Bella Pop Photography | Brandy and Brandon Frank » NEWS

Bridal Show: The Sorta Kinda iPhone Version

Brandy Frank — Mon, 16 Aug 2010 17:43:35 +0000

Sorta kinda? Yeah. Because we sorta mostly took pics with our iPhones. And kinda cause we snapped a bad photo of the booth with our point and shoot. For real, the iPhone could have done a better job than that camera. And we don’t even have the new iPhones yet. Really should have brought the big camera. I’m soooooo kicking myself today for not taking it. In my defense: we were sleep deprived, melted by heat and filled to 99.9% capacity in our vehicles. When it came to the decision to pack the big camera (and we’re talking, way last minute after everything else was done) all I could think was “I have nowhere to put it and nowhere to keep it during the show.” As it turns out, I’m SUPER bummed I didn’t go to extremes and just bring the big camera. Once everything was set up I so wanted to take lots of detail pictures of the booth. Photographer fail. Forgive me. It won’t happen next time. :)

Anyway! This weekend = crazy crazy insane. We had a wonderful time shooting Chelsea and Steven’s wedding on Saturday – then right after they hooked it to the airport for a fabulous honeymoon in Ireland, we jetted to Grapevine to load in for the Star Telegram Bridal Show. One of our amazing Bella Pop brides Becky helped us out. THANK YOU SO MUCH!!! We love you and we are so grateful you were there for us. XOXO. After the first set up the three of us finally crashed and enjoyed dinner at California Pizza Kitchen and it totally made my day that they put the candied walnuts back into their signature Waldorf Chicken Salad. Really. I was smiling the whole time. After dinner it was: rinse. wash. repeat.

The next day rock and roll time was at 5:00 am (again!) and sadly I realized it was 83 degrees even at 5:30 in the morning! We arrived bright and early to finish setting up the booth and our bella Becky showed up looking super cute with a big box of doughnuts to boot. Love that girl! The show was great: we met a ton of super cool couples. And despite the 115 degree heat index and a very uncool load out we finally ate dinner. One bubble bath and chocolate pie later… I crashed. For 10+ hours straight. Yeah, that’s how we roll.

our Bella Pop crew @ the bridal show: bella Brandon, bella Brandy and bella Becky! ;)

photo booth antics!!

Oh My Gosh. New Content!

Brandy Frank — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 17:22:12 +0000

Ok, it’s true. I went a little crazy with the website. It was another heated battle with me and my creative brain: a fight for the gold in the boxing ring of insanity. Rocky theme song: press play. Sure thing, I moved the blog posts to their own site within Bella Pop. Did I like it? no. Did I move it back? yes. Can’t you see me fighting in a boxing ring? Maybe not. Well let’s pretend. In the end I’m trying to say I won the battle and finally found a layout I loved more than anything. Everything is here in one place, just like before. Except now we have this super cool “splash page” at the top. Well, I think it’s cool. ;) Once we start adding all the new content, our amazing readers will have the option to 1) go straight to their favorite stuff by clicking one of the links at the top or 2) scroll down and enjoy the posts old school style. Which brings me to the new content…

OH MY GOSH!! So excited! Bella Pop is about photography – it’s what we do and what we love. But we love sooooo many other things too and we really wanted to offer more to our readers who love Bella Pop style. We wanted a place for fun ideas, art, photography, wedding planning. We wanted our newlywed couples to have something to still enjoy as well. So we started thinking… and this idea grew and has developed into what Bella Pop.com is about to become. A photography/lifestyle/music/fashion/cooking place of goodness. Yes, jump up and down and get excited. It’s pretty sweet.

So we had this idea and we kinda knew where we wanted to go with it but we had to dream up how. And that’s what we’ve been up to the past couple of weeks and we are so excited to announce our new topics for Bella Pop.com:

PHOTOGRAPHY – our professional portfolio. this is where we’ll show off new posts of weddings, portraits and other fun stuff we love to shoot.
OH SO DOMESTIC! – cooking, recipes, sewing, crafting… all that fun domestic stuff (squeal!!)
ROCK IT! WITH BP – love photography? want to learn more? this will be the place for FAQ sections, tips, activities and where we announce classes and shootouts.
GETTING MARRIEEED – with these posts you’ll find our favorite vendors, ideas, venues, honeymoon ideas. three words: wedding planning bonanza.
HE SAID, SHE SAID – our favorite lifestyle posts… travel, date nights, stuff we love, books to read, music, fashion, style, movies. and yes, Brandon is about to be a post contributor!
BRANDY AND BRANDON – our personal posts. this is the place to get to know us!

