Best-of-the-best Ceremony

For an explanation of best-of-the-best click here.

Aaron's Picks:

Ah, the ceremony. The staple of the day and ultimately why we're there in the first place. Unfortunately it is also the most repetitive and challenging parts. Between fighting terrible church lighting and near jogging bridesmaids the ceremony can provide quite an assortment of difficulties. Luckily for me the winners were pretty clear cut. No alter shots but emotion and interesting angles are the way to go.

This is probably my favorite all-time ceremony shot that we have done. The angle, depth, color, and even natural lens vignette all works really well. Photographer: Aaron Hawes

This shot is a little more simple. Clean and dynamic, great emotion. Just a good take on the old carry me down the altar shot. Photographer: Aaron Hawes

Another simple image. All about emotion here. How excited are they! Photographer: Heather Hawes

Heather's Picks:

To me this is the perfect capture of a maid of honor. She is fastidiously smoothing the bride’s dress before she sees her groom for the first time. This is love between friends --caught on camera. Photographer: Heather Hawes

Most flower girls and ring bearers don’t want anything to do with each other. This couple decided they would get married before the reception started. Photographer: Heather Hawes

Best-of-the-best Getting Ready

For an explanation of best-of-the-best click here.

Aaron's Picks:

Honestly I'm just glad I don't have to pick my favorite engagement session pictures again, that was really hard! For me this was one of the easier categories, although we probably take more images for this category and any other certain ones just stand out to me. There is also a lot more diversity between Heather and I than any other group, she really has different taste than me sometimes.

I can't help it, I really like this shot and I really can't explain why too much. I just don't think I've ever seen this much emotion during the bustling of a dress. Photographer: Aaron Hawes

For me this is all about the candid moment and wonderful color. I rather simple shot that just works. Photographer: Aaron Hawes

In complete contrast from the last shot I like this because of how busy it is. I think it captures how crazy it is with the girls getting ready. Photographer: Aaron Hawes

Heathers Picks:

Children’s furniture and a bride getting her makeup done – so cute. Photographer: Heather Hawes

Photographer: Heather Hawes

Photographer: Heather Hawes

Best-of-the-best Engagements

For an explanation of 2007 Best-of-the-best photos click here.

Aaron's Picks:

So we started with by far the hardest category for me to narrow down. As many of you know engagement session are my favorite part of the whole wedding process. I just love to go out with the couples and just have fun. You can really see how my fashion tendencies come out in these shoots with my picks.

This might actually be my favorite picture of the whole year. Urban shooting is definitely my favorite and this really encompasses my style and wonderful emotion. It's also one of the few times that Heather & I will overlap picks. Photographer: Aaron Hawes

I just love the wonderful genuine emotion from these guys. Photographer: Aaron Hawes

This is one of my favorites for lots of reasons. They have such a strong emotive look and pose. It is also a technically wonderful image, great lines and color. It really works well for me. Photographer: Aaron Hawes

Heather's Picks:

I love how this captures the couple in a private moment. Photographer: Aaron Hawes


They look like models, and I love the clouds. Photographer: Aaron Hawes

If you're willing to make-out in trash it must be love! Photographer: Aaron Hawes

2007 Best-of-the-best Photos

Well it's a new year and Heather & I are so thankful for all of the wonderful couples we got to work with over the last year. It was a year that has shown a lot of growth for us and we have all of you to thank for it.

As the busy season slowly ended we sat down to reflect on all of the images we've captured this year and decided that we wanted to both share our thoughts and show off some of your beautiful events. Heather and I have each gone through and chosen our personal favorite 3 images from 10 categories (Engagement, Getting Ready/Pre-ceremony, Ceremony, Details, Reception, The Couple, Bride Only, Groom Only, Wedding Party, and ending with our overall favorites). We'll spread the posts over the course of January so be sure to check back often. This may seem like quite a bit but considering all of the events we've done and the tens of thousands of images captured it made for some very tough choices. That's also the reason we each chose our own favorites, and simply because we couldn't agree very often.

So please, enjoy. Check back to see if your event makes our favorite list and to see some other wonderful couples. Feel free to leave your comments, we always love to hear from you!

The Picks

1-3-08 Engagements

1-7-08 Getting Ready

1-10-08 Ceremony

1-15-08 Details

1-17-08 Reception

1-21-08 The Couple

1-24-08 Brides

1-29-08 Wedding Party

2-1-08 Grooms

2-4-08 The Final Picks

Caleb & Erin

Caleb & Erin are definitely my kind of couple. They just have fun together and are really up for anything. Anyone who is willing to climb inside the Christmas tree at Union Station, dive into a snow angel, and start a snowball fight at the mere mention is okay in my book. Needless to say they where one of the most fun couples I've shot this year and the pictures just show how much they enjoy each other.

Vacation Pictures... Finally

Well at long last I have finally gotten some vacation pictures looking pretty. For those of you who don't know Heather & I took a much need vacation at the end of November. We did an 11day Eastern Caribbean cruise on the Princess Cruise Lines' Emerald Princess that sailed out of Fort Lauderdale and stopped at Antigua, St. Lucia, Barbados, St. Kitts, St. Thomas, and The Bahamas.

I tried not to take too many pictures as this was a vacation away from photography but of course I still took quite a few. I'll try to throw in a little explanation on some of them but if you want to hear more detail just give us a call! Enjoy.


Our ship, the Emerald Princess docked at St. Lucia.
The docks at Antigua, shot from our balcony. Lots of rainbows that morning.

Our first excursion was zip lining, and it was tons of fun! I can't believe Heather agreed to do it!

We took a pretty long tour on St. Lucia that took us all over the island. The next 9 pictures were taken at their poorest fishing village. This was a little scary because our tour just dumped us in the middle of the village but I got some of my favorite pictures of the cruise here.

I just love this shot. He really wanted to pose when he saw me taking pictures. It cost me $2 but I think it's worth it.

I would swear this dog was posing for me.

I just wanted to post this so you could see what the scene above actually looked like.

After the village we went up around the Pitons and visited this natural hot springs.

Then on to a drive up volcano. Very cool because you could see the bubbling water and steam. Stunk like sulfur though.

When we hit St. Kitts we realized that we hadn't actually been to a beach yet. So we got up early and went to shore in search. The tourist desk recommended we go to Frigate Bay, much to our surprise this was the ugliest beach we had ever seen. At least the water was pretty and I got a couple of nice pictures (not of the beach though).

After the beach we took a private 4wd tour of St. Kitts. This was our favorite tour because it was very private and we stayed off the road for most of it. Our guide even stopped and gave us a picnic with local food and rum. This particular shot was at an old sugar cane plantation.

This was at a different plantation but this building wasn't lived in because they thought it was haunted.

We just thought all these caterpillars were cool.

Looking up in an abandoned windmill.

It wouldn't be a vacation with out Heather showing off the bikini. Taken in The Bahamas.