A Weekend Trip to the Southwest with Megan
Hey guys! I hope everyone's week is going well! I'm back with another blog post of my travels. This past winter, I got a chance to explore the southwest with my good friend Megan. Although I've been to the Southwest before, I've never visited during the winter time. Originally this was going to be a group trip consisting of the 3 of us, however our other photographer friend couldn't go anymore so I got to spend a lot of time with Megan. We managed to explore 3 states: Utah, Arizona, and Nevada all in a weekend. You can read the first part of our trip here detailing our experience at the Mystic Hot Springs.
Almost exactly a year prior to this trip is when I first got a DM from Megan asking if I wanted to shoot. With work consuming most of my life at the time, it was really difficult for me to set something up. Over time I've been watching Megan grow as a model and she has improved a lot since I first saw her Instagram. I think we can proudly say that we both have grown a lot since then as artists.
After exploring Monument Valley, we headed straight to Antelope Canyon. This was my third time exploring the area but it was my first time taking portraits inside these beautiful slot canyons. It's always a bit challenging taking portraits in low light situations such as this but once you know the direction of light, it gets pretty easy exposing for the image and nailing the focus.
Our next stop was the famous Horseshoe Bend. I've been here plenty of times, but I've never taken portraits at this location. As always, Megan killed it. Horseshoe Bend has a great significance to Megan because this is where she had her first portrait shoot as a model. This is where it all started for her a year ago. The photographer found her on Instagram, messaged her, and they decided to take a roadtrip to Arizona. The shoot went so well that she decided that she wanted to keep modeling on the side. It still blows my mind how one app can connect people on so many levels. Who would of thought that we would be living in an age where we can meet people through an app where in most cases, we probably would of never met that person if it wasn't for that app.
While we were driving, the landscape around us caught my eye so we decided to pull over and snap a few pics before the sun went down.
Throughout the trip we were deciding where to go for our "retro themed diner shoot". Since nothing was on our route back home, we stopped in Las Vegas at Ruby's Diner. It definitely gave off those 80's retro vibes and the food was pretty good too! I highly recommend stopping by there if you're ever in the Vegas area.
Overall, it was an exhausting but very fun and rewarding trip. By spending a weekend away from home, me and Megan got to know each other a lot better. I think if I had to choose between instameets or a weekend getaway with a model, I would probably choose the latter. You get to know a person so much better when it's one on one and can have really deep conversations. From my experience, instameets don't really provide that chance since the time that you're with people is so short and it can get overwhelming since there's so many people. Thanks for reading this far and I hope I was able to motivate you to get out into the outdoors and adventure!