As you can see, things are about to start hopping around here. Our goal is to start posting daily… sometimes twice a day. So you’ll want to subscribe and/or check back often. In fact we’re gonna jump right in with a contest with OH SO DOMESTIC later today followed by the premiere of Christine and Andy’s engagement. Tomorrow, we’ll feature the big premiere of Sara and Chris’ wedding! So stay tuned! xoxo – Brandy and Brandon

Love, Moving and Daily Pop!

Mon, 28 Jun 2010 19:52:40 +0000

Happy Monday everyone! Things have been very busy here at Bella Pop and we’re in the final crunch for moving over the next few days. Yes, as much as we love our little studio space in Weatherford, Brandon and I made the decision to let it go since we’re not there enough to justify having the space. It would make more sense if our office was located there as well (but it’s not) and we still prefer our home office wtih the ability to jet all over Dallas Fort Worth like we usually do. So the next few days will be crazy and I’ll try my best to update with a blog post or two. If not, hang in there, we will return!

You may have also noticed that we are slowly making changes to the website. The most obvious change is the return of a dedicated home page and the blog is again located under “Daily Pop!” I have been busy creating gorgeous galleries that are almost ready to launch and we’re excited about our plans to morph Daily Pop! into a fun lifestyle blog with Bella Pop vibe. I’ve found that our former brides and grooms still dig Bella Pop and we wanted to expand the content of our blog to include our amazing newlyweds. With that in mind we plan on having wedding planning tips (for our new couples!) plus ideas for decorating, cooking, guy’s posts and other fun things. Pretty much stuff we love. With pictures. It’s going to rock! :)

Of course our weekend was fabulous which included the beautiful wedding of Sarah and Chris. We simply can’t wait to share the images from this wedding. For now I will leave you with a sneak peek from Sarah and Chris’ last dance. Congrats you two… have a wonderful honeymoon in New Orleans!

Summer Love – Sneak Peeks!

Fri, 18 Jun 2010 17:28:55 +0000

Happy Friday everyone… the weekend is almost here – woot woot!! :) We’re stoked for a weekend off and we’re kicking back with Toy Story 3 tonight, then a cookout / outdoor movie / smores extravaganza on Saturday. So excited to see our friends (lots of Bella Pop couples too!) We hope you have an awesome weekend and we wish all the dad’s out there a swell Father’s Day (including our own!)

In the meantime, here’s a little Bella Pop photo goodness…

Congrats to Jaime and Barret!! Hope you two had a great honeymoon in Maui!! *swoon*

Snezha and Dean are engaged. Yay!

Might as well jump…

Brandy Frank — Sat, 22 May 2010 13:36:15 +0000

Did you see any flying pigs today? Because today is one of those rare days that we’ve been up since 6:30 am – giddy with excitement because our clients turned friends Mylynka and Lupe are finally getting married today!

It’s only been oh… about a year and a half we’ve been looking forward to this day and now we’re on our way and Van Halen’s JUMP is blasting on the radio. We are pumped!!

I realized last night that personal trip pictures have taken over the blog for a while, so it’s time to share more fun stuff we’ve been shooting. Be sure to check back first thing Monday for the premiere of Sky and Peter’s wedding!

Have a fabulous weekend everyone! xoxo Brandy and Brandon

Jamie and Mengmeng rocked a bride+groom shoot

Candice rocked her dress!

LexAnne and Barrett got married!

Chelsea and Steven are engaged!

Andrea and Matt kicked it for a bride+groom shoot!

Road trip!!

Fri, 30 Apr 2010 22:17:41 +0000

Yay!! We are blogging LIVE from the road – thanks to our amazing iPhones…

If you’re just now joining us – Brandon and I are hitting the road for a ten day adventure. There was a crazy amount of voting for West or East and it was sooooo close!

So where are we going? Mad Tater says…

From now on during the trip a picture that looks like the one above – we took with our iPhones. :)

So, the voting results….

