Lethbridge Portrait & Wedding Photography & Design by Tanya Plonka

Today I had the pleasure of doing a photo session with a woman out of Edmonton who has a fantastic name: Tanya! Once you get over the awkward “Hi Tanya, this is Tanya” on the phone, you stop noticing :)

Tanya (her, not me) wanted to show that she’s a hot mama (and boy is she ever!) so she braved the chilly wind in her sexy blue dress. Luckily the sun popped out a few times, and we could keep her coat nearby when needed. Summer is soooo close, but needs to hurry up a bit more!

She has such an amazing, huge, sparkling white smile and is full of positive energy, so I had to snap quickly to get the more serious shots… but I definitely prefer the smiling ones :)

Here is a quick peak at the shoots I did while in Boston!

I have not taken a self-portrait I have been happy with in years, which has been nagging at me since it is ALL I used to do. My last night in the hotel proved to be productive!

Hoo boy, it seems a little strange posting photos of Kelsie in total white out when it’s finally warm outside, but sometimes I get a little behind in my personal work! I think the problem is that I hate winter. I hate winter a lot. During winter, I tried to be in denial that it was happening. Every time I’d open Lightroom and see these photos of Kelsie in the snow (and trust me, they came up a lot since we did them on New Years Day), I’d feel so cold and want summer, so I tried to pretend the photos weren’t there. Now that it’s officially spring, winter and I are kind of on speaking terms again. You know, like when you run into an ex and you say a polite hello, then continue on your way, but complain to your friends about it later? Winter and I are kind of like that right now.

Anyhow, Kelsie was as beautiful and sexy as always, and it wasn’t THAT cold compared the other days that week (a smokin’ hot -15C!) but cold enough I can definitely admire her for doing these. If it looks like she has dandruff, it’s just snow I got sick of Photoshopping out!

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I really wanted to do a photo shoot when I went to Las Vegas, so I was thrilled to find out Erin would be there while I was, along with one of her sisters, Krista, and her mom, Verna. I photographed Erin’s wedding to Jonathan last summer with Litwin Photography, and will be shooting her sister Bethany’s wedding this upcoming summer (my last Litwin booking), so I’ve come to know the family quite well!

Verna didn’t want to be in the photos, but Krista was easy to talk into doing a few with her sister. In my limited location scouting time, I picked out the Forum Shops at Caesar’s Palace as our location, and was really glad I did! In under an hour we shot outside AND on all three levels of that part of the mall, so we got tons of awesome shots.

Ideally, I would have kicked all the other people out of the area and gotten some cool photos on the spiral escalators, but well… maybe one day when I’m famous and have that sort of pull ;)

I was also really disappointed that no one else tried to jump into our photos like when Sarah and I did our shoot! I guess this time, we shot too early in the evening for passerbys to be drunk!

Thanks, girls, for being my models!

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Now that the gift has been given, I have permission to post some of these photos ;)
(That, and I’m starting to catch up after being at WPPI in Vegas.)

Brenda did this photoshoot for her husband as a surprise for Valentine’s Day, and she was so excited about them that she had to show him a few days earlier! Brenda was so fun to work with, and I loved her funky hair… it wasn’t too surprising to learn that she is a hair stylist!

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On Sunday I got to partake in one of the most exciting shoots I’ve ever done! A group of photographers made up of Lethbridge folk and Calgary Strobists got together with the U of L swimming team, a group of models, a fashion designer (Caitlin Power), a makeup artist, and a scuba diver (Chris) for what can only be described as epic. Michael Warf, Kevin Logan, Cody Belter, and I split off to do head shots of the swimmers while the other photogs set up for the fashion shoot, and then we all headed to the dive take window to take part. All the models and swim team must really be commended for the great work they did… their jobs were not easy!

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