liz + raul

Liz and Raul are an adorable couple who each wanted to have portraits done as a gift for their parents for Christmas. How cute is that? This was one of my favorite shoots of all time. Not only were they incredibly patient with us and our craziness, but they were so easy to work with, and so much fun. The only not-fun part of this shoot was the part where I jumped out of a tree, busted up my ankles, and did a face plant into a leaf pile at Liz and Raul’s feet. It was freaking hysterical to everyone who saw it, including Ben, who laughed harder than anyone else. Good thing I handed him my camera before jumping…anyways, aside from that fiasco, it was a ton of fun. Since it’s starting to get dark earlier, we were able to get creative with some “off-camera” lighting, which I LOVE doing. Lighting is so much fun to play with; especially when working with a couple who’s as easy going as these two were.

Liz wanted to do some shots in their apartment, so we met them there first. (Ironically, their house was only three houses down from where Ben lived as a child. He was reminiscing the entire time we were there.) These were our favorites from the “apartment segment” of the shoot:



Their cat, Cheerio, was amazingly cute; so, of course, I had to give props to his cuteness on the blog…

After the apartment, our next stop was the Delaware Park area. Good ol’ Delaware Park – always gorgeous, no matter the season. As soon as we got there, I saw all these bright orange and red leaves on the ground in front of the art gallery, so I dragged everyone over there. This was the part where I busted up my ankles, but these shots were worth the pain…


Ben grabbed this shot while I was up in the tree…love it!

While we were over by the art gallery, we decided to play around with the pillars a bit (which was TOTALLY worth it, as these are some of my favorites EVER…)




As it was just starting to get dark, we headed across the street to Delaware Park.


This one makes me smile every time I look at it ?


Then we decided to get SUPER-dramatic with it…I am loving the leaf shadows in this one.

We’ll end with this crazy-weird-magical masterpiece. We were trying to do some long-exposures before it was actually dark enough to do them, so instead of the look we were going for, it kind of looks like UFO’s are landing all around them. Oh well, it’s still a sweet photo regardless, and I decided that it was the perfect circumstance to try out this new texture I’ve been dying to use. It’s kind of crazy looking, but I ? it!

Liz and Raul, we had so much fun hanging out with you guys! Thanks for being so easy to work with! Hopefully, you love these as much as we do. :)