We make no secret of the fact that our time is prioritized for our wedding clients, and that leaves little time left over for things like family sessions. We photograph most of our family sessions twice a year at our mini session marathon events, and that works really well for us. But let me tell you, when a fellow photographer is willing to drive 4 hours to see us for the second year in a row to get her family pictures made, we will ALWAYS make time for that!
Last year for Mari & Nathan’s anniversary portraits, Mari brought a huge pink tutu. This year… she brought a baby.Sweet Ascher is nearly 6 months old, and the smiliest little chunk I’ve ever seen! We had so much fun catching up with these awesome people, and we’re already coming up with ways we can make next year’s session even better.
Enjoy a few of my favorites!
Isn’t he delicious??
Kudos to Mari for convincing Nathan to haul the big orange couch all the way from Odessa… totally worth it!
Hot mama!!
SOOO cute, right??
Stay tuned… this may be a light blog week, but tomorrow’s post will be a glimpse of something pretty magical.
Mari Thomas -Did you hear my squeal?! I’m in love. Thank you both for our first family pictures. We wouldn’t trust them to anyone else. And that’s saying something, considering how many photographers we know in our area! We will be back every year, one way or another!!
Ok, now I’m going to stare at these all day and cry.
June 4, 2013 - 9:13 am
Bethe-That last one of the baby on the big orange couch – if I were them, I’d have a giant print of that in my house, and it would be my Christmas card. Such a cutie!
June 4, 2013 - 9:17 am
LeighAnn -That couch, that baby and his hair are all precious!!
June 4, 2013 - 9:24 am
Melissa -Great shoot Chelsea, adorable family memories for them. Made me smile all the way through!
June 4, 2013 - 9:33 am
Megan Gray -That baby is so cute! Seriously though, the couch makes it.
June 4, 2013 - 9:49 am
Will -Giant orange couch and chubby baby legs are fried pickles and ranch= perfect for each other. Great job, y’all!
June 4, 2013 - 1:53 pm
Mari Thomas -I am not getting ANYTHING done today because I just keep looking through these!
June 5, 2013 - 2:11 pm
Amy -I kinda wanna eat up that little cute baby. Great pics!
Another Saturday, another storm… except for McG clients! Once again we managed to dodge the forecasted rain, and had BEAUTIFUL weather for Carmen & Ryan’s big day in Dallas. Mack and I remarked to each other all day long that this was one of the smoothest, easiest, happiest weddings we’d ever photographed. It truly was ALL about these two precious people and their love!
We’ll have TONS more to share from this gorgeous wedding later in the week, but in the meantime, here’s a little peek at how bride Carmen spent her day:
When we walked in, she was calm & kind & getting ready for her big moment…
Then she got to walk across the street and meet up with the love of her life…
We got to shoot some lovely portraits in Belo Garden and around the SMU campus…
They pledged themselves to each other in a gorgeous ceremony at Perkins Chapel…
Then they celebrated with their guests at City Club, complete with McG-approved lime centerpieces.
Congratulations, Carmen & Ryan! You’ve been a joy to work with, and we hope your Mexican honeymoon is off to an incredible start!
Carmen -These pictures are indescribable and I’m so glad you guys were there to capture the most magical day of our lives. There truely is no way to properly express our gratitude to both of you for everything you guys have done for us. No better choice was made in this wedding process than picking McG (besides choosing each other of course ha!) Thank you guys so much and I can’t wait to see more!!!
We spent last Saturday with Alex & Chris, celebrating their wedding along with great friends & family. The rain chased us around all day, forcing us to take cover inside, but thank goodness the Palace Arts Center at the Lancaster Theater in Grapevine has gorgeous light! No matter the kinks that came up throughout the course of the evening, Alex seemed unflappable… being married to her love at the end of the day was all that mattered!
A dress with a rather robust train requires the tallest bridesmaid to stand on the bed! Protect the hair at all costs!
While it rained & rained outside, Alex & Chris saw each other for the first time in the lobby of the Palace Arts Center…
And then YAY! It stopped raining for just a few minutes… long enough to walk around one block of downtown Grapevine and get a little green in our portraits.
Just a few blocks away is FUMC Grapevine, where the happy couple’s wedding ceremony took place inside the Founder’s Chapel.
Mr. & Mrs. Judge!
The bride’s mother surprised the newlyweds with a horse drawn carriage ride back to their reception… riding in style!
These little dessert martinis were so cute, and smelled heavenly. It was all I could do not to gobble them up before the party had even started!
Sarah wins the McG award for Funniest Maid of Honor Speech in 2013 so far… absolutely hilarious girl!
Congratulations, you two! According to Instagram, you’re having an absolutely killer honeymoon in St. Lucia, and you totally deserve it.May this just be the start of a lifelong adventure together!
Chris & Alex -We love all of our photos, the wedding was captured perfectly! The action photos are all so fun & the ones of just the two of us really show how happy we were for that day. Thank y’all!
May 31, 2013 - 12:58 pm
Sarah (MOH) -LOVE LOVE LOVE! Great job!
June 1, 2013 - 3:23 pm
maggie -love all of these and the bride is so pretty! great job!!!
Thursday, May 30, 2013 6:00 amPosted in Engagements
Where is this year flying off to? It’s nearly June, we’re shooting all our Spring 2014 couples’ engagement sessions… YEESH, I can’t keep up!
