Wasing Park wedding photography
Monday, August 3rd, 2009The weather wasn’t perhaps the kindest