Ray and Kineca: New Orleans Surprise Proposal Photography
New Orleans Surprise Proposal Photography
Ray proposes to Kineca in City Park
In six years of New Orleans Surprise Proposal Photography and working with dozens of hopeful proposers, only two have gotten a little help from their friends. Ray was one of the two. He had planned a weekend getaway with his long-term girlfriend, Kineca, and invited a couple friends along. But what she didn’t know was that he not only planned to propose, but he invited a few more friends to surprise her so they could all celebrate together.
Ray is a boat captain who would be leaving soon for a three month trip to Alaska. He knew they would have to wait a while for a proper engagement party so he wanted to make sure she had one while they were in New Orleans. Since their friends were already there, he enlisted their help in pulling off the plan he and I came up with. We all got to the bridge in New Orleans City Park early so we could set up for the romantic proposal. Kineca was on a sight-seeing tour with a friend and was supposed to meet up with Ray at the park after.
Ray and his friends spread rose petals along the walkway she would be coming down towards the bridge where Ray would be waiting on the other side for her, ready to propose. Ray wanted all angles captured- both close-ups and epic wide shots of the moss-framed stone bridge. So he had me bring a second photographer along to capture another angle.
We had KIneca request her uber take her to Morning Call in City Park and we had a friend waiting there to intercept her and send her to the bridge. Everything was going according to plan. Until Kineca accidentally requested the Uber take her to Morning Call in Metairie! We couldn’t figure out why it was taking so long for her to get there. Poor Ray was so nervous and the waiting was only making it worse! Once she realized she was going to the wrong location and corrected course, we had her share her location with Ray. The Uber had no idea where Morning Call was and dropped her off a half-mile walk away on the wrong end of the park (Damn you, Uber!!)! With her location shared with Ray’s phone we saw that we would need to change which side of the bridge he waited on and drop rose petals on the opposite walkway!
Thank goodness for good friends! They sprang into action, moving rose petals and swapping sides of the bridge to hide on. Everything was in place just in time for Kineca to arrive. Ray met her at the top of the stairs and delivered a picture-perfect proposal. She said “yes” of course and her friends revealed themselves. Ray definitely accomplished getting the intended reaction and me and Traven captured it beautifully. After lots of teary-eyed hugs, their friends delivered a bottle of Champagne and headed to Morning Call (the right one!) for beignets while we did an engagement session.
We started a lot later than planned so lost light rapidly. But it ended up being perfect with golden-backlit bridge photos and twilight portraits in the oaks. It’s an image set I absolutely adore.
Need help planning your surprise proposal? You need a pro you can trust for less stress and more “yes”.
