Meet Keary & Justin. They are one amazing couple and also good friends of mine. I’ve known Keary for a little over a year through her own photography business, Keary Dee Photography. Earlier this year she married her best friend and amazing husband, Justin. I recently did a 7 hour day workshop with San Diego photographer, Dan Fields and at the end of the day he wanted to shoot a downtown bridal shoot so our good friends Keary & Justin modeled for us.

Keary & Justin are totally in love with each other but more in love with Jesus and the way they live their lives shows that. Our shoot started near one of my all-time favorite places, East Village near Petco Park. We walked the streets, shot inside of a fun hotel and even went inside Petco Park. The weather was so perfect and these two totally know how to rock the camera because they are SO good looking!

At the end of the session, we totally realized that Keary looks like Taylor Swift and Justin kind-of resembles American Idol winner Kris Allen? I don’t know… maybe thats just me. You can decide for yourself.

I first met Phil a couple of years ago right after I had first gotten saved. He was the lead singer in the worship band at church where my parents & sister were all married and its the same church where I have been serving as a youth leader for the past six years. He recently went to Nashville, TN to start the recording process for his new worship album that is is releasing sometime in the early fall. I got a call from him last month asking if I would shoot the cover. Okay, now I really wanted to respond with, “Yes, Yes, Yes!! That sounds like so much fun!” The only thing is that I have little experience in photographing musicians. I am a wedding & portrait photographer. (Side note:If you want to see an incredible music photographer, checkout my friend David Molnar) Phil believed in me and he knew that I would do a great job. I accepted the shoot and we planned some sweet concepts for his album. I knew that during this shoot, Christ would give me the power to do great and he really did come through.

We did the shoot last week in downtown San Diego. We partnered up with my good friends at Hotel Indigo to shoot on their rooftop and also walked around the area near Petco Park. Such beautiful light!!

Checkout some of Phils music by clicking here

I laid awake in bed a few weeks ago. Looking at the ceiling I realized that there needs to be a free group in San Diego that is all about shooting and hanging out. With how many big groups are available to photographers that already offer a wonderful experience, I really wanted to start a group that is small and really intimate. Since its a small group, we are able to meet a few times a month! It’s so awesome!! Our first meeting was last Friday in downtown San Diego. It was a group of 8 photographers and 2 engaged couples. After a few hours of casual shooting we walked over to a rad mexican cuisine next to Petco Park for some time of photography chat and good food. If you’re interested in attending our next event in June.. join our facebook group

Here are a few of my favorite images from our shoot

Our wonderful group!!

Last February I was attending my very first photography convention, WPPI in Las Vegas. I was enjoying the trade show & after parties so much to the point that I wanted to have some more fun so I decided to crash a “workshop after party” at Rouge inside the MGM Grand. Little did I know at the time it was hosted by Scarlett Lillian.

We briefly talked with each other, and later on that night I added her on facebook. It wasn’t until this recently when I noticed she twittered something about her faith & responded. This opened up the door for the two of us to start communicating via email. In these emails were stories of our commonly shared faith in Jesus Christ, favorite music… we both love Jeremy Camp and dare I say N*Sync! Through our long emails, which stretched past 5 paragraphs every-time, our fingers grew tired from typing and this led to video chat for weeks followed by texting throughout the day.

After all of our communication, Scarlett informed me that she was making a trip to Nor-Cal to shoot a wedding and she was coming to San Diego to shoot an engagement session! What started with just hanging out as friends then turned into a few fun “date nights” followed by a few amazing shoots around San Diego & Orange County. Through our time together, we realized we had so much more in common!

Our trip first started when I picked Scarlett up from the airport. The amazing thing about our relationship is we have Christ as our center. The very first thing we did was worship Jesus at church together. The last thing we did before she went home that next Sunday was worship Jesus together. I knew that our connection to each other was something more than personal love could ever control and it’s a feeling between two people that can only be felt when you have Jesus in the middle of “everything”. As we heard the words of “From The Inside Out” being played, we opened our eyes, looked at each other and with tears running down both of our faces we knew that it was God’s love that brought us to be together.

I was lucky enough to take a few portraits of Scarlett during her visit to San Diego. I am so excited to have the opportunity to share them with you!