The dress I wanted for my wedding day was $8,000. My mom flatly refused, steering me toward the traditional Asian route of renting a dress for the big day. I hated that dress and would gladly “trash” it given the chance.

My friend Michelle (milaPhotography ) calls her trash the dress sessions, “One More Time.” Since not all “trash the dress” sessions actually TRASH your wedding dress. It just gets exposed to things that normally a wedding dress doesn’t get exposed to on a wedding day — like salt water and sand, paint and cake…

So what are you going to do with your wedding dress? Breed another colony of dust bunnies or pull it out, put it on and do something FUN with it.

When Annette contacted me to do a Trash the Dress session, she told me she wanted to trash her dress two days after her wedding at the beach. IN JANUARY. I told her it might be cold, but as long as she didn’t care, seeing as she was the one getting in the water, I was up for it. Lucky for her, it was 75 degrees that day. (Hello, California!)

So, with perfect weather and perfect sunset, we frolicked in the waves and amused the beach goers who normally don’t get to see a bride and groom swimming fully clothed in wedding attire.

CONTACT ME to schedule your trash the dress session! 951.264.1710

It’s been 10 WHOLE months since our first Photog Shootout and wow, in retrospect, as I look at the old photographs, I  never imagined what the shootout has become. I’m humbled and awed at the response that we have gotten from the entire photographic community.

Our mission remains the same as the very first shootout in January – learn, network, build our portfolios and each other. We started with 10 and as of today, we have over 500 members in the SoCal Photog Shootout group on Facebook. Our last three events have sold out in a matter of hours. If you have no idea what I am talking about, head over HERE to check us out! Also, go check out the new national website: www.photogshootout.com

We meet every EVEN numbered month and October’s event was so epic, I felt like I planned an entire wedding! Except with 6 wedding dresses, 6 brides, 2 grooms,  80 dinner guests and a limited budget. Wait till you see what we think up next!

Of course, I could not have pulled this off without the help of:

~ Jay’s Catering and Mary Lallande: Mary found us the venue and got permission for us to use it. She knows all the great wedding and event venues in SoCal. Jay’s was just voted #1 Caterer for the OC and provided the fabulous dinner.

~ Bella Collina: This venue is remodeling their grounds and building an ampitheater for weddings and events. They  generously allowed us the use of their grounds and ballroom.

~ Kacee Geoffroy Makeup Designs: Kacee is no stranger to our shootouts because she is AMAZING and she makes our models’ hair and make-up look fabulous. She also helped style the event.

~Kim Bragalone: Kim helped us with makeup and was awesome.

~ Bows-n-Berries Hairbands: The gorgeous hairpieces that the models are wearing are custom designed by Heather, She is branching out her business to include couture hairclips and headbands for women and brides. They were so cute, I’m NOT GIVING THEM BACK AND YOU CAN’T MAKE ME.

~ Florist: Jay Jensen Floral Design: At the last minute, Jay came through and provided the exquisite bouquets our girl’s are carrying

~ Avery J Productions: wait till you see the fantastic shootout video Shannon is making for us this time. It will be posted here soon.

~ The Models: Lindsey Addie, Stevie, Joe, Tiffany, Micah, Chelsea, Shannon, and Megan

It’s bittersweet to plan a large event, as you get to be the one in charge and not really get to shoot, but as I was running around, I made sure I ran around to each group and fired off a few shots. Not my best work, but if you want to see some awesomeness, go over to the Facebook Photo Album and see what the other 79 photogs got!

This is just one of the 6 groups:

Before we destroyed over $6,000 worth of dresses and clothing, I figured we should photograph them in all their glory.

The weather was amazing- no rain and beautiful clouds!

Let the trashing begin:
Cake, anyone?

Water.

The pond water was green and it was 65 degrees by the way. Chelsea was a great sport.

Don’t be offended. It wasn’t my idea. You can thank Chris Diset for his morbid-ness.

Dirrrrrrty.

Painting:

Special Thanks to Joe Photo for speaking to us (pictured here with rockstars Sara France and DotMan):

P.S. You should trash your wedding dress too. Come on, are you gonna wear it again? Contact me for details!

Still able to fit in her size 0 wedding dress, with near perfect skin (she’s an esthetician) and gorgeous features, I knew I wanted to get Sarah in front of my camera. And thankfully she loved the trash the dress idea. It also doesn’t hurt that not only do Sarah and Mark look like models, they are natural models in front of the camera, too.

For those of you who don’t know, a “trash the dress” session is where you put on your wedding dress and have some fun – not caring if we dirty it up a bit and ignoring the surprised/confused/amused looks of the dry cleaners when you bring in a sand covered, salt water-fied wedding dress. This was my first TTD session and it was so much fun. If any of you ladies want to do trash your dress, let’s get creative and do it!

You’ve seen this one before, but it’s my favorite EVER.

We went for the “shipwrecked” theme:

Sarah was such a good sport. The water was really COLD!

Special thanks to my friend Michelle of mila photography for coming along!