blissfully engaged , familiar love , first look , in expectation , newborn , with this ring
Jillian Zamora Photography – 2022 Year in Review
Y’all can just go ahead and thank my husband for narrowing down this post from 500+ images to sub 200. Welcome to my 2022 Year in Review blogpost – only three months later than I’d hoped haha. But I got all my editing done on time and cared for a houseful of three small children and a husband so I feel fairly accomplished with that.
For the first time on a year in review I wasn’t able to get every single shoot represented in the post because I switched my editing a bit and wanted to keep this post cohesive with the new edits — however it’s about three quarters of my year represented. If your face wasn’t in here and I took your photos last year just know I LOVE YOU SO MUCH, I just couldn’t find the RAW images from your session to re-edit a few to match these.
The year took me to Austin, Houston (more times than in any other year — it was THE YEAR of Houston for JZP), Dallas (my longtime JZP home base), Boston (my first time!), Bend, OR and to the great state of Hawaii (also my first time and, let me just say, BIG FAN).
Always and forever I am so thankful for all those who hired me to document a portion of their lives last year with my camera. I am truly honored to have been trusted with this privilege to capture the dear, honest and blissful moments of your lives in 2022.
I kicked off 2022 with Ankitha + Jose’s wedding in Austin, TX.
This next set was from my time in Boston, MA with Mounica + Joe. We got to take some of their day before portraits around Beacon Hill which was GLORIOUSLY FUN (as are M + J)! Also, quick story, Mounica originally reached out about their wedding slated for May 2020 . . . we all know many large weddings didn’t end up taking place that particular summer. I was SHOCKED and DELIGHTED when she reached back out at the start of 2022 and was like, “So . . . would you still like to shoot our wedding?” So I’m especially thankful to have been a part of their wedding day because it had been such a long time coming.
At this point in the post alone we’re to the SIXTH of my past wedding couples who hired me to photograph their growing families in 2022 (and many more to come later in the post). This particular family are longtime friends of mine, one of whom is also a wedding photographer! I got to visit with the Oehlers when we were in Bend, Oregon this summer and meet their precious son and do a family photo swap with Allison — WHAT COULD POSSIBLY BE BETTER??
And now we’re at the point in the post where I get to pinch myself YET AGAIN that this beautiful job takes me to all the beautiful corners of the world and this year it took me, for the first time ever, to Hawaii for Dani + Dalton’s intimate 20-person wedding. I got to be the 21st person and document every single bit of the ocean waves crashing, tropical ferns as big as a full grown adult, sunsets over the water and all the friends and family who had travelled to celebrate Dani + Dalton’s marriage.
The following set are just a small sprinkling of the fall minis I got to take in October and I’m totally going to offer mini sessions again this year because it was SO MUCH FUN to see so many past clients (and new clients) all together in a single day — just warmth and delight all the livelong day.
INCOMING — more lovely past brides + grooms and their lovely offspring! HAVE I MENTIONED I ADORE MY JOB??? LOOK AT ALL THESE BABIESSSSS.
For real, I get to work with some of the kindest people in the world. Two of whom are named Pragnya + Kishan.
Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you to all the clients pictured (and the ones who didn’t make it into this post but you know who you are) and all the clients who have already booked again for 2023. Each and every one of you mean so much to me. I love photographing your first days as a family + your first days as your family grows + all the in between days too.
I’ll end this post with the same final words I say as I put my three kids to bed each night:
I love love love love love love love love love love love love love love LOVE you.
blissfully engaged , familiar love , first look , in expectation , Indian wedding , newborn , personal , with this ring
Jillian Zamora Photography year in review 2021
Hello and happy 2022 to anyone who still visits blogs (lololol). I can’t help it . In this Instagram/Tik Tok world I can’t stop loving longer form photo sharing and I honestly don’t foresee that changing anytime soon.
Here is my compilation of all my JZP work from the past year. I do these posts for myself to be able to look back on all the stories and lives I am so incredibly honored to be invited to witness and document. I am thankful for each and every person in these photos. It just causes me to praise God for the gift of this work that I never could have dreamed of pursing on my own.
I also do these posts for future potential clients to see highlighted what I value in my storytelling — preserving your most dear, honest and blissful moments. I hope you can see that in this post.
Now for the photos. I started the year off in San Diego with the Sewell family at their favorite tide pool. I love them I love them I love them and hope to blog this entire session one day soon because every single bit of it makes me smile smile smile.
I had the honor of meeting + photographing my cousin’s newborn photos in January. Spoiler alert: if you make it to the end of this post you’ll see what he looks like as a big one-year-old too.
Beth + Zack’s wedding was my first of the year. As I looked back at their gallery with a year’s distance from it one of the things that stood out to me most were how all the masks in the photos marked the time in which their wedding took place.
