Kimberly J Barnes is now EXPANDING area coverage!

Kimberly J Barnes Beach and Wedding Photography based out of Destin, FL has now decided to expand her services to everywhere outside of just Destin and the surrounding areas. Kimberly J Barnes Photography travel fees as well as session and wedding coverage are VERY reasonably priced. To view Kimberly's online portfolio & session pricing please visit the website at http://www.kimberlyjbarnes.com
Kimberly also does custom packages for those of you who are looking for your own unique and specific package of print sizes, amounts and albums. For more information you can also contact Kimberly J Barnes at 850-598-2366.

A Marvelous Sunset Wedding!

I had the pleasure of shooting my 1st "on the water" wedding for Jenn & Kimesh. They stayed at the amazing Grand Hotel in Baytowne and had their ceremony aboard the Solaris Yacht. I must say their timing for the ceremony was absolutely perfect. This evening produced one of the most amazing sunsets I've seen in the 2 + years I've lived here in Destin. Jenn wore a very elegant red gown which stood out with the firelike colors in the background behind her. After the ceremony was over and the reception started, I began to think to myself, "This is why I love my job so much!" The love that was felt between both families and the intense emotion that was spread throughout the room during the speeches left me in awe! Being there in the midst of such happiness, pure and true is such an amazing experience! To view more photos from Jenn & Kimesh's wedding please be sure to check out my website at www.kimberlyjbarnes.com

A beautiful day for a family beach shoot!

Last week I received a call from a lovely family from Georgia, The Wilsons. They wanted to book me for a beach portrait session while they were in town for the week. They were staying in a house in Rosemary Beach so I wanted to cater to their needs and find the perfect location around that area to do this session. I asked them to meet me at the beautifully breathtaking state park of Grayton Beach. If you haven't seen this area it is something else. No hotels or condos nor umbrellas lining the coastline as most of the coastal beaches in this area. Just pure beautiful white sandy dunes and amazing emerald green water stretching as far as the eye can see. This in my opinion is the BEST spot to do a small family beach portrait session. The two children in this family, a sweet little girl of the age of 5 (almost 6!) and her little brother who was just turning a year, were so photogenic and knew how to work the camera!
We had planned for a week for this shoot and hoped weather would permit. But, being in Florida where the weather is often unpredictable, the whole day was black skies, thrashing wind and rain. We weren't sure we would be able to do the shoot do to the weather. Just about an hour before sunset the skies of Grayton Beach cleared long enough for us to get in that last hour of beautiful natural lighting that appears right before the sun sets. Here I would like to share some of the photos I took from this session of this lovely family! Being a Destin Wedding Photographer I would most certainly recommend this area for beach weddings & beach portraits due to the stunning surroundings this beach has to offer. To view more of my family beach portraits please visit my website at www.kimberlyjbarnes.com

Website Updates!

There are a few new things I have recently made changes to! Please look at my website for more details under "WHAT'S NEW?" at www.kimberlyjbarnes.com

Thanks so much!
~Kimberly

Allison & Eric's Engagement Session!

Just a few days ago I met up with Allison and her future husband Eric to shoot their engagement session! It was a blast! I'm always so happy when I meet such a fun & loving couple willing to give it their all and just be themselves! Eric is definitely quite a character and I really think this couple are perfect for each other. They seem like the perfect balance for one another and that makes for a strong relationship. So I'm pleased to share some of the photos I took with these two great people! I really am so excited to shoot their wedding! For more information and images from this session please visit my website at www.kimberlyjbarnes.com

