Extended Graduate Session - In-Studio and Downtown Demopolis
Let me start with, Makenna drove all the way over from !!Georgia!! to do this session with me! Her grandmother, Miss patty, is my neighbor and fellow church member and she connected us. Makenna wanted to work with a photographer she could trust and did not know any in her area. She therefore coordinated a trip to see her grandparents mixed with our photography session. She booked a 1-hour session but I upgraded her to a 2-hour extended graduate session as a gift to miss Patty, who is so kind and such a wonderful neighbor.
We set the date & time and as the session approached, the weather was not looking great. I asked her if she wanted to reschedule, try to shoot some outdoor images in the rain, or shoot indoors in my in-home studio set up. She wanted to keep the session so we agreed to be flexible. Less than an hour before her session the bottom dropped out and it was absolutely pouring outside.
I had just gotten my new backdrop set up and I was excited to try it so this was the perfect opportunity while we waited out the storm. Also, I did not have another session that evening so we didn't have to finish at a certain time. I rolled out the tan backdrop and we started shooting images. Makenna's sisters came too to help pump her up.
The first 30 minutes with the tan backdrop went great, but we got more comfortable as artist & client and posing began to flow more naturally Also, Makenna's sisters started to throw out poses to try.
This is a normal phenomenon that I talk about regularly - that oftentimes I really connect with my clients after the first 20-30 minutes. I learn what poses the client likes, she begins to start trusting the artistic space I create, and she begins to experiment with poses she'd like to try. It's important as we enter this zone that there is no judgement. If we want to try a certain pose, no matter how silly, we try it. I will simply not share the image if it does not look good. But come on - Makenna was a natural, like all her images looked fantastic.
We then switched to the pink backdrop, took some shots, then did an outfit change.
There were probably 100 more fantastic images from the pink backdrop. We were truly in the zone at this point.
Luckily, the rain finally calmed down enough that we took some test shots outside in the street in front of my house. The umbrella made for a fantastic prop.
I felt comfortable with the weather so we headed downtown to snag a few more images in downtown Demopolis. I love the white of the Trustmark bank downtown and shoot there frequently, so we started there. The added benefit of this location is its covered!
We took a few more images downtown. There was still some sprinkling going on so Makenna had an umbrella and one of her sister's shielded me and my camera with another umbrella. We were quite the team!
We lastly headed to the riverwalk for a few more photos. Makenna wanted a few more in the black dress so we did a quick change before driving over to the riverwalk.
I really liked the overall look of these images. I ended up having over 600 images to cull through and culled down to 253 images I edited and delivered. I couldn't cut any more, they were way too good. What a fun experience to get out and be creative in the rain! I am honored that Makenna entrusted me to capture her senior portraits.
As always, if you have made it this far, thank you for reading!!
If you're interested in an extended senior session in Demopolis or Tuscaloosa, you can contact me here. Ask me about bringing my backdrop setup to you!
