Elephant + Proposal?  Maybe for the Wedding Day.Proposal Details:

Trying to find a way to incorporate an elephant into your proposal is difficult in this country.  Matt was seeking to make it unique, special, and a surprise for Ericka.  While we get that a zoo would not give you the time of day on the request as that is not the nature of the business and not a common request.  In Colorado you can likely get moose or elk in the proposal.  If only she was into moose and they were into being treated like a horse.  Word is that there was a moose nearby on the other side of Brainard Lake at the time of the proposal.  If you think we are implying approaching the moose let alone saddling one up is a good idea – it is not . . . unless you want your proposal to include a trip to the hospital potentially via flight for life.  If that is your intention we do not want to be one of those photographers that capture those kind of memories.   Our take is we want to balance things being natural while doing something that makes sense.  This requires not just being a photographer but proposal planner to advise on what will work well in this case to balance his vision, her preference, the location variables, and past experience to capture the raw candid emotion.  There are so many things that can go wrong in doing this that to reduce risk we map things out detailing all the turns where you could get lost, drawing lines, and detailing the angle.

Brainard Lake is a gorgeous mountain spot that has higher lake water in the summer months due to snow melt.  They were running a little early and so had to cause a little delay which meant taking a different less direct route to get there.  We are not sure if this is what caused some of the less comfortable 45 minutes but if it was a low know that it makes the high seem all the more high.  When they got out of the car it looked like there was a need to get a jacket.  The sun was behind some clouds so it was about 25 degrees cooler than the city.  The view is still awesome.  Thankfully the selfie idea worked for her preparing for photos as she was wearing a jacket.  If it was sunny it likely would have been sunglasses.  The reaction was a clear YES.  There was little delay in it which always helps the guy as all the rehearsal he had done was forgotten.  When you start adding these things up all the thought behind trying to make it special and wanting to be with her so intensely that the focus is completely blurred with the desire for the ring to be on her finger.  The relationship started as a 5 year friendship – not by choice.  For two years there was some romantic relationship in there.  They are now the on the path to marriage part of the relationship called engagement.  In your wedding planning if you can find a way to come down the aisle on an elephant we will do the wedding at cost.

You can get mountain lake proposal ideas from reading past blogs and read about how we do proposals on our engagement proposals page. If you like what you see here and are considering using this location here are some of the other shoots we have done at Brainard Lake.