February 9th, 2011:
Early last week Jerald gave me a call and laid out a scheme he was planning for Saturday night – this involved Teniel, a ring, a sunset and Malibu. Jerald had the whole night planned out, oceanside proposal, dinner at Geoffreys, and an night at the Loews in Sanata Monica. He had asked her father and rented a Mercedes, all the details were in place. I agreed to meet up with him the day before, to finalize all the details of successfully pulling off this endeavor.
Jerald told me about how he was telling Teniel that he was winning an award from his company and was going to have some pictures taken on the beach for the company newsletter before the evening got started. So that’s where I came in. Saturday evening we met up at the beach in Malibu (faking that this was our first meeting), I walked them out to the perfect spot (where Jerald and I had agreed on beforehand), spent about 3 minutes getting the “newsletter photo” then asked if Teniel wanted one with Jerald. She accepted, and I grabbed a quick portrait of the two of them together (the last photo of this post), then said “That’s all I need, you guys have a great night.” and walked away as planned.
Jerald had asked that I stay a bit back, giving them some privacy for this giant moment and hoping that I wouldn’t be noticed by Teniel. After I left them, I started walking away until their attention was on the sunset, then I turned around with my 50mm and 135mm mounted on 2 different cameras, and shot away. All the while trying to stay as inconspicuous as possible, although I think by the point that Jerald dropped to one knee, a circus elephant could have walked right next to them and Teniel wouldn’t have noticed.
She said yes as the sun began to dip below the water, they kissed and headed away from the beach towards a new life together. Congratulations to them both!
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Awesome job! The emotions in the photos priceless.