Clifton and Lesli are awesome. Remember these photos? We could end there. But we won’t:) They are engaged and getting married in June and we celebrated with a little engagement session and rocking photos. It was another beautiful evening with gorgeous light here in Knoxville and Lesli was kind enough to be ok with me asking her to roll around in all the nature of the Knoxville Arboretum. I think it was all worth it:)
Courtney and Will are engaged and getting married in Knoxville in the fall! I was super excited to do their engagement photos because, well, they are awesome! Courtney loves out of the box creative pictures so I knew we were a good match:) And I also soon learned that Will is hilarious. Half of the time I was cracking up at the expressions he was making. You’ll see:) We went to a couple different spots here in Knoxville for their engagement photos including the arboretum and a few random spots along the road in downtown Knoxville.
Oh, and did I mention that the light that day was delicious and yummy!
lovelovelove this one! Hilarious!
and saving my favorite for last. LOVE these two! I was playing around with some lens and just being a little bit crazy and LOVE it! I love that they are so old world looking and almost ethereal.
Will and Courtney, you guys rock! Thanks so much for trusting me with your engagement pictures!
Are you engaged or just want some awesome couple photos?
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I’m a little behind on the personal blogging so I thought I’d do a little posty post on this beautiful Saturday of Indie’s first birthday party that we road tripped to Wisconsin for. A first birthday of awesomeness because Indie was born on St. Patrick’s Day, how cool is that! So these are some pictures of while we were then…we’ll do another post of the actual party and roadtrip because 24 hours of travel in a period of 4 days, with a two year old to boot, equals funny pictures:)
the svelte nana!
cute cheeks and shark eyes. the indie bear.
they took me to trader joes. i stocked up on almond butter and then tried their hummus at the party and realized I should have stocked up on that too! I’m now planning all my trips around Trader Joe’s and Ikea:)
then we loaded up Lena’s cart with the important stuff…bwahahaha!
quick story for memory purposes: Lena loves penguins. all penguins. but especially the one’s from Madagascar. So we found this one right before we went on our trip and it talked, not when you squeezed it but with motion. So the whole entire trip all we heard with every slight movement of the car was “cute and cuddly boys”, “soldier, you can share a foxhole with me anytime”. Needless to say the penguin lost his voice a few days ago and no one is mourning the loss:) The penguin was also the first cousin rivalry so by the end of the trip we had found Indie one too. Love these pictures. Love that they capture one of her favorite toys and the hands on the cheeks in the first one:)
One of my favorite things about weddings are all the fun details. And how each bride gets to handpick how their wedding looks and feels. And its no secret that I’m a big fan of diy stuff for weddings. I just love it! So when I photographed Courtney and Casey’s wedding last year and saw all the fun beautiful diy stuff I knew we were a great match:)
Fast forward a year and the ever fab blog of bridesmaid.com agrees! Yesterday Courtney and Casey’s awesome wedding was featured on their blog! Even Courtney’s love of Dave Matthews got a little love:)
Go check it out and leave a comment over there to support the amazing Bridesmaid.com! And brides, hop on over there to check out some awesome ideas for your own real wedding:)
It starts really before birth with your mom picking out all the fun outfits you’ll wear and then grows from there. Come 13 and its the normal morning activity of worrying about what to wear to school. Then you get engaged to your soul mate and go to take your engagement photos. It’s the normal question. What do I wear? I have a few things I tell my clients here in Knoxville that I thought I would pass on in hopes that it helps a couple who is engagement or a photographer that is in need of some suggestions for their clients. I by no means am an awesome dresser nor would I consider myself stylish in any way but I have been around the block with engagement photos and here are some insights on what I’ve learned…
*be you
This is the biggest tip I think. Just be you. Don’t try to change that. If you are comfortable with yourself that day then that results with better, more candid, pictures. Embrace your awesomeness! Also take into account your location…you can play into it or go against it and still look cool. Example, if you are having a session out in the woods then you can go super casual and really fit into the scenery or you can go super glam and stand out and the photos would be awesome. And in your engagement session, feel free to ask your photographer if you can do outfit changes to maybe get a little bit of both:)
*no matchy matchy
I’m going to throw this out there for ya. I know there are people and photographers that love this look. And I will *sheepishly* admit that our own engagement photos may have had a little too matchy matchy in them. But we’ve all come into the new modern era and really, just please, don’t wear matching white shirts. Coordinate, yes. Matching, no. 
*think of an outfit
When you are picking out what to wear for the two of you, think of both people as one outfit. Have similar colors, coordinating patterns, fun accessories. This visualization works well for me because then you free yourself up to coordinate. For example, you have a fun patterned dress you want to wear. Then maybe pick out one of the colors on there and have his shirt be a solid color or a smaller coordinating pattern.
*be bold!
I love pictures because they are the one place where bold, larger than life things look awesome. Crazy striped shirt with giant glasses and a hat? Yes please! If you can’t go that bold that is fine but don’t limit yourself. For instance, I have this one hat in my closet that I love but just never wear because its not one of those “let me put this on and run to the store” kind of hats. It’s a little funky. and awesome too:) It’s those kind of things that are great in pictures. Got awesome shoes, crazy scarves, a cool leather jacket, you name it? Bring em on:)
*accessorize
Accessories can make even a plain black shirt and jeans look great. In fact, if you must be matchy matchy then accessories are the way to go! And feel free to bring some accessories with you to your photo shoot to change it up.
Hope this helps! Here is an example from the awesome Caroline and Ryan rocking their engagement session last fall… simple, coordinating, and rocking the boots…what more could you want:) 
Alot of my clients love their pups. and cats. and maybe fish. I have yet to have a couple want their fish in the pictures but, hey, I won’t judge if it ever comes up. In fact, I have an awesome idea on a picture with a fish so if you are a couple out there who loves their fish, hit me up:)
So, back on track, people love their animals and often want to incorporate them in pictures. I get timid requests for this because I’m guessing there are those photographers out there that don’t really want to incorporate pets. I say bring them on! I, by no means, am a pet photographer but I love doing engagement sessions or weddings with pets in them.
So I thought I would ask my friend Paula of Doxzen Pet Photos what she recommends in working with your animals during a session. Paula specializes in pet photography and is amazing at what she does, definitely check out her site! What would you recommend to a pet owner as some suggestions to make the photo session go smoothly? Paula says
If the pet tends to be over active a nice brisk walk around the block might be a good idea. But I don’t want to take away the energy from the shots. Don’t scold your pet during the shot. Scolding makes everything go down hill – getting the ears to pop up naturally will be difficult. They are under enough stress with some stranger there with a big black box
Also, for engagement photos and during weddings, sometimes it’s nice to have someone that the animals trust bring them over and get the pictures that we want and then be able to take them so you won’t have to worry about it and the animals are with someone that they trust. Even if you puppy isn’t the ring bearer, you can still include them during the pictures before or after the wedding:)
Here is one of my favorite pictures from an engagement session last year in Knoxville with the couple’s pups:)
today I couldn’t come up with a five. today I struggled. i thought about doing a thankful post.
because this week has been full or awesome things to be thankful for.
and then I remembered.
its Friday, but Sunday is coming.
isn’t that the greatest thing to be thankful for today?
this video is amazing. amazing. please watch it:)
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shann@shannonkelleyphotography.com
