Dennis and Julia

We headed down to Pittsburgh yesterday to shoot Dennis and Julia's engagement photos. I'd never been to Pittsburgh before, and Rich has only driven through, so we were pretty excited to explore the city. I have to say, I came away very impressed with the city, but there was actually more snow on the ground down there than there was in Buffalo! So, I just wanted to point that out because my entire life, when people find out where I'm from, the immediate reaction is, "Oh! You get a lot of snow!" So, at least for now, Pittsburgh is snowier.

We had some excitement when we first got into town, too. I heard this weird :snap: sound and looked over as this GIANT light pole nearly fell on a car about 50 feet away from us. Luckily, that was not a sign of things to come at all. We had a totally awesome time planning our shoot over lunch.

First, we headed down to a waterfront park, right across from Heinz Field. Julia and Dennis first met in college, but lost touch. Years later, they ran into each other at a Steelers game, and then, again, the next week at church - and they eventually started dating (Dennis admits he totally stalked Julia for a while until they started dating...but that's okay, though, Rich totally stalked me too :) ) . We hung out and took some portraits with our very brave, shivering couple. Ummm, notice the snow piled by the stairs -- they didn't wear jackets the majority of the day!

My point-of-view above, Rich's below. We love shooting together because it allows us the flexibility of taking one event and seeing it in multiple ways. We have a few versions of that going on from this shoot that we'll show you in a minute...

The one tree with leaves in the park. I think we officially can't pretend we're shooting in the fall anymore. You see how Rich "warmed" the shot up in Photoshop?

Here's the second instance of us shooting the exact same thing, completely differently. Rich went with the silhouette using a telephoto lens, and I went for the architectural point-of-view. Best part - we were standing directly next to each other :).

We wandered around downtown a bit and headed into this mini-park above the restaurant where Julia and Dennis had their second date. Rich and my first date (no joke) was to watch the Passion of the Christ. So, not really first-date material, and we were laughing about that with Julia and Dennis, and as it turned out, that was the first movie they watched together, as well! What an really strange coincidence! Anyway, at the site of their second date was this park with this really cool tree.

And fun vines...

And, for one very brief moment, the sun made an appearance!

And across the street was this random giant orange public art piece. Rich says it looked like a wacky 70s-era piece, so he went with that feel for the processing.

Then we took a coffee break -- since it varied between 31 and 33 all day (every time we passed a time/temperature sign, the masochist in me couldn't help but look!), it was very needed. Then we headed into Dennis' neighborhood. We stopped in this garden by the coffeehouse, and Rich and I both took almost identical shots for the blog... including which ones were black and white! I thought it was funny that sometimes we see things so differently, and then sometimes, we're seeing it exactly the same!

Rich up, me down.

Rich up, me down! (Rich's note: I love processing photos to make them JUUUST right - but you always hope for a shot like the one right above this sentence. I saw it, shot it, and that's exactly how it looked coming out of the camera, no cropping or touching up - they just looked that good!)

So, Dennis and Julia, being big Pittsburgh fans, really wanted a shot with the city skyline in the background. We headed over to this park, and I saw this fantastic bridge I wanted them to walk across... of course, I probably should've thought about the decline of the bridge and the layer of ice covering it! Sorry, again, Dennis!!

A crazy, awesome relief/mural on the side of a building!

And that does it from our time in Pittsburgh! Thanks, again, Julia and Dennis, for having us come down and for showing us around. We had a blast and can't wait to see you guys again. You really do have a great little city, and you are a spectacular couple. We'll talk to you soon!