Melissa is getting married today!

My friend Melissa is getting married today! We went to the rehearsal and it was a gorgeous place. We are so excited for the wedding.

Right here Melissa and Rick were talking to the Pastor and he was telling them what an amazing day it was going to be. They were so touched that they both started crying and I got this great shot of them. Aren't they such a cute couple? We are going to have such a great time and get some amazing images!

In Austin

Well, we made it to Austin after a long crazy flight. Melissa and Rick are getting married on Saturday and we are so excited for the wedding. My traveling assistant on this trip is Rose, a great friend of mine, and Mary Beth flew in from Florida to help 2nd shoot.

We were supposed to get in at 10:20, but because the Dallas airport was closed, all the flights were re-routed to Austin so we sat on the runway for 45 minutes. Luckily we had my camera phone to keep us busy. Rose and I took this this picture to send to Mary Beth who was waiting for us at the airport. It's a horrible camera phone picture, but it was funny:)

We finally made it to our hotel, The Omni Hotel in Austin. I was so excited because this is a 4 star hotel and I love nice hotel rooms! Well, we went to grab some food and then go to our hotel room... when we walked in we were a little shocked. There was a huge conference table in the middle of our room with 6 office chairs around. The bed is a murphy bed, so it came down from the wall. We had to move everything around to fit the beds in. They actually put us in a conference room! A little crazy.

We decided to take a picture of the room because to be honest I was a little dissapointed that we got stuck in a conference room at a 4 star hotel. I've never had that happened. We had to document it. I don't think this picture does our dissaointment any justice:)



Oh well, we are so excited for this trip. We laughed for about 30 minutes and then I decided I had to blog it and share with you our fun times of the night!

Get ready for some HOT pictures from Melissa and Rick's wedding. It is going to be amazing!!

Jennifer and Jeff

Jennifer and Jeff got married yesterday in Mesa. The forecast said it was supposed to rain, but it was gorgeous!!!

The day was a little different for me because Jennifer and her girls had already done their makeup and hair, so we quickly took pictures of them getting dressed and started taking pictures of the wedding party! The girls were a total blast!

Also, I wasn't able to take any pictures at the ceremony because of the church policy, so we were only able to get them walking out of the church and the kiss. This was very unusual, but we made due with what we had.

The pictures turned out great and it was a fun crowd.

To see a slideshow click here.

What a Week!

Well i'm off to Las Vegas for an amazing Trade Show! This is the big one of the year and i'm so excited. I'm meeting my great friends, Mary Beth, Melissa, and Jennifer there and we are all gonna party like crazy and learn a ton of great things about photography.

What happens in Vegas Stays in Vegas; but i'm sure i'll post a little for your viewing enjoyment!

After Las Vegas I get to photography one of my dear friends weddings, Melissa Palmer!! It is in Austin, so when we get back from Vegas we are off again.

Because we will be gone all week, we will have little access to phone and email. If you need something please email before you call. I can check emails much easier than voicemails and will try to get back to you ASAP!

Have a great week everyone, I know I will!!

Engagement Guest Book Album

Engagement Guest Book Albums are so much fun! Every one of my wedding packages includes an enagement session. It is a fun, relaxed session where you can see how I take pictures and I can see how you interact as a couple. Almost everyone who does them is so happy that they did them.

Well, with the enagement session, one of the newest things people are doing is an Engagment Guest Book Album. It's a way to show off your fun amazing pictures and have a guest book at the same time. The guests will actually sign the pages. You can then put the album on your coffee table and have it as a rememberence of everyone special at your wedding.

Below is an example of what these look like. We just did Alysea and Lukes session a few weeks ago. Thier album is ready to go once they approve it!!

If you are interested in one of these just send me an email! I would love to create one for you.

Click on the images to see the actual album.

A St. Patricks Day Wedding - Renaissance Style

On March 17, 2007 - St. Patricks Day, I photographed something that I have never photographed before. Jeannette and Jason were married at the Renaissance Festival here in Arizona. It was crazy!!! There were so many things to take pictures of and the crowd was huge because of it being St. Patricks Day.

I had a great time with Jeannette and Jason walking around taking pictures and following their guests as they wandered around to see everything at the Festival.

Jeannette wore a Green and Black dress which was beautiful on her and Jason wore an amazing outfit that you would find in the Renissance time. All their guest dressed up or at least wore green! It was amazing!

Below are some of the pictures and then if you would like so see more you can view a slideshow here.



Jeannette and Jason had a Wiccan ceremony, which I have never seen before. This is them right before the ceremony waiting to go into the middle of the circle.

My sister in law is now shooting with me and got some amazing pictures this time around. This one is of the ceremony. Way to go Kayla.



At the end of the ceremony they jumped over a broomstick and Greyhounds howled in the back.



At the Festival there are all types of interesting people around. This guy showed up to take everyone to one of the shows. He was a little different!!

We walked around and took some great pictures of Jeannette and Jason!








Jeannette also did a little shopping!

The reception hall was fun! Everyone dined while we had some wonderful entertainment. This was not your normal wedding reception at all!

Isn't this cake Crazy?

The King and Queen joined us for a toast.

We also had a sword swallower.

And to end the night some belly dancers with wonderful colors and great music.

It was a wonderful day! Something i've never done before... that seems to be a lot of what i've been doing lately! It's great fun!

Cynthia and Chucks Album

Well, we just finished designing Cynthia and Chucks album. It turned out great.

This is their predesign, so they will be getting some changes to me if they would like to change out pictures. Cynthia and Chuck decided to choose their own pictures, so for the most part this album consists of images that they choose; however, in order to really make the story flow I added some additional favorites!!

Click on the image below to see the entire album!! Enjoy!

Other Fun Photographers

There are some really great people out there linking to my blog - some which I've never even met yet!! So, I thought I'd help out my friends by linking back to them too, which will help improve their search engine rankings!

Michelle Allen Photography - oh wait that's me:):)
Melody Hood
Lea Dales
Erwin Wijanto
Scott Neumyer
Gerald Pope Photography
Jose Roces
Squier Photography
Studio Aimee
Floyd Palitang
DB Photo Design
Eddie Bojo
Toute Mavie Photography
Tempting Weddings
Alyssa Lang
Divine Reflections
Agnes Lopez
Phil Pereira
Becker
Anne Ruthmann
Holritz Photography
Captivating Studios
Picture Infinity Studios
Jillian Kay
KMB Foto
Julie Walton Shaver
Jennifer Images
Lifespring Photography
Photo Forward
Lucky Red Hen
Frank Dimeo
Schaefer Photography
CU Photography
Blue Mountain Photo
Candy's Photography
April Rocha
Stevie's Cam
Polis Photography
Kari Douma
Kendall Price
Garrett Nudd Photography
Nataly Lemus
Jennifer Grigg

The need of a Wedding Planner and Invitation Lady

My friend Liene (An amazing Wedding Planner, who I highly recomend) just blogged about invitations for your wedding. I thought it was great especially since she recomends an amazing Invitation Person, so enjoy the commercial... read what she wrote, and then check out the links to The Invitation Lady and Blue Orchid Designs.

From Liene's Blog...
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I do not recommend printing invitations at home. Unless you have the patience of a saint or a printing background, it will be a bigger headache than it's worth. People usually end up spending more because of all the unforeseen problems than if they had just gotten them done professionally in the first place. That being said, this is a funny commercial:

Another Album Design Complete

Laura and Marco were married in October and I have to say it was one of my favorite weddings! They are an awesome couple and I loved every minute of the day. I also had one of my very good friends and awesome photographer Mary Beth Tyson there to help me all day. She got some killer pictures, which are included in this album!!

Click above on the image to view the entire album! I would love to hear what you think!

This album is the predesign and has a lot of pages as well because there were so many great pictures. Laura and Marco will have a chance to go through the album and make any changes they would like.

The album is going to be much larger than on the screen, so note that when viewing. In real life these albums are stunning!

Something a little different

A couple of weeks ago I was able to do something a little different. I was called up to go take pictures of Jonathan Paton, a member of the House of Representatives in Arizona. In 2005 after his first year in office, he was called up for active duty for six months. I was asked to photograph his swearing in because he is now back in the House of Representatives.

I haven't ever done anything like this so it was an exciting challenge. It was actually really neat to see how things work over in the House of Representatives! Below are a few of the pictures.

Jessica and Jim

Jessica is Melissa's younger sister. I did Melissa's wedding in November and now in September I get to do Jessica's wedding! I love it when I get to do family weddings because I already somewhat know the people who are going to be there!!

Ok, this is a cool fact about Jessica and Melissa that I just found out... they are exactally a year apart in age. Yes, they have the same birthdays but a year difference... isn't that so cool?

Jessica and Jim are living in Michigan right now going to school and they were up last week for their spring break! We scheduled their engagement session on Monday in Downtown Phoenix.

It was great, although I did make them walk a lot!! Thanks guys, you were troopers!!

We got some great pictures and I've been trying to post them up all week but i've been having blogger issues. Hopefully it all works today!!

Alysea and Luke

A few months ago Alysea's mother called and asked me to meet her and her daughter to go over my work. It was a great meeting and we hit it off. Alyesea told me that she didn't want any other photographer but me!! How flattering and humbled I was!! They booked me on the spot and I am now the photographer for their wonderful wedding in May!

I was really excited to do their engagement pictures. What a great couple.. high school sweethearts. We had so much fun! Here are a few of my absolute favorites.. we got a lot!

Allison and Family

Allison called me up about a month ago to ask me to do family pictures for her family. They hadn't had a "real" family portrait in years, so I was honored to do pictures for them. Because Grandma couldn't move well we had to do the pictures close to mom and dad's house. Allison found a great park nearby and we hauled out a couple of chairs and had some great fun!!

We tried to get a mix of everything. These are all the girls. Aren't they gorgeous?



They had a little guy as well who hammed it up!!!

Grandma joined in!!







I love this picture!

Jessi and Matt

Jessi is a faithful Blog watcher, so I know she has been dying to see these pictures finally posted on the blog!!

We got some really great pictures of Jessi and Matt while we were in Downtown Scottsdale. They are getting married in October and i'm so excited for their wedding!! It's going to be so much fun!! Jessi and I met a long time ago and that is when they booked me for their wedding, over a year out, so it's been fun emailing and getting to know her. The engagement session was really fun though because I did get to know them so much better and their wedding pictures are going to be AMAZING!!

Thanks guys for such a fun time! I hope you enjoy these, the rest will be up shortly!