I’m going to do all DFW people a favor and tell you to order you some Heimat pretzels after you finish looking through this post. You will not regret it. For the record the rosemary-garlic and cinnamon sugar ones are my favorites!
Below is the first of two Poe family sessions in 2021. Not long after this session Abi texted me that apparently those would be their last photos as a family of three (keep going in the post to see the second little Poe boy shortly after his arrival right before the end of the year).
Joni + Jeremy’s intimate Broken Bow, OK cabin wedding was full of intentionality and personal touches and sweetness.
There were so many favorite things about Hillary + Regan’s lovely Fort Worth wedding with KC Cloud Events — the light streaming through the stained glass windows of the church during their ceremony, their stunning florals, and both of Hillary + Regan’s fathers being a part of their wedding ceremony. But I gotta tell you, every time I think about their wedding I can’t help but think about the PUPPIESSSSS at cocktail hour.
Every time I think of Alyssa + Blake’s wedding I start singing Julie Andrew’s “Raindrops on Roses.” The rain fell off an on all morning, even up to the ceremony itself, but that didn’t dampen even a bit of the joy of the day.
I also want to give a special shout out to my second-shooter and JZP associate shooter, Jacob. He shot all but three of my 2021 weddings with me LIKE A CHAMP and several of the photos I selected from the following wedding are ones he took. He does such amazing work and I’m proud to have him work with me and represent JZP.
HOW COOL IS IT being invited into the Vanderpool home for my third newborn session for this dear family? I’ll tell you: PRETTY DANG COOL.
Then I had the joy joy joy to document a slew of past JZP brides and grooms growing their families this year – so sweet to be a part of documenting a family from their first day married and some of their first days as parents.
In May I flew out to Taos, NM for Bethany + Josh’s wedding in the mountains but the forecast disagreed with their outdoor ceremony plans. The rain and hail may have pushed us indoors at the last minute for a ceremony in their airbnb but Bethany, Josh and all their people rallied and made it happen. That airbnb was filled top to bottom with so much delight that it was palpable.
Sophy + Jason’s was my last wedding that I photographed pregnant with my third child. It’s funny how I mark even my own life by y’all’s special events I get invited in to be a part of.
While that was my last wedding before maternity leave there were still plenty of shoots (and a mountain of editing) to come before it officially started.
I LOVED meeting back up with the Tipton’s while they were on sabbatical from serving overseas as missionaries. I photographed their wedding back in the earliest days of JZP and getting to reunite with them in Tyler, Texas and meet their three children was a joy in and of itself. Another thing I loved was how storytelling focused this session was from their family’s porch swing to s’mores to a family water gun + hose fight and ending with bubbles. I definitely intend to do a separate blog of this session to share more in depth, but here are a few of my stand alone favorite images.
On that same trip to Tyler for the Tipton session we celebrated my birthday by staying at an airbnb and hitting up the local coffee + restaurant scene. These photos were taken when I was 32 weeks pregnant.
My last two shoots before maternity leave were with repeat JZP clients and their precious babies – just what I needed to make me allllllll the more excited to welcome our own baby so soon.
Jesse Cypress Zamora was born in August. We are so thankful for him and he’s pretty well snuggled as you can see in the below photos with his big sister and brother. Also in September my oldest, Juniper, turned six-years-old.
I took two glorious months to give my full focus to welcoming our newest family member and then in October I photographed a quick maternity session for a dear friend, followed by Brittany + Akash’s two-day McGovern Centennial Gardens in Houston, TX.
Next up out was Melissa + Nik’s New Orleans, LA wedding — my first time to New Orleans and my first time to witness the fun that is a second line band at a wedding reception. Melissa + Nik are so down to earth and about their people. They had actually waited a year longer than originally intended to have their wedding due to the pandemic. The hidden gift of the wait was that instead of their wedding being the day after daylight savings time, it was now the day OF daylight savings time which meant we were gifted the most glorious hour of sunlight after their wedding ceremony that we were not anticipating having and boy, oh, boy did we bask in it!
As promised, we’ve arrived at the second Poe session of 2021 starring their newest member, Luke.
And do you remember my cousin’s teeny baby at the beginning of this post? It sure was fun to get to document these updated family photos of their sweet one-year-old at the end of the year.
My last wedding of the year was Thao + Chris’ and it was SUCH a fun one to close out 2021 with. The photos I chose to share in this post barely scratches the surface of Thao + Chris’ THREE ceremonies in one day but I have high hopes of blogging the whole thing on its own later this year.
We celebrated Christmas with family and I ended the year with two more past JZP couples who are expecting sweet babies along with one engagement session for a 2022 JZP bride + groom.
