather’s house.   It’s actually a really great location for portraits particularly late afternoon when the whole place is lit up with some really nice light.

Can’t wait for the new CD Josh!!

I am looking for a few senior photography reps for Austin/Dallas high schools, but that will be on  different website/blog.  More on that later.

I have just received my set up of a new lighting rig for outdoor portraits on Friday which includes a beauty dish and a flash head that can pump an incredible amount of power which I need for outdoor use (bright daylight, whatever).  My usual test subject, my wife Hazel, is in Dallas so she wasn’t available, but my parents who are 82 and 72 respectively, are.   I guess it’s called, “senior” senior photography  It was a quick 5 minute shoot and it was also hard because, well, they’re my parents! 

Then my dog starts to get into the fun…

Dogs are more fun outdoors, so took the rig out and hook up to a battery and did another image 5 feet from the house with harsh daylight.   The flash power is sweet – I can pump enough out of it to overwhelm the sun and darken the sky…

It was fun! (and annoyingly fun to get my dog to stay still)    We have an incredible number of weddings and portraits (engagement, etc) in April and May (9 weddings and 5 sessions so far) so it was fun to take a small break at end of March and try out new ways of using light for outdoor/indoor purposes.  We’ll be using this rig for outdoor weddings or portrait session that doesn’t require moving around (the total weight is about 60 lbs or so on a cart, so it’s not very portable).  

We took the lovebirds Tatiana and Ben out for a quick portrait session in the snow.  Since I spend the bulk of the time in Texas, it was really cool just to make some fun images in the snow and in challenging lighting conditions with just a couple of small flashes.  It was so cold that we ended up having to use two small flashes just to match the daylight/ambient lighting conditions, since the batteries don’t seem to charge up the flash to full power in 20 F weather.

I am just testing lights here and all the sudden a cross country skier came by…

They were so natural, the pics practically makes themselves….

(That’s Aspen Highlands – I was telling Kate (see previous post) that mountain looks hard and she goes: “No it’s not!”  :)  It’s all relative…)

The sun came out and lit them from behind.  Love the mountain light!

I was in knee deep snow for this image but it was well worth it.  Hazel had it tough as she had to hold two lights in the same condition and have to get it lit behind them a bit (i think it’s a cliff on the other side of the fence).

Some of the best pics is just natural – this is simply her falling down (and she couldn’t get up! )