Their Session: Historic Smithville Park, NJ

It was so much fun getting to photograph this absolutely adorable couple at Historic Smithville Park for SO many reasons! First off, I had the honor of joining my photo bestie, Jennifer Larsen, to photograph Melissa and Chris’ WEDDING a few years ago! Now, Melissa is an amazing photographer herself and we’ve worked together a bunch of times! When her and her hubs said yes to modeling for this mentoring session – where I teach another photographer all about my posing style – I was beyond excited!! Getting to photograph a close friend is always special and seeing how their love has grown since their wedding made the session just that much more amazing!

Their Love Story

Melissa and Chris met through a mutual friend at a bar over the summer. They clicked right away and have been totally locked to one another since! Melissa’s birthday is a special date for more than just the fact that it’s her birthday – it’s the day Melissa and Chris started dating in 2014! In 2017, they visited a downtown area for her birthday like they always love to do to end off their date nights! Since they had already celebrated her birthday the weekend before, she didn’t expect anything! He surprised her by bringing them over to a garden to sit and reading her a thoughtful birthday card that he wrote! He asked her to be his wife at the end! They loved being alone in that moment to just celebrate and soak it all in together!

Melissa & Chris,

I’m SO grateful that you took the time out of your day to hang with us at Smithville Park and model for this shoot! We are both so lucky to have a couple who was as dedicated as we were – I meannnn, rolling around in a field while it’s raining truly can’t be beat! You two are ADORABLE, and it was a pleasure to get you two in front of my camera!!

Marina,

My sweet mentee, Marina, had an amazing vision for the session she wanted from boho style to a mixture of architecture and nature! Historic Smithville is quickly becoming a favorite location of mine after this session. Just wait until the end as it started to drizzle – oooh, this session got EVEN better!

Marina is an incredibly talented photographer who is a digital marketer and a rockstar photographer who is engaged to the love of her life!! She’s such a fun, genuine person who is truly so invested in learning and growing, so we had a blast chatting about everything from posing to Instagram growth strategy and all the nitty-gritty in between! She told me she’s a homebody who loves to travel, which I connected with deeeeeply! I always say I’m an adventurous homebody! 🙂 She said, “I’m a planner, a giver, and a perfectionist. I’m passionate about everything and everyone that I love (which is a long list) and I take a lot of pride in that – 3 of which are…Eating pasta, being in PJ’s and Taylor Swift! :)” Isn’t she the cutest?! Check out her work and give her a follow to keep up with all she’s up to!

Thank you so much for being all in on this mentoring experience with me! I had such a blast getting to know you from soaking in the rain to chatting it up over lunch. You’re such a talented gem and I can’t wait to see all the incredible things you do from here! Keep crushing it, I’m cheering for you!

Loving this rainy sesh?! Check out another gorgeous drizzly day here!

Historic Smithville Couples Session, NJ | Melissa & Chris

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

follow along

on instagram

@torikelner