We met Jennifer & Matt in Fort Worth last week, and the clouds met us, too. It was muggy & dark, but we still had a great time! Enjoy a few of my faves :
Thanks for coming out, Jennifer & Matt! The year between now & your wedding will FLY by… just wait & see.
I feel like we’re pretty darn good at what we do– we capture real life happening in relationships. And I’m really proud of that work, because it’s something that can last for generations, and help your kids and grandkids appreciate who you were “way back when you got married”. But Chelsea’s wicked good at this other thing, too… and the work she does on the Girls on Film side of our business is a real blessing for women and their relationships. She’s kindof amazing.
But that leaves me in a bit of a weird spot– Typically, girls don’t want me hanging around during their boudoir sessions, and I wouldn’t be as good as Chelsea anyhow. So I have this little chunk of creativity left over, and all of this camera gear not doing anything of an evening. Time to put it to work
I got inspired to shoot some night sky images by a discussion Chelsea and I had regarding decorating our bedroom. We wanted some sort of grand starfield image with some lyrics overlaid (more on that later), so I started searching through Google Images to see what was out there. Holy crap. There are people who are SO much better than what I’m about to show you guys! But I just HAD to try it.
My first attempt was on the blog back in March, and I felt really good about it. Since then, I’ve gone out a number of times, dodging the weather, cycle of the moon, and light pollution to try to capture a few more. Here’s what I’ve been working on:
This first image is what happens when you’re taking a shot, and a rancher yells at you to get off his driveway… Whoops! Lesson=learned. Great stars, no foreground!
You also have to watch out for those pesky planes in your images…
That last shot is OK, but I REALLY love the time lapse captured during the exposures… check out those clouds!
The next few have a delightful accident — cow silhouettes! I didn’t even realize they were in that field until one nearly trampled me…
This frame from the above composite had a really wicked meteorite!
And these final two were captured after Meagan & Cody’s wedding in Odessa– The sky is a bit brighter than I would’ve liked, but we were feeling adventurous!
So all that to say that I’ve been working getting something good enough to mount in our bedroom– and I think I might finally have it. What do you think?
Note: By request, these are now available for purchase on the McGowan Images Art Gallery. Except that last one– because that’s for me.
Mad -Very, VERY cool Mack! Any of them would look awesome, big and on a wall!
May 29, 2013 - 6:58 am
Kendall -Those are wicked! The space geek in me has my fingers crossed that a lot of these images will be on the Art print site soon!
May 29, 2013 - 8:07 am
Kari -Seriously. Nothing short of amazing.
May 29, 2013 - 8:25 am
Leslie -Impressive, Mack! Very cool!
May 29, 2013 - 8:35 am
Todd -These are great! If I lived in the country this is what I’d be doing too. These are do much fun to try and get! When are you going to try light painting?
May 29, 2013 - 8:47 am
Liesa -Fantastic and cool in every way. It’s like modern Van Gogh. Love it!!
May 29, 2013 - 9:17 am
Ambo -Me & Jason were just on the gallery site last night trying to agree on art for the house, can’t wait to show him these…we might ACTUALLY agree on something
Great job Mack!!!
May 29, 2013 - 9:58 am
Jordyn Pitts -These are AMAZING!!!
May 29, 2013 - 10:01 am
Ann -Seriously awesome work there Mack! The windmill speaks to my heart being the daughter of a girl who grew up in west Texas/panhandle.
Kevin-Nice work Mack! I am mostly amused by the statement “working around the moon phases.” Stupid moon and cloudy nights need to get on the same page. Oh and stupid planes too! Not sure why they have to fly all up in the frame and photo-bomb a good startrail. Cows FTW!!!
May 29, 2013 - 1:59 pm
Stephanie Rogers -Wow! Your leftover creativity is stunning! I am blown away, and this is truly inspiring.
May 29, 2013 - 7:00 pm
Courtney -So. Wickedly. Awesome. Mack, these are stunning and totally epic! You McG’s…. You NEVER cease to amaze me.
May 29, 2013 - 8:22 pm
Ram G -Uh-huh-huh…you said “good enough to mount in our bedroom”. But seriously, I love ‘starry night’ photos and these kick ass!
May 30, 2013 - 2:02 pm
Will -Great job. Talent and weather and patience and design all meet in an incredible way! It’s so fun to watch y’all do different things in new and fresh ways!
by Chelsea
Mari Thomas - Did you hear my squeal?! I’m in love. Thank you both for our first family pictures. We wouldn’t trust them to anyone else. And that’s saying something, considering how many photographers we know in our area! We will be back every year, one way or another!!
Ok, now I’m going to stare at these all day and cry.
Bethe - That last one of the baby on the big orange couch – if I were them, I’d have a giant print of that in my house, and it would be my Christmas card. Such a cutie!
LeighAnn - That couch, that baby and his hair are all precious!!
Melissa - Great shoot Chelsea, adorable family memories for them. Made me smile all the way through!
Megan Gray - That baby is so cute! Seriously though, the couch makes it.
Will - Giant orange couch and chubby baby legs are fried pickles and ranch= perfect for each other. Great job, y’all!
Mari Thomas - I am not getting ANYTHING done today because I just keep looking through these!
Amy - I kinda wanna eat up that little cute baby. Great pics!