What prepare’s you for a Las Vegas engagement shoot on New Years Eve weekend? Honestly, nothing can prepare you for what a madhouse it was. City shoots are always tricky, because 1. you have to have a couple that is comfortable with posing with hundreds or thousands of eyes on them. From passer-by tourists to honking horns and creepos yelling from the road, it definitely takes a special personality to handle a shoot in the city. 2. You the photographer have to be ready for anything, as well as all eyes on you. As a wedding photographer, I’m used the fact that I might have some people watching and once I get behind the camera, I’m in my own rectangular world and beyond that I don’t care what is happening or what I look like because it’s just me and the people inside the frame.
When Amanda contacted me about wedding photography, like every couple I asked if there was a place that was special to them, where they got engaged, etc. At first we discussed the possibility of Boston or the Kentucky Derby and when she mentioned those two places, I didn’t care where, I was already packing my bags. But then we talked about later on in the year and it was going to work out to do an engagement shoot in Las Vegas. Our flights were booked just a couple months later and what seemed like a blink of an eye, in 6 months we were meeting up at the hotel and talking about session locations.
December 29th, we met in the early afternoon to begin the session. Like many cities I will of course get some of touristy locations, I mean we flew all the way to Vegas we had to get some by the Bellagio, but it was important that not every picture looked like a tourist type of picture. Why hire a photographer to do that then? And like many cities, the great thing with Vegas is that many of the locations are within walking distance. So we just walked around and would stop at locations as we saw them. Starting in the early afternoon we were going to capture well-lit pictures but because we were in Vegas we had to capture some night time pictures as well so we had plenty of time to walk around and explore. Amanda and Todd were so much fun to work with, as I expected and with the help of their best man and maid of honor there as well, it made it even more enjoyable to just spend some time hanging out as we walked from one location to the other.
Like I mentioned above though, nothing can prepare you for a Las Vegas shoot. Where can you take pictures and where can’t you take pictures? This seemed to be the question at every stop. Outside of a hotel with metal walls we were asked to leave the property because we couldn’t take pictures there. But then you look around and see 30 tourists all taking pictures at that time. We took this as kind of a you can’t take pictures in this exact location, so we just walked over 10 feet and started taking more pictures. The second time we were asked to leave we made sure to jet out of there. We were outside on the sidewalk, who knew you couldn’t take pictures there. Our next location was at the Aria and inside was a really ritzy bar/club area. They had the second floor closed and when we asked if we could go down and do pictures there they were more than happy to let us in. So a huge shout out to the Aria for being so cool!
As the sun set and night came we began out night scene of the shoot. Of course going to the famous “Welcome to Las Vegas” sign which was definitely worth the trip out. Then we ended the night shoot at the Bellagio where we arrived just in time for the light/water show to begin. It was absolutely amazing. And like I said earlier, working with Todd and Amanda out there was so much fun and I’m so thrilled they were on board to going out there for pictures. Part of our brand is providing pictures that are going to be unique and I think we definitely did that by going to Las Vegas. Now I’m sure if you are reading this post you were expecting to see some pictures from the shoot, not just a story. 🙂 Enjoy!
