Love how much these two laugh – they cracked each other up the entire afternoon and I barely had to dig into my usual arsenal of oh-so-hilarious jokes :) We wandered around some of my favorite places in downtown including Little Tokyo, where we happened upon the newly opened ‘lette. I’m usually the first to run towards macarons, but was happily surprised to find Volt & Cecile beelining for the store before me – definitely my kind of clients! :)

Their wedding will be my last for the year and I’m so excited to be there to capture it and celebrate with them!

There are a million and one reasons why I so love and endorse engagement sessions, but the top 4 must go something like this: (1) you get to show the world who you are, (2) in your favorite personalized locations, (3) in your unique “you” clothes, (4) with your best friend and most favorite person in the world (usually your fiance, but I don’t mind if you give me that title too :). And what Nina and Erick showed, lovingly and wholeheartedly, is that they’re Laughers. They laughed from the second I pulled out my camera, as we were chatting in between shots, whenever they caught one another making a silly face – and I would be telling a bold-faced lie if I didn’t say that I LOVED every minute of it (and that it was horribly infectious).

I really adore all the kinds of expressions that seem to come up in a shoot – the serene shots, the sweet smiles, even a more serious moment or two, but my favorites are always the ones with the big, honest laughs. The kinds that remind you of why you’re doing this whole marriage thing in the first place… because who doesn’t want to spend the rest of their life with the one who makes you giggle until your sides hurt & milk comes out of your nose? (The latter didn’t happen on the shoot, but it’s totally happened to me umpteen times, usually with painful things like juice and maybe soup.)

We met up with Nina & Erick in downtown LA, starting off at the Walt Disney Concert Hall, making a detour through the tall fountains of the music center, and ending by MOCA. Thank you Nina & Erick for an afternoon filled with laughter and love!

I love this sculpture in front of MOCA. Totally reminds me of something out of a Studio Ghibli movie.

I am a firm believer in dreams. I believe that if you can imagine something in your mind, you can make it come to fruition. That if you want something with every ounce of your being, you can dream it into a reality. This was the mantra I repeated to myself when I began purusing wedding photography. I repeated it religiously as I picked up my first camera and clumsily fumbled through the controls and cursed my less-than-perfect photos. I reiterated it when I emailed photographers to second-shoot and received a less-than-ideal response. As I excitedly set up my business email only to log in to a less-than-full inbox – for the first few months, I wanted to shake my first at the sky and whine at the world, but I kept the encouraging words in the back of my mind. If you can dream it, you can make it so.

I love meeting people who are following their own dreams, so when Tammy contacted me with her story I was so excited to work with her! She wanted to move from her self-proclaimed “normal desk job” into a career in sports broadcasting and needed some headshots for the occasion. We fittingly did the session at the Walt Disney Concert Hall (what better location than a hall named after such a famous dreamer?), and as we shot I asked her about her goals and aspirations. Her passion shone through as she talked about her love for sports and her highest hopes for the future. Tammy – thank you for sharing a piece of your story with me and best of luck in pursuing your dreams! :)

The metallic walls of the concert hall are stunning, but I was so enamored by the garden! The lush greenery (complete with the most unique colorful flowers) was such a nice contrast to the mod silver walls!