About 3 years ago, I came across a set of documentary images by a good friend of mine, Daniel Shaw, who captured an amazing documentary of his wife giving birth to their son.  Being the father, it was easy for him to be front and center, and the emotion and pure wonder of child birth was captured with striking imagery.  Since then I have always wanted to document an actual birth, and I finally mustered up the guts to do it.

My experience was a whirlwind of 20 hours that is still quite vivid in my memory.  They arrived 8pm the night before, and Cason was finally born around 2:15pm the next day. I got very little sleep, but, I didn’t mind.  I loved just being able to be there, in the same room as the family, and experience life’s most amazing and sacred events.  Maybe I didn’t sleep because I wanted to know what it might feel like to not sleep at all, to help me put myself in a father’s shoes moments before the birth of his first child.  In short, I walked away completely amazed at the miracle of life, and how amazing both Kelly and Roger are.  Thank you so much for letting me be part of something so special, I will never forget it!

Now, this is the first time I’ve created a slideshow for the blog, would love your thoughts and I’m sure the new mom & dad would love to hear your thoughts as well!

“O! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved home and the war’s desolation!
Blest with victory and peace, may the heav’n rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: “In God is our trust.”
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!”

I hope we all (Americans or citizens living in this amazing land) remember the many, many great and very serious sacrifices of the men that signed the Declaration of Indepence and the many thousands that fought to protect our Freedom.  I believe that we live in a land that was preserved by God and it is our duty to help keep that reason prominent in our minds and across the nation.

Now, what better way to celebrate this great nation than by sharing what I believe to be at the core of our mortal existence, and the fundamental core of our nation: the family.  The Greer family contacted me a while back about creating family portraits that were very dear and important to them.  Shannon mentioned that it could very well be some of the very last portraits where the entire family is together and I thank them for trusting me with such an important occasion.  If you know them, you’ll know that they have an AWESOME family and I was proud to be able to help create something so meaningful!  Thanks again, look forward to working with you all in the future!

We photographed a LOT of individual families, some fun a crazy individual portraits, a LARGE group photo, and even a group portrait where ALL the grandkids are smiling . . . that’s an accomplishment itself  Hope you enjoy!

I LOVED these, there are so many more too, this is just a tip of the iceberg of fun

Aren’t they a good looking family?

And the reason this all started, they are 2 awesome people with one amazing family, thanks Greers!

Katy from Couture Makeup is not only an extremely talented makeup artist (that has worked with me on a few weddings), but an overly nice and awesome person to just be around  Katie wanted a different look for her headshots and we decided to shoot it on film for a look that digital just can’t achieve.  If you are getting married, you owe it to yourself to give Katy a call and see why she is so awesome at what she does!

I shot some film with this set too, can you pick out the film vs digital shots?