Hampton Roads Wedding Photography- James Bibow

Hampton Roads/ Virgina Beach Wedding Photography

My Home:

I currently live in the little bay side community of Phoebes, in Hampton, VA. I bought a little waterfront place that I'm in love with, and not at nearly enough. I moved here this past winter from living abroad in Japan for 4 years, and never thought I would come to Virgina. I did, and in the end, I'm glad for it. I've made some great friends since moving to the area and it's getting more awesome everyday!
Photography and me

Photography has always been very important to me. The first time I realized that I loved photography faces was in DC, years ago. A friend asked me to take a photo of her and her then new boyfriend with this antique camera I had just bought at a pawn shop. I agreed and went out and bought some black and white film, and shot a roll of 12 images of them just talking to each other. Weeks later when I took the film to be developed, I discovered that in those 12 random images, I had captured 2 people falling in love. It was magical moment for me, and I was hooked.

Personal Project: “What I fear the most”

November 4, 2011 Posted in Personal Work

Hello all! Ive been a little off the grid for a few weeks. Mostly due to the fact that switching to all film, Ive had to start over and learn everything all over again. Ive went a little purest in how I do things even. Ive decided not to outsource anything, and do all my own developing and printing/scanning. So, over the last few weeks, Ive been coming up with a work flow that keeps thing as close to the convenience of digital as possible.. which I think Ive finally worked it out.

One great thing about shooting film is that Ive found out that I shoot allot slower, and more thought out. Ive seen an increase in the quality of the photos pretty much right away, and Ive found that Im far more satisfied with the work.

Along those same lines, Ive started a few personal projects just for myself. Ive been wanting to challenge myself with photographing something with a little more feeling. This is actually incredibly challenging, but Im really liking the thought process behind it.

My first project is one called ” What I fear the most”, where I photograph someone in a way that shows whatever their biggest fear is. The goal is being able to tell the story with one photo, or at least create some thought. Im not really meaning a fear like spiders, or the dark..but REAL fears… fears that most people are too afraid to admit. This narrows the subject pool considerably of course, but I was lucky to have Kim as my first subject.

Kim is one of the coolest, most beautiful person I know…. but for as cheerful of a soul as she is, shes had some tragedy this year, detailed here in a story on the local news. Her and 10 friends were on a sailboat on the James River that capsized and they were too far from the shore to swim the distance. They threaded water for hours, and one of Kim’s best friends sadly passed away.

I remember seeing the report on the morning news that next morning, and feeling a huge sinking in my chest at the thought of my friend almost dying. This of course was no where near what she feels. Her biggest fear being that she didnt do enough to save her friend. This is a weight I could never understand, but Im very proud she let me try to capture it on film.