What a year, what a year.
Thank you, Lord, for an eleventh year getting to tell so many sweet stories for such lovely humans. What a gift it is.
blissfully engaged , familiar love , mentor sessions , newborn , personal , with this ring
Jillian Zamora Photography 2020 recap
Listen, I know it’s April and we’re a solid quarter of the way into 2021 but this is my first and probably last chance this year that I could fit in the time to devote to a 2020 year in review blogpost. And something in me would just not let me skip it. I think it’s because 2020 was such a hard, hard year for so many that it can almost feel like a pointless, wasted year to some. Or at the very least, a year many would like to forget.
When I reflect back on these photos taken during that calendar year I have to remind myself, there was so much joy in it too. That doesn’t negate the pain of loss many experienced, by any means. But the joy was there too. These moments of beautiful human connection and growth happened too. And these are only *some* that one individual person witnessed + documented. How many more must there have been?
If you know what my children look like, you may notice I mixed in several personal photos I took of them throughout the course of the year into this JZP recap post too. Because so many of my 2020 weddings were cancelled or rescheduled to 2021, I spent a lot more time just being mom and documenting my own kids with my DSLR camera and thought those might be fun to include as well.
So here it is, a look back at JZP’s 2020. I hope it’s as helpful for y’all to look through these as it was for me.
You can see my full blogposts of my last pre-pandemic wedding here and here. For the sake of this post I had to narrow down my favorites from Cybil + Ambika’s three-day wedding weekend — the following is my best attempt at that haha.
I so enjoyed getting to do a photography mentor session with Madeline this summer — it’s such a joy of mine to encourage other photographers in their strengths + growing their businesses (and bonus is getting to give them some updated headshots like the ones of Madeline below). Our models for the mentor session were newlyweds who had a downsized pandemic wedding in the backyard so it was special to be able to take these portraits of them!
My sister had a bone marrow transplant in a pandemic. Any point I felt scared of something in the uncertainty of 2020 I told myself, “If Jalesa can face what she did in the midst of a pandemic then I can certainly face this.” Her God-given courage — which, let us remember is not the lack of fear but the ability to do something in the face of fear — over the past several years as she battled leukemia, went into remission, celebrated, then immediately faced relapse, a bone marrow transplant at the beginning of a pandemic and slow, important, difficult recovery from the transplant throughout the remainder of the pandemic is a source of inspiration to me, and to many. Below are some portraits I took of her (socially distanced) about three months post-transplant.
My friends created thriving, successful businesses in 2020 (both that I recommend SO HIGHLY to each and every one of you)!! Below you’ll see some headshots I took of my long time friend Brittney of BGD Digital Marketing. SO DANG PROUD of what she’s built and she does such quality marketing/social media work. And then you’ll see some mouthwatering photos of some pretzels that come from none other than Heimat Baking Company out of Arlington, TX. I have taste tested (and photographed) each and every one of their German pretzels + baked goods and let me tell you GO ORDER SOME NOW AND THANK ME LATER.
In August 2020 JZP celebrated 10 years of business! It’s still so bizarre for me to type — a DECADE of getting to do this beautiful work with so many beautiful souls. To mark it, some sweet past clients recorded testimonial videos that you can see on my JZP IGTV if you missed them this summer (they STILL make me teary) and James took an updated headshot for me (because I hate being in front of the camera by myself and hadn’t done so in years OOPS).
It was right after the above very photo-ful weekend trip to Texas that I came home to discover that I’m pregnant with our third child! Beautiful, joyful news that was really complicated for me to process two months after a move to a new state (our second cross-country move in less than one calendar year) and still trying to get my bearings in Louisiana. If I’m honest (after all, that is one of JZP’s brand words), I’m still trying to get my bearings in Louisiana after so much transition we’ve experienced in the past year with my husband’s job bouncing back and forth across the country. It’s been a difficult transition for me. But the news of this third child has been a bright spot in the midst of the hard.
And that, my dears, was JZP’s 2020 in photo form that spanned DFW, Houston, Austin, and sent me into Arizona + Oklahoma and on back to Louisiana. If you made it to the end, thank you, I know it was a long post. All these people, all these individual moments of connection + joy I got to witness, are why I do what I do and why I love what I do.
Love, Jillian
There are a LOT of really cool things about my job. Like, a ton. But one of those really, really cool things about my job is getting to see the “before” at the engagement session, then witness the very first day of a couple as FAMILY on their wedding day and then my job gets exponentially cooler to be invited back to do a newborn/family session however long down the road.
This was the case with Taylor + Danny — I shot their engagement session in 2014, their wedding in 2015 and then in 2019 I had the joy of documenting the addition of their dear son Luca into their family.
What a joy joy joy joy.
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