I always get nervous about shooting a session entirely in film. So far I’ve only done that for styled shoots, so that in case I really messed things up, at least it wasn’t a paying customer….and I also made sure to have other photographers shooting digital with me so that our amazing vendors would still get images, if something were to go tragically wrong.

Waiting for the film scans from the M&M Retreat Styled Shoot was no exception. I kept having moments of panic, wondering if perhaps my film would get lost in the mail, or if it had somehow gotten ruined while flying back from Idaho, or if I had just plain old done something really wacky with my metering and they would all turn out terrible/overexposed/too grainy/other terrible things.

Luckily the day my film scans were due back I was so busy with the boys and household errands that I didn’t have time to check my email every 30 minutes like I usually do when it’s Scan Day. Pulling up the email with my film images is like Christmas morning, every single time. I get to relive the magic, surprise myself, and fall in love all over again. Yes, I made errors. Yes I had shots I threw out. Yes I had to color correct some. But man, are some of these shots truly exquisite.

This shoot is of course a special one to me, for several reasons. One, it’s in Idaho. It’s not often I get to shoot beautiful portraits in Idaho (but when I do, it’s always with Michelle). Plus, when I left Maryland it was still SUMMER. Hot, green, and humid. But as Michelle and I drove farther north to Island Park, the trees exploded with oranges and yellows and the air turned crisp and clean. I could not wait to get my camera on those colors!

Speaking of colors….I almost can’t believe what film did with some of the blues and yellows in some of these images! I just could not replicate that with digital, even if I tried!

Another reason I loved this session is because I got to teach throughout it, and shoot alongside so many other talented photographers. I got to capture the amazing work of other creatives, too, such as those behind Paisley Cakes, The Rose Shop, Sarah Pearl Studio, and Signature Party Rental, not to mention our incredibly gorgeous, patient, kind, and cheerful models, Taylor and Adam.