Danessa's Senior Portraits

With only hours to spare, the sweet new gear arrived to get Danessa's pictures done right. Danessa and older sisters Danika and Dantae had a great time scouting locations on their ranch and helping set up the shots. I'm pretty sure I was spoiled into thinking I will always need two assistants. We had a blast and got some pretty neat pictures.

When I talked to Danessa's mom earlier in the week to ask if they had any locations in mind she said there was just an awful lot of junk laying around. Perfect!! Junk is cool and I hope to have my own someday :) For the shot above we worked with some foliage growing on one side of an old house, currently used for storage. Classic senior pose - check!


Then we shot a few pictures by an old windbreak. For as smiley and happy as she is, Danessa can do serious pictures! I think it was harder for me to maintain composure than her - she rocked.

I realize that this picture probably won't make the yearbook, but I couldn't help myself. Besides being related, I was also Danessa agriculture teacher for several years and this face I saw many times. In true youngest-child fashion here's her "It Wasn't Me" - hehe...

It seemed like a central theme throughout the afternoon and evening was a mixture of "Glam Danessa" and "Ranch Danessa". She is one hard-working ranch girl who loves to ride horse, break calves and shear sheep (right?) but also loves getting all glammed up for rodeo queen contests, prom and special events. Here's a sneak peak at next year's prom dress!!

I took a ton of pictures with the horses, and this one is by far my favorite. We hope to try a few more toward the end of summer but we'll leave those ideas as a surprise. I couldn't get over how awesome her blue dress looked in the bright green grass. So cool.

Definitely one of my favorites. This is a road that Danessa probably travels several times a day between "places" on the ranch. How cool is it that she'll be able to show her friends and family where she grew up by using pictures like these? It makes me want to go home and take some of where I was raised.

And this - a little attitude, right?! What teenage girl hasn't been told to take off the heels or flip flops and put something a little more practical on? Just because its cool, doesn't mean it is a good idea. Except in this case...

Thanks again to Danessa and sisters for being troopers! We took pictures until there was barely any light left in the sky and we had been eaten by mosquitos. But (I think) we all had a great time and came away with some pretty cool images.

Note to other seniors interested in pictures for this school year - I'll be taking some time off in September/October so if you want summer foliage (the green stuff) we should book sessions before school starts.