I’m a Wilmington NC wedding photographer, but this summer had me driving from Cincinnati to Portland, Maine, camera gear stacked to the ceiling of my car, for something that’s become a pretty huge part of my life as a photographer: Camp Roam.

And this one felt especially significant because it was our tenth retreat.

Ten retreats.

Ten times packing way too much camera gear, traveling somewhere beautiful, bringing a group of photographers together, creating something from scratch, teaching, learning, making new friends, and inevitably coming home exhausted in the absolute best way.

Camp Roam is my retreat business for wedding photographers. I co-own it with my besties Dana and Meaghan. The retreats have evolved a lot over the years, but the heart behind them has stayed pretty consistent, creating a place where photographers can connect, learn, make things they’re proud of, and remember why they fell in love with this work in the first place.

And honestly, I think hosting them has made me a better wedding photographer, too.

Creating without the pressure of a wedding day

There’s something really valuable about creating simply because you want to create.

On a real wedding day, my priority will always be the people in front of me. I’m documenting their relationships, their families, their weird little in between moments, and a day they only get to experience once.

I don’t want to turn someone’s wedding into my personal portfolio shoot.

But Camp Roam gives me space to experiment.

I can try something I’ve been thinking about. I can play with film in a way that reminds me why hybrid wedding photography still lights me up. I can approach light differently.

I can take a little longer with a composition. I can see what happens when something doesn’t work, and then try again.

There isn’t the same pressure to get through a wedding day timeline or make sure Grandma is where she’s supposed to be for family photos.

There’s room to just make something.

And every time I give myself that room, I bring something new back into the way I photograph actual weddings.

This Portland elopement

For our Maine retreat, we created this elopement in Portland at Fort Williams with the same intention I want behind all of the shoots we build for Camp Roam.

Maine has this combination of coastal New England charm, texture, history, and slightly imperfect beauty that photographs so well. It doesn’t need a lot added to it. It’s a different coastline than the one I shoot most, the stretch of sand along Wrightsville Beach back home, but it’s got its own kind of magic.

And being able to photograph an elopement there, surrounded by other photographers who were equally excited to create, was such a reminder of how much I love this part of my job.

Elopements & micro weddings keep growing as a wedding format nationally, not just as a smaller budget option. 

Ten retreats later

When we hosted the first retreat, I don’t think I completely understood what this would eventually become.

Camp Roam isn’t really about styled shoots anymore. The photographs are obviously part of it. We’re photographers, and creating together is always going to matter.

But somewhere along the way, I realized the bigger thing happening was everything around the photographs. It’s sitting around a table talking about business. It’s watching someone try something creatively that they’ve been scared to try. It’s photographers sharing what isn’t working instead of pretending everything is perfect.

It’s making dinner together, exploring somewhere new, staying up too late talking, passing cameras around, and leaving with people you didn’t know a few days earlier suddenly feeling like actual friends.

That’s why we’ve continued doing it. And after ten retreats, I think I’m more convinced of that than ever.

Why hosting Camp Roam makes me a better North Carolina wedding and elopement photographer

There’s another part of hosting these retreats that I don’t talk about as much, being around other photographers constantly challenges me.

I get to watch how other people see. Someone can stand in the exact same place as me, photograph the exact same couple, in the exact same light, and make something completely different.

I love that. It reminds me that photography isn’t about finding the correct way to make an image. It’s about developing your way.

Teaching also forces me to think about why I do things the way I do them. Why I give certain direction. Why I choose one lens over another. Why I step in during one moment and disappear into the background during another.

When you have to explain your process to someone else, you understand your own process differently.

And when I come home from Camp Roam and step back into my life as a Wilmington NC wedding photographer, photographing my couples’ actual wedding days, I feel creatively awake again.

I’m noticing things. I’m experimenting. I’m excited to pick up my camera. And I think my clients ultimately get a better photographer because of it.

The importance of staying inspired

Wedding photography can become repetitive if you let it.

Not because weddings themselves are repetitive, they absolutely aren’t, but because it’s easy as a photographer to find something that works and just keep doing it.

Same poses. Same compositions. Same safe photographs.

I never want to get to the point where I’m walking into someone’s wedding already knowing exactly what their photographs are going to look like. I want to stay curious.

Camp Roam has become one of the ways I protect that. It gives me permission to make weird things, try things, fail at things, learn from other photographers, teach what I know, travel somewhere new, and remember that before photography became my business, it was something I genuinely loved doing.

Ten retreats later, that’s probably one of the greatest gifts this little business has given me.

If you’re curious what it’s actually like to work together, from that first message to the day your gallery lands in your inbox, I wrote about that here too.

And getting to photograph an elopement in Portland, Maine while celebrating retreat number ten? That felt like a pretty damn good reminder of why we keep doing this.

Here’s to whatever we create next. If a quiet, intentional day like this one is what you’re picturing for yourselves, I’d love to hear about it over on my inquiry page.

If a quiet, intentional day like this one is what you’re picturing for yourselves, I’d love to hear about it.

A shoutout to the amazing vendors that helped us bring this vision to life:

Hair & Makeup: Black Fern Beauty Co.

Dress: LVD Bridal

Florals: Rose & Reverie