By Scott and Monique,

I know, the title is a little lame, but they tell me those words are important for that SEO thingy. Actually it was Colin and Hope’s 10-year wedding anniversary and they wanted to do some fun pictures. Their original wedding photos didn’t really turn out so hot, and apparently involved a flaky photographer, some cloak-and-dagger tracking maneuvers and legal action just to get some messed up negatives.  When Colin’s sister got married at Squaw Valley recently, he didn’t want her to have to go through what he went through, so he recommended me to shoot her wedding and we had a great time. I kayak a lot, and Colin is the head of special projects at Jackson kayaks, so we have known each other for a while from the river and skiing. We were really looking forward to this shoot because Colin and Hope are mostly fearless and we knew that the river had to be involved in many of the pictures, as well as some stand up paddle boarding on Lake Tahoe, one of Hope’s favorites. We scouted a popular after work kayak run on the South Yuba which should be roaring by now, but due to the low snowfall was just a trickle and thought that would look great with the dogs. More on them later. Also, due to low water, we could get in position below the one big rapid, Tombstone. Knowing Colin, the big trick was going to be getting some pictures that actually look sweet and romantic without him cracking up in the middle of it or making funny faces or snarky comments. Monique pulled that off quite well, much to my surprise.

I knew the river was going to be a key player for this shoot, so we scouted a spot where we could get in position below a favorite rapid, Tombstone on the summit run of the S. Yuba.

Colin and Hope love their dogs. Their dogs are sometimes quite crazy. They really wanted them in some of the pictures so we found a calm section of the S. Yuba river with wide open granite fields and let the dogs out of the car. They immediately took Hope down!

We got about 5 minutes of pictures with the dogs before they made a beeline right into the river.

Then immediately came out of the river and I could see this coming a mile away. I love dogs in wedding photos

Finally the dogs calmed a bit for some nice pictures

So this was my first attempt with this cool reflection I saw. The idea was to have Colin and Hope and the dogs walking along the rocks past me. The dogs saw it different and charged me through the puddle.

This was more what I was aiming for in the first place.

These were Monique’s idea. Once the clouds floated over the sun and softened the light, we made a beeline for this series.

These guys grew up along whitewater on the East Coast. Fortunately, they had no problems getting into all the difficult locations we asked of them.

This is another of my favorites. Monique was determined to get some romantic shots or die trying. I had my money on die trying, but she nailed it.

We ended the day on stand up paddle boards on Lake Tahoe. The wind was kicking up making the water a little choppy so we worked fast. Like the Chacos?

There are times when a polarizing filter can make or break a shot. Water like this at Lake Tahoe is one of them.

Colin and I are both competitive freestyle kayakers. Difference is, he has a cool belt buckle to prove it!

Can we get two on a board? Ooops

Actually, we meant to do that