WEST VIRGINIA COUPLES PHOTOGRAPHER | FAIRMONT, WV

I Don't Want You to Look in Love. I Want You to Be in Love.

I don't want to turn your relationship into somebody else's Pinterest board.

I don't care if you're wildly affectionate or aggressively allergic to PDA. If you've been together six months or sixteen years. If your version of romance is handwritten letters and candlelit dinners or sending each other increasingly unhinged TikToks from opposite ends of the couch.

I want the two of you to look like the two of you.

The way you laugh together. The way you touch without thinking about it. The stupid inside jokes I won't understand. The look that means please get me the fuck out of this conversation. The quiet stuff. The loud stuff. The weird shit.

I'll give you direction when you need it.

But I'm not here to teach you how to look like you're in love.

You already know how to do that.

Yeah.

So is basically everyone who isn't professionally photographed for a living.

You don't need to arrive knowing what to do.

I'm not going to drop you in the middle of a field, yell “BE ROMANTIC!” from fifty feet away, and hope for the best.

I'll tell you where the good light is. I'll fix your hands when they've suddenly become foreign objects attached to your body. I'll give you direction when you need it and something to do when standing there thinking about the camera is making everything worse.

But eventually?

You'll stop paying quite so much attention to me.

You'll start talking shit to each other.

Somebody will laugh for real.

You'll reach for each other without me asking.

And that's when the photographs stop looking like a photoshoot and start looking like you.

You Don't Have to Perform Romance for Me.

Some couples are touchy.

Some aren't.

Some will make out in the middle of the street without a second thought.

Some show affection by roasting the absolute shit out of each other.

Some relationships are loud and playful.

Some are quiet and soft.

Some are sexy.

Some are goofy.

Most are a weird combination of all of the above.

There isn't a correct way to look in love.

So I'm not going to force you into somebody else's version of it.

Because here's the thing.

You can put on cute outfits, meet me in a field at golden hour, and make beautiful photographs.

I fucking love a good field.

But that's not the only way to do this.

We could...

Get pizza and wander around downtown.

Go to the arcade and become unnecessarily competitive.

Make breakfast together in your kitchen.

Hit a bookstore and pick terrible books for each other.

Grab drinks at your favorite bar.

Go hiking somewhere ridiculous.

Hit up a thrift store & dress each other in ridiculous outfits.

Rent a boat.

Go fishing.

Get ice cream and inevitably make a mess.

Set up a picnic.

Go stargazing.

Ride horses.

Hit a record store.

Go swimming.

Cook dinner at home.

Bring the dogs and accept that they'll probably become the main characters.

Or recreate your first date.

Go back to where you met.

Spend the evening somewhere that means absolutely nothing to anyone else but everything to you.

Or tell me:

“Aireal, we have no fucking idea. We like tacos and being outside.”

Excellent.

I can work with tacos and outside.

Your session doesn't need to be an elaborate production.

It just needs to give you enough room to forget that you're supposed to be having your picture taken.

Because I'm not particularly interested in photographing sixty minutes of you performing for me.

I'd much rather photograph the two of you having a fucking blast together.

I don't photograph an idea of love. I photograph the specific weird little language the two of you have built together.

EMBRACE YOUR PLAYFULNESS

EMBRACE INTIMACY

EMBRACE NOSTALGIA

Some places already belong to your relationship.

Shelby + Danyell love exploring Dolly Sods together, so we didn't choose it because it was pretty. We chose it because it was theirs.

Your favorite trail. The town where you met. The bar where you had your first date. Your own kitchen.

A location doesn't have to mean anything to anyone else.

It just has to mean something to you.

You don't need to be engaged.

You don't need an anniversary coming up.

You don't need to be announcing anything.

You don't need matching outfits, a Pinterest board, or an Instagram caption explaining why you did this.

Being in love with somebody is enough of a fucking reason to have photographs together.

Maybe you've been dating eight months.

Maybe you've been married twenty years.

Maybe you realized the only photographs you have together are selfies, wedding photos, and pictures somebody's mom took at Christmas.

Maybe life is really fucking good right now.

That's worth remembering too.

And Yeah. I Mean Every Kind of Couple.

Queer couples aren't a special category around here.

I'm queer. My business is proudly LGBTQIA+ inclusive, and I don't need your relationship translated into heterosexual photography poses.

I'm not going to decide who gets the “masculine pose,” who should be more affectionate, who leads, or what your relationship is supposed to look like.

You tell me who you are.

I'll photograph that.

Couples sessions begin at $399. Most couples choose the $549 Sundance Collection, which gives us up to an hour to actually settle in and make something together.

Want multiple locations, outfits, or a bigger adventure? Sunfinity gives us room to make a whole fucking day of it.