Serena and Jonathan first met in the UK but now live in Singapore. They met each other working together (another work couple!) at Industrial Light & Magic. I’m not much of a Star Wars fan but I do consider myself a bit of a movie buff and in my mind I can’t think of many other cooler jobs than making movies at ILM. During one of their recent visits to Hong Kong we shot engagement photos around Central and I had to restrain myself from asking all sorts of gushy questions about their work. Fortunately they had no problems focusing on each other and ignoring me and my camera. In fact, for every location we stopped at it wouldn’t be more than a minute before they were making each other laugh. I couldn’t help but to think that this is how all engagement sessions should be – casual, simple and fun. Its a beautiful thing to see a couple that were naturally made for each other and a privilege to be able to photograph – very much looking forward to their Hong Kong wedding later this year!

One of the downsides of living in a vibrant, transient city like Hong Kong is that too often people come and go. Such was the case for Anne and Jean-Marie, who after only a short stint in Hong Kong were returning to France late last summer. Bittersweet as it is returning home, Anne wanted to capture a bit of the old and new to commemorate their time living here in Hong Kong. So we set out to wander around the Central area, and ended up shooting in Lan Kwai Fong, Hong Kong Park and IFC among a few others.

Thank you to the talented Ka Lam for the makeup for this shoot.

Like so many of us that have ex-patriated from the US to Asia, Jesse eventually landed in Hong Kong. He originally met his fiancé Julie in Washington DC and proposed to her in their prior city – Taipei. They have been living in HK for a few years now, so they already had some ideas for shots to take. We chatted over coffee and decided on a very casual engagement portrait session at a few locations they particularly liked – SoHo Mid-levels, Central and Shek O.

Julie and Jesse are getting married next year in Honduras!

Central

Shek O Beach

A few years ago, I met Stephanie in Hong Kong while photographing an event in Central. Like me, her and her husband Tom’s move to Hong Kong from the US marked a chapter in their developing careers. Earlier this year, Stephanie was 7-months pregnant and had asked me to help photograph a maternity portrait session in her home. We took our time to plan our shots which would eventually be slightly fine-art in nature and a little less photojournalistic than my other portraiture.

Last April, in the early hours of Sunday morning, Stephanie gave birth to beautiful baby Gabriel. Here are some of the pregnancy and newborn baby shots (taken at 8 weeks).

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Gary Jackson is a writer, comedian, public speaker, blogger, podcaster, DJ and all around gweilo of Hong Kong. Jackson performs regularly at the TakeOut Comedy Club in SoHo, but you can find his many web presences on letterstowindsor.com, gweilojackson.com and soulparking.com.

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Nothing beats natural light for headshot portraits, so we did a lot of the shooting on the balcony of his Mid-levels flat. We also walked around some of the local HK backstreets and finished up at the Pacific Coffee on Hollywood Road, his favorite writing spot.

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