Last summer, I traveled abroad to second shoot for the amazing Abi Q! She asked me along to a wedding in Buckinghamshire England and it was an amazing and irreplaceable experience. I really do love the opportunity to second shoot because you have a LOT more time to capture behind-the-scenes stuff and lots of candids – something I focus on/adore anyway as a photographer. So basically this wedding was me in heaven. And in England. At the same time! Winning.

Abi has recently launched a mentoring program called Abi Q Teach and I would encourage anyone who is passionate about growing their artistic and photographic selves to check it out – you don’t even have to be in California to take part in it! I feel like I’ve already participated in her teaching venture by working alongside her. The lady knows her stuff, guys, and has really good ideas and a passion that is infectious. Now here’s the cool part: Abi challenged me to shoot the majority, if not all of this wedding with only one lens – the lens that made me least comfortable – the lens I liked the least. As someone who switches lenses every 5 seconds and basically never uses a zoom lens, this was different for me. But I jumped on the idea of pushing myself and finding new avenues to explore. So, I used my 16-35 2.8 L series for 90% of the images you’re about to see. It’s not that I dislike this lens, I just normally ONLY use it for reception photos. So, using only this lens was a huge growing experience! I am really glad I took on Abi’s challenge. (But hey, I also borrowed her 50 1.2 lens a couple times and then had to come back to the US and buy it for myself…. so yeah. You’ll see some images were shot with the nifty fifty. Anyway, onto the images!)

PS, You can see Abi’s blog post of Mandy and Adam’s big day here. Go drool over them. They’re so good.