Gear is gear.  The road to success in the arts is not the latest and greatest in gear or trends. My opinion of the road to success is strength in vision, presentation, and willingness to put the work in. Chase Jarvis coined the phrase, “The best camera is the one in your hands.” I fully believe that quote. That said, I also LOVE gear! 

I tend to trade in full-camera systems when I read about or physically test-drive a different lens. I don’t switch to upgraded camera bodies or the “newest” rage in photography. It is the lens that makes me want to switch. Or it is a new system perhaps?

***My first switch was from my Nikon F5s to a Fuji finepix Pro S3 digital camera in 2005. I was a Nikon nerd and Fuji was built from the Nikon F60 and F80 bodies, This allowed me to keep my F-mount Nikkor lenses while stepping into the digital realm. 

***A few years later in 2008, I played with a certain lens from Canon. It was an 85mm f/1.2 L. The next day I traded in my Nikkor lenses and Fuji finepix and purchased the new Canon 5d markii and the 85mm 1.2L and 70-200 2.8L. Beautiful images for sure! A true workhorse of a system. 

***2014 rolled around and Fuji released its XT-1 mirrorless system. I switched! I felt like I was getting stale and needed a change. Plus, I had checked out my friend’s X-T1 and it was like going home to Nikon. Again, I sold my Canon system and purchased the Fuji mirrorless system. This new energy I felt from the switch allowed me to start doing more personal work and started to move into more fine artwork. 

***2014 rolls around and life is changing for me. So to deal with all the changes I was experiencing I needed to switch systems. I went out and upgraded to medium format. The Mamiya Leaf Credo 40 was the starting point. HUGE sensor and beautiful lenses! Slow camera system but it was needed at this time in my life. At that time I traded my Fuji gear for Sony. Why? It was the Sony 135mm f/1.8 Carl Zeiss Planar T* Telephoto Prime Lens. Perfection! 

***A few years later I unloaded my Mamiya medium format gear. I was just not using it as I thought I would. My personal plans changed as did my professional plans. 

***Then in 2023, I was in a major creative funk. My ADHD told me to switch up my gear one last time. So out with the Sony gear and in with the “new to me” Fujifil X-T3 system and several lenses.  I immediately felt at home! 

As I said, gear is gear. But I tend to fall into the power of the lens. Nikkor had the best glass of its day. That could still be the case. The Canon 85mm 1.2L was an eye-opener. Just beautiful and buttery. From there I moved to mirrorless….but from Fuji to Sony because of the 135mm 1.8 Zeiss. Again, just beautiful imagery with that lens. However, because you needed an A to E mount adapter the speed of the lens suffered and it was not as useful for the speed of my wedding coverage. Finally, I landed back in the Fujifilm arena. This time it was not lens related, but comfort. The Sony system felt like I was shooting with my laptop. No real personality. For me, the Fujifilm X-T system is like hanging out with your best friend or your loved ones. The X-T bodies just fit perfectly for me. So, in my final swap of gear, it was about the camera and not just the lens. 

So what was old is now again new! 

Fujifil X-T3  XF10-24mmF4 R OIS

Although Morgan and Brett wanted just a short history for their wedding website, Amy could have written pages on this interesting, warm couple. Joe reports that the wedding’s vibe suited the couple perfectly: elegance met joy in that downtown venue, where family and guests were embraced by the arms of their big love. Here’s another of our average joe and amy projects; we thank our subjects for their graciousness in allowing us to share their story.

Morgan and Brett had been dating for four years when Brett announced a weekend trip to Traverse City, Michigan, in November of 2018. He’d had the engagement ring for seven months by then, but the couple lived together and were practically married already, right? No need to rush things, he figured.

“That was not the case with Morgan,” Brett says, a calm grin spreading across his face. “She was spazzing out.”

“I was like, If this doesn’t happen this weekend, I’m going to lose my mind,” Morgan says, with just a touch of drama.

Morgan declared a state of emergency. Crying, she called her mom. She called Brett’s mom. Brett’s mom called Brett.

Dee knew her son had planned to pop the question on Saturday, so she gently suggested he move the plan up a night. Brett agreed; he’d scheduled a trip to the vineyards and made restaurant reservations, but Morgan wouldn’t concentrate for a second if he didn’t ask her to marry him upon arrival.

“I called the hotel,” Brett says. “‘Could you have chocolate, champagne, and strawberries waiting? She’s not going to make it. I think I’m going to have to propose in the room.’”

The hotel, fully embracing the urgency of the situation, came through, as did Brett.

Morgan’s response was somewhat in character: YES! THIS IS AWESOME! I’VE BEEN WAITING SO LONG FOR THIS! THIS IS SO GREAT! And Brett’s response was what you’d expect, too: a content happiness upon seeing her joy.