Now to announce the big winner… Winner winner chicken dinner! A big congrats to Miss Aubrey – she wins a gift basket of road trip goodies we pick up along the way and her own potato head! (Better think up a good name for that spud Aubrey!)

Stay tuned for more posts – live from the road and/or our base camp. Up next – how our car is too small and stuffed silly, random roadside attractions and our first stop!

xoxo – Brandy and Brandon

Getting Ready to Hit the Road

Fri, 30 Apr 2010 16:51:05 +0000

Woo hoo!! Today is THE day we reveal our mystery destination! I know everyone is excited to hear where we are heading (it’s going to be amazing that’s for sure!!) so stay tuned because we want to post from the road (with pictures of which way we’re driving!) We’ll also announce the winner of our contest later today.

The car’s all packed (pretty much.) Mad Tater is packed – the cats and dog are wiggin’ out because they know something’s up. We’ve got a brand spanking new 2010 road atlas, my mom’s GPS, the cameras and a whole mess of other stuff. It’s almost time to take this show on the road!

And because every post is better with a picture – here’s Sky and Peter on their wedding day (en route to their reception) hey what can I say? they needed gas! Oh, and our Bella Pop brides and grooms seriously ROCK!!!

xoxo, Brandy and Brandon

All You Need Is Love

Sun, 25 Apr 2010 06:32:55 +0000

Hello everyone! This past week at Bella Pop = amazing. We’ve had so much fun shooting cool weddings and sessions, dancing, laughing and loving life with our Bella Pop couples. To celebrate (and get everyone excited) here are a few sneak peeks of the photo goodness we’ve got up our sleeves. We’ll be back Tuesday with the premiere of Becca and Blake’s wedding! Have a happy weekend! xoxo – Brandy & Brandon

Becca and Blake

Kate and Chris

Jaime and Barret

Sky and Peter

It's Coming! – Wedding Bonanza Sneak

Mon, 15 Mar 2010 20:28:30 +0000

Hello everyone! We hope you had a great weekend! It’s been all quiet on the Bella Pop front for the last few days – Brandon and I were having a blast shooting the weddings of two awesome couples: Andrea and Matt (Saturday) Kate and Chris (Friday.) We very rarely shoot two weddings in one weekend. In fact we will only shoot weddings back to back if one is a) 20 min. from home b) shorter coverage and c) very cool people!

That being said, during the 48 hour wedding bonanza it pretty much goes like this: sleep. wake up. PAR-TAY, take pictures! get home. upload photos. backup photos. snack. relax. sleep. wake up. PAR-TAY all over again. take pictures. get home. upload photos. backup photos. snack. CRASH FOR TWO DAYS straight. Yes, this is how we roll.

After oodles of sleep I’ve been awake a bit and I wanted to share what’s coming to the blog in a few days!! Be sure to stay posted for the the weddings! xoxo Brandy

Andrea and Matt

Kate and Chris

Dallas Photog Shootout

Wed, 03 Mar 2010 22:58:07 +0000

Last week we were connecting – networking – meeting new people like crazy. We LOVE meeting new photographers, making new photog friends and just having a fun creative time in general. So when I heard that Photog Shootout GTG would be in Dallas, I snagged us a couple of tickets. The Dallas event took place at the lovely Ryan Manor. There were gorgeous models, fun vintage outfits and of course 30 something photographers! I didn’t shoot much because I was more excited to talk and connect with my fellow peers and gosh did we have a BLAST. After the shootout most of us went to Breadwinners for dinner. It was the best time and I highly recommend future Photog Shootouts.

We are still planning our own Rock it with BP creative series and for sure it will be filled with good friends, fun and photography!

I want to give a shout out to the awesome people who pulled off this event: Venue – The Ryan Manor • Makeup and Hair Design – Emily Hudspeth • Zsanae Panquerne • Adina Wright - Group Leaders Amy Karp • Heather Essian • Jason Huang – Sponsored by Groom Sold Separately – organized by Rob “Ninja” Nicholson of Photog Shootout GTG. Catie Ronquillo and Amy Karp pulled together the gorgeous outfits and accessories. Woot!

Last but not least, just some of the many business cards I collected from all the new people we met. Yay for new photog and designer friends! :)