It was truly an amazing experience being able to photograph David + Suli’s surprise sunrise proposal at the beautiful Griffith Observatory overlooking Los Angeles.
Thanks to the help of his sister Becky, and several of his friends, David was able to construct the ultimate plan from all the way across the country in Florida, for the perfect dream proposal. This past Christmas, David surprised his girlfriend with a vacation to Southern California! She had no idea what else was being planned besides what is already a trip to remember.
When I talked to David, he told me his initial plan to surprise his girlfriend and it was perfect. We went over some logistics, and being from California, I gave him a couple of ideas to look into. With his friends, he came up with the best plan, to propose to his girlfriend at the Griffith Observatory overlooking Los Angeles at sunrise!
From my perspective, it was really fun to plan how I would photograph this. There were many people at the Observatory exercising, taking photos and considering Suli had no idea who I was, I was not worried about “bing caught”. I had already seen photos of them and knew exactly who I was looking for.
As they walked up to the Observatory, I picked a spot to remain stationary and pretend I was taking photos of the city scape. David, being an avid photography enthusiast, convinced Suli to come with him to the Observatory early in the morning to take som photos of the sunrise. I remember at one point I had the camra pointed in their direction and Suli looked at me funny…but then looked behind her and noticed the Hollywood Sign, and that was enough to convince her that that was what I was taking a photo of.
David set his stuff down and walked up to the binoculars that are located at the Observatory and took a peek through. He then instructed Suli to have a look. When she did she immediately started laughing with joy. At the other end of those binoculars was two of her and Davids friends standing outside a car holding a giant sig asking her to marry him.
She was so struck by the surprise she hadn’t even realized it was her own friends holding the sign. David got down on one knee as I cam around the corner know she was fully in the moment and knew I would not even be close to being a distraction as he began to ask her for her hand in marriage.
Of course she said yes as she threw herself on to him hugging him in disbelief. He told her to look through the binoculars again and thats when she realized it was he friends. As she started to mutter the questions, “What are they doing here?” An entire group of her friends and close family members came around the corner to surprise her, if the proposal was not enough!
David was able to bring their entire group of friends and family to spend the week with them on their trip to California, a trip that will be forever a core memory.
This was such a fun experience, I am so excited for these two and just so grateful they found me and had me be a part of this chapter of their lives.
