Rory and Ashley had my first ever all-black-and-white GTKY session. Shot entirely on black and white film alongside an infrared camera. We finished with a custom-designed album: black moleskine leather cover, warm linen-toned acid-free paper inside. The kind of object you keep on a shelf and hand to someone decades later.
Shamong and Atsion Lake
Shamong Township sits in Burlington County, deep in the New Jersey Pine Barrens. Atsion Lake is a historic recreation area inside Wharton State Forest, ringed by cedar and pitch pine. The water runs dark with tannin, the sky feels wide, and the light comes through the trees at a long, slow angle. For black and white film, that combination is ideal. High contrast without being harsh, and a quiet that shows in every frame.
Film handles this environment the way no preset replicates. Fixed ISO, limited frames, the knowledge that you are committing to each exposure. That constraint changes how you move and when you fire the shutter. The infrared camera adds another layer, turning foliage bright and sky dark, inverting tonal assumptions carried from digital work. The results look nothing like a Lightroom filter. They look like film, because they are.
Ashley and Rory were easy in front of the camera, which is what makes a GTKY session work. The point is to surface that ease before the wedding day, so the crew is not a crowd of strangers when it matters. That comfort shows in the frames, particularly where nothing is directed and the two of them are just existing together. For couples planning South Jersey weddings or Philadelphia-area weddings, a session like this changes how the wedding day itself goes.
The album came together after. Leather and paper selection started with what the photographs asked for, not a catalog option. Black and white film work lives differently as a physical print than it does on a screen. These frames earned the object.
Ten frames from two days in the Pine Barrens. All film. Nothing staged beyond where they stood.
Ashley and Rory are now married. Their wedding frames live in the same archive as these. There is a consistency in the body of work when a couple shows up for both sessions, a thread that runs from the first GTKY frame through the last dance photograph of the night.
GTKY sessions are available for all couples booking with Jordan Brian Studios. Film is an option for clients who want the session to live as a physical object, not just a gallery link. Sessions run ninety minutes to two hours depending on location. If you are curious whether film is right for your session, that is worth a conversation before you book.