The night concluded in true Morgan and Brett fashion: they ditched a fancy restaurant and celebrated at the town bar with locals, who insisted on buying them drinks. Morgan and Brett are the couple who can get along with just about anybody, who attract others with charisma and vibrant storytelling (Morgan) and a chill, relaxed personality that sets people at ease (Brett). Their love has grown since the day Brett first laid eyes on Morgan, when her friend Victoria told him, “If you are staring at my friend, then ask for her phone number” (he needed a little prodding back then, too). When Morgan worries about how to talk to their children about society and race, Brett assures her that together, they can do it.

Because above all, through the years and differences, they trust each other. With this kind of love, future emergencies don’t stand a chance.

photo by Chris Humphreys, Denver, Colorado

My wife Amy is an author-freelance writer-personal trainer-mother-all around fantastic human. This post was written by her. Enjoy! 

AMY, on writing a love story:

I’ve told our story in many ways, including a handwritten serial version that hung by lighted rope, on clips, at our wedding. But trying to tell our story as I do for couples whose weddings Joe photographs is something different; I can look at Amy the wife through the lens of Amy the writer, and fit the story into a more typical structure. This way is limiting, of course, in the sense that I can only begin to understand a relationship when meeting a couple for the first time, but also because a story like this has to have a certain snap, a climax and a denouement, whereas real life is messy. In this version of our story, I won’t write about the really hard days, because I wouldn’t tell them to an interviewer. Likewise, I won’t tell the best moments, either, but back them down a notch to leave the best in my heart. Also, the piece needs to wrap up before the other stories of life together begin, because this is a “How We Met” piece and we can’t slough through day-to-day worries; this is not the place.

Putting myself through this same process makes me see that our clients probably hold back, too, and necessarily so; even still, as I’ve learned by conducting hundreds of interviews and writing just as many stories, a picture emerges, which is an appropriate metaphor for what we do at average joe and amy.

Disclaimer: I hire an editor to read the stories I write for clients, but she didn’t read this one. Any mistake serves to enhance the spirit of the experiment, I hope.

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Each afternoon, when high school let out, Joe and Amy would happen to meet at a particular corner, appear slightly surprised to find each other, and continue in the same direction, together. Amy saved her best stories from the day for the walk home, as making Joe laugh was a pleasure that was easily earned and felt like a gift. She wondered if this quiet, athletic boy could ever like a skinny, awkward girl such as herself, even as Joe watched her intently, memorized her laugh, and marveled that she didn’t fall over (“She walked like a baby deer,” he would say, years later).

Some days Joe would need to stop at the accounting firm where he helped out; although nothing was said, Amy would wait until he appeared again, and they’d continue walking to another corner that marked a midway point on the two blocks between their houses, and go their separate ways.

They’d come to talk about those two blocks thirty years later, usually while staring at the ceiling right before sleep took over. Why, fate? Why did decades have to go by when these two felt what many have known and which many a love song has tried to describe, way back when they were kids?

Joe would go off to college and write Amy letter after letter. Amy went off to college and he’d visit, and they’d go on a date here and there. There were nights spent together but there were also angry phone calls, probably due to the frustration that had been building; to the outsider, they were meant to be together–they were a couple–but each was afraid in their own way of this comfortable intensity, an almost chemical reaction, and this became intolerable.

Joe made a final overture one holiday while he was back home from college; he walked the two blocks and asked after Amy. Her mother answered the door and let him know that she was engaged. He went home and burned all of their letters. Meanwhile, in the time of the early internet, she looked him up and found evidence that someone of his name and age had died. This didn’t feel right or likely, but she accepted that finding and buried her feelings for the boy.

(He was still a boy, please note, and she was very much a girl. Thinking back on this now, with sons around this age, they marvel at what they felt and knew, and encourage these boys to follow their instincts in a way their parents couldn’t.)

Both would marry others and remain apart for twenty some years. Social media had its advent during this time, and Joe and Amy found each other there. Amy noticed that where she’d usually feel sentimental finding random old flames online, an anger swelled when she found Joe. She felt he had never been honest with his feelings. Later, he would agree, but she would also come to see that she wasn’t exactly forthright back in those days, either.

Joe photographed Amy’s sons one summer, and they couldn’t figure out how to talk to each other at their first meeting after twenty years. It ended abruptly.

Meanwhile, their marriages were falling apart. After the break ups, Joe and Amy met again in an Applebee’s. Amy talked and talked. Joe listened and memorized her laugh. They had their second first kiss and, before 24 hours had passed, said those three words that had been long delayed. It was if suddenly, everything they thought should have happened a long time ago was absolutely, perfectly right, right now.

Each morning, each day, they are as surprised to find each other nearby as they were on that corner every day after school. They still write love letters. All of it still feels very much like a gift.