The vast majority of my clients know, I will go to the extreme to please them. When ideas are tossed out for portraits, I am the one wanting to go to the ends of the earth to make it happen, and make pinterest jealous in the process. So, I knew already when Jennifer and I decided to do end of maternity pictures (she was 37 weeks in these), we knew they needed to be nothing short of magical. She threw out a few ideas, and I ran with them. I spent more than a couple weeks mulling and churning ideas, pulling pinterest ideas on maternity pictures with a whimsical feel, throwing out samples that weren’t up to snuff, and finally getting together a general idea of what we would do. We drive all the way to Kerrville, Texas. 300+ miles to do this particular maternity shoot. One hour prior to our shoot, we get the first warning that this would be anything but an easy shoot. Thunderstorm Warning with potential hail. I called Jennifer, and went, we are still shooting. Jennifer being the very trusting, wonderful woman that she is simply replied “Your car or mine?” No question, just went with it. I turned to my Sister In Law, who is also a photographer, and said, you might want to join me, this has the trappings of being epic, and I won’t turn down any additional help I could get. She knew. Allison hopped in her Hummer and merely asked where to meet me. The next hour, we shot two locations all near Tivy Street. I found a patch of bluebonnets, which had to be included. It is, after all, the Texas Hill Country. From there, we took Jennifer to this grove of trees that made a perfect canopy of both covering, and natural beauty. As we were wrapping things up, I looked to the creek, now swollen with rain water. I passively thought, man, shooting her wrapped in the blue lace I brought would be perfect there. I wouldn’t be able to get the words out of my mouth, because at that exact moment, Jennifer and Allison vocalized that very thought. Before I could even caution our very pregnant friend against crawling into a river in her flip flops, during a thunderstorm, she was already in. I did the only logical thing at that point: started shooting. The entire time, I am being reassured Jennifer completed Tough Mudder, that her balance is impeccable, that she is feeling great. In the end, I couldn’t have asked for a better shoot. The rain lightened at just the right moments for these images, and in spite of the craziness around us, this shoot will forever be a favorite for me. When my clients trust me to make the call, and to know how much light I need to make the shot happen, there is no greater sense of pride I can experience. Enjoy what will go down as one of my top shoots in my career.
