This past Saturday I photographed one of my family members professionally for the first time! My cousin whom I have not seen in over a decade due to living in different parts of the country moved down here to the Tampa Bay area. She got engaged and contaced me about an engagement shoot on Sunset Beach in Treasure Island Florida. I said sure, sounds great, you bring the romance and I will take care of the rest!
They did their homework and had several photo ideas they wanted to try out, which is fine with me as I am always looking for new shot ideas myself. It was a frigid day, actually the coldest of the year, but they dressed Florida style anyway and were real pros!
As requested, they brought the romance allowing me to make candid portraits like the one above. I wanted to have the sun melt through the couple in this shot adding to the impact of the overall image.
Besides being cold, it was incredibly windy, but at least Mother Nature also provided a classic dramatic Florida sunset to use as a background in the photographs. I prefer there to be clouds in the sky as well, as I feel it adds more interest than if the sky were cloudless.
I remembered to make a quick shot of my strobist setup this time. As you can see, I use two speedlights in my off camera flash technique for sunset portraits. There are just diffuser caps on the strobes as it was far too windy for an umbrella or anything like that.
My cousin and her fiance brought their dog, Bear, who was a good boy and watched patiently until it was his time to be in front of the lens where he immediately started dishing out big kisses!
My cousin, like me, was born in Rhode Island and will have her wedding actual up in the Ocean State. It was great to reconnect with her, and her mom (my aunt) made a surprise visit too! It was a real reunion and a very fun engagement portrait session.