Lethbridge Weddings & Portrait Photography by Tanya Plonka

When Sital’s dad was young, he did a bunch of photoshoots of himself in various styles just for fun. Sital wanted to recreate this fun idea after seeing her father’s old photos, and the first of these was a colourful summer-themed concept that we did last June. We’ve since done a few including her daughter, but this first photoshoot was all about Sital! :)

For her summer lifestyle portraits, Sital started with a mood board and we communicated back and forth while she was thrift store hunting to find the perfect outfits. Her mood board had lots of food based ideas, so we went with the more colourful restaurants in the city. It’s hard to beat Tacos Made in Mexico for those bright vibes!

Mackenzie was my earliest grad last year for her springtime graduation photos. Everything had only just bloomed in the river bottom so her photos were perfectly timed for spring. She was celebrating her high school convocation here in Lethbridge and her family captured the event with a photoshoot.

From far away, Mackenzie’s dress looked like a shimmery pink. Up close it had the most beautiful and intricate bead work designs, sheer panels as a base to some of the patterns, and the best part of all, pockets! (Brides are at an advantage that they get bouquets to hold for photos, but Mackenzie had the perfect spot to rest her hands.)

Mackenzie was wonderful to work with and up for anything… she had no qualms about climbing over logs or running in her dress!

Raiden and Kendra celebrated the soon to be arrival of their daughter with early spring maternity photos. They personalized the session by including their classic Ford Falcon as a focus point, which may be the best maternity photo prop I’ve had so far!

I’m so glad they were able to add photos in the Helen Schuler nature reserve to the session because it looked amazing on Kendra! The time in between winter and the spring blooms is so complementary to redheads.

“Hand in hand, with fairy grace,
Will we sing, and bless this place.”
-A Midsummer Night’s Dream

If you saw Shakespeare in the Park’s summer performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream in Lethbridge last year, you’ll definitely remember Titania, played by the talented Megan! Between the incredible presence she had as the character and how dreamy her whole look came together, I had to get her to step into the role one more time for a creative photoshoot.

I waited until the wall of leaves turned its vibrant red colour in the fall, knowing it would be a perfect match for Megan’s hair. And it was even more close than I expected!

The most important part of my vision was a light painting portrait once it was dark enough out. Megan and our helper Leslie were amazing and committed – it started snowing on us as soon as we arrived at the final location and I needed Megan to hold still! None of us could feel our hands by the end but it was worth it :)

Gown by Amanda Epp
Makeup by Leslie Van Zwol

To celebrate the end of high school, Brooklyn’s family treated her to a fun session of downtown Lethbridge grad photos. Her mom and brother came along in the beginning for a few photos, then let Brooklyn do her thing! She had wanted an urban location so I chose the city hall area for how many diverse settings it gives. Brooklyn’s baby blue grad dress looked amazing with the local architecture and pops of blue sky, plus she knew how to work it!

One of the biggest projects I worked on last year was with Lethbridge Family Services for their 2020-2021 Annual Report. The report is presented each year in a magazine style with local stories to illustrate their past year. Over several photoshoots, I got to work with many of their staff members and clients (and even got to snuggle a baby Corgi). Their designer let us know what she needed for layouts, and we got to turn each idea into a reality! LFS does great work in the community and it was awesome to see that reflected in the people we photographed.