Erica & Steve’s Engagement Session

‘Tis the season for engagement sessions! I travelled out to Orange County, California in mid December to meet up with Erica and Steve for their engagement session. They are getting married this October at Silverleaf Club in Scottsdale, but both live in LA and wanted to do their session out there. We had so much fun exploring San Juan Capistrano, a town I had never visited before. There were so many fun historic buildings there, so it offered a lot of variety photographically. We had planned to also go into the historic Mission to try and take some images, but since we didn’t have an appointment, they wanted to charge us $75 to use the grounds, so we decided not to spend the extra $$ and moved on to Laguna Beach. It was actually a blessing we left when we did, because the light drops over the horizon earlier in California than it does here, so we had the perfect amount of time left on the beach!

Erica knew of this quirky little petting zoo in town, complete with this shack that reminds me of that spooky house on LOST. You know, the one where “Jacob” lives. Or as Steve said, one look inside was like Poltergeist.

We figured when there is a bathtub on a porch, what else do you do but get in?

I loved this whole set of them on this random person’s stairs.

After San Juan Capistrano, we moved to Laguna. We went to The Montage Resort there and just caught the setting sun.

This shot is an HDR image of two exposures: one for the sky and one for them on the bench. The bird was luck.

Then we headed down to the beach, and Erica was a trouper for wearing shorts because it was cold!

I felt this next shot called for a little texture…

Taking advantage of the last remaining light with high ISO

We came back up and warmed up by the fire with a glass of wine. Ironically, The Montage had just finished a commercial shoot for their brochure and had some real props in place by the fire, including all the fixings for smores! How perfect, because Erica and Steve made s’mores together on one of their first dates, so it was especially fitting. They made me one too and it was yum – sticky and chocolatey, just like it should be.

Thank you for such a fun time Erica and Steve! I cant wait for your wedding in the fall. :)