Ashley & Jason in Seattle | San Francisco Bay Area Wedding Photographer

Ashley and Jason were my second models for a styled shoot in Downtown Seattle for the Click Away conference! I've known Ashley for years - she was actually my crazy talented, fun hair stylist when we lived in Seattle. We became friends and I immediately thought of her when I needed models for this class. My vision for them was classic 60's Hollywood because Ash has always reminded me of a young Elizabeth Taylor. The day of our class/shoot it was POURING rain. In a rented satin dress going out in the rain was not an option. On a real wedding day I would simply stay inside and find a way to make it work, so that's what we did! I LOVE the moody, dramatic light and my students got some amazingly beautiful, unique photos...even from a small, basic conference room!

Dress: Belltown Bride

Location: The Westin Seattle

Tova & Tyler in Seattle | San Francisco Bay Area Wedding Photographer

Earlier this month I was lucky enough to head to Seattle, WA to teach 4 completely full classes at the Click Away conference. Two of my classes were styled wedding shoots, the first of which was with Tyler and Tova. If you recognize Tova it's because she actually modeled for a styled shoot that I did with BHLDN in Seattle last year! This year she brought along her boyfriend Tyler and along with 25 other photographers we shot in a few of Seattle's most iconic locations.

Hair and makeup: Ashley L Smith

Dress: The Dress Theory

A Photo Walk around Downtown Seattle | On Film

A few weeks ago I got to hang out with a few dozen other photographers for something called Clickin Walk. All across the country, groups of people met to spend time with their fellow local photographers, explore Downtown Seattle, and take photographs. I rarely if ever shoot street photography, so it was great to be pushed out of my comfort zone. I decided to push myself even further by shooting primary on film. I decided to try my very first black and white roll, Ilford HP5, which I rated to 800 ISO for some extra grain (maybe a bit too much in hindsight). Shooting deliberately is something different for me, since with digital you can take as many shots as your large memory cards will hold. Having just 36 frames is definitely a challenge. I will say that the thing that is most difficult for me is to find beauty in images that don't contain people or actual subjects. Try as I might, I just don't have the eye for it. So, as we were walking around Pioneer Square, while many of the other photographers were focusing on architecture or objects, I was searching for people while still trying to not jump into my safe "portrait artist" zone. I am surprised that I do like some of the architecture shots. I should do this more often I guess :)