Unique Senior Class Portraits

So I just recently had a request to do a shoot for this year's Senior Class Pictures. Sam from Tennessee asked if we could do something a little different from the normal woods and hay barrel scene class pictures. She wanted something that expressed more of who she is and what she enjoys so in effort to make this happen we headed out to the beautiful west jetties of Destin. Sam spends her summers down here on the beautiful beaches of Destin so beach portraits were most certainly the appropriate scene for something like this. Finally after a week of trying to dodge the rain the day the weather was forcasted to be clear sunny skies we headed out to the beach. We watched a dark storm cloud lurking just north of us as we walked to our destination (about a 20 minute walk), keeping our fingers crossed that it was headed that way. After what seemed to be a very long stroll out to the tip of the jetties we started to notice a horrible smell coming from the water. Turns out red tide decided to roll in that late afternoon, leaving the coastline covered with washed out dead fish and the thick gooey algae splashing onto the beaches everytime the surf came in. So here we are faced with red tide and massive storms surrounding us. I started shooting immeditely and surely enough 15 minutes into the shoot the rain came pouring down on us. These had to of been some of the biggest raindrops I've ever seen! Now remember we had to walk over 1/2 mile to get to this location so running and getting in a car or under any shelter was out of the question. The closet thing we found for shelter were some of the rocks that make up the west jetties. We thought if we just waited it out the rain would pass and we could go back to shooting. It didn't exactly happen like that so we decided to make a run for it and continue the session the following morning. The next morning we got up and I met Sam on the EAST jetties were we finished the shoot. It all turned out great and we got some amazing shots! I especially love some of the shots from the rainy red tide evening, where the sky was almost black but a sunset was peaking out behind the storm and the rocks were covered in a magnificent shage of green! So here I will share some of the photos taken from both days! I think it's safe to say that Sam will have some very unique & original photos to share with her fellow senior class this year! I hope you enjoy these images and please to be sure check out my website at www.kimberlyjbarnes.com

Northern Europe Travels

My family and I have just returned from a 3 week trip to Northern Europe. We started out in the beautiful fairytale like city of Copenhagen, Denmark. It rained the 1st 3 days we there but we still managed to walk around town in the rainy, windy & 49 degree weather, exploring castles & palaces throughout the city. From there we went to Tallin, Estonia where we toured the ruins of an ancient castle, ate lunch in the courtyard then walked around this quaint little town for some more site seeing. Next we stopped in St. Petersburg, Russia for 2 days. The history behind this country is amazing to me along with the palaces that line the streets of the city. We visted four palaces while we were there; Catherine's Palace where we walked thru the famous ball room & amber room, Peterhof's Summer then winter palace & then Yusupov Palace where thru a Russian sang opera learned about the plot to kill Rasputin.
A few other stops we made to see some of the amazingly unreal architechture there were The church of Spilled Blood, St. Issac Square, Peter & Paul Fortress & the Hermitage.
After leaving Russia the rain and very un-summer like cold weather stopped when arriving in Helsinki, Finland. This town was so charming with the cobblestone streets and gorgeous cathedrals, cafes & castles. We didn't spend too much time here but I think it may have been one of my favorite places so far. We went in the Rock Church (a church made from a boulder) & visited the Sibelius Monument. We strolled around the streets into the city market, had lunch at a finnish cafe and walked thru the shopping district and watched the livelyness of the city at work.
The next day we went to Stolkholm Sweden. There we toured the 18th Century Royal Palace & the old town of Stockholm. Yet another very beautiful & charming fairytale like city.
When leaving Sweden we headed back to Copenhagen where the weather was much better than the 1st visit. Once we were settled at the hotel in the heart of the city we set off on foot to Tivoli Gardens where the kids had a blast on all the old rides, Kayla had cotton candy for the 1st time and Aislynn drove a car for the 1st time (only being a year old). After the gardens the kids went back to the hotel and the grown ups went to check out the famous Absolute Ice Bar. It's excatly what it sounds like. We walked into the hotel, picked up our Eskimo coats and walked inside the bar which was a chilling -5 degrees C. The entire room was made of ice. The walls, ceiling, bar, tables, chairs and yes even the glasses we drank from we ice. It was definitely a different experience but it was pretty cool, no pun intended.
Copenhagen was where we started in these travels and now where it ended. Now were back home where night and day seem more normal and we're working on getting back with our time zone (it didn't EVER fully get dark outside and wouldnt get dark until past 11, in Russia past midnight, then it was only dark for 2 hours) I guess with the 9 hour time difference and being that close to the artic circle would explain all that. Now were home and settling back in to the nice relaxing life here on the coast of Florida. Quite a change in deed. Please enjoy some of the photos I took on this trip and be sure to visit www.kimberlyjbarnes.com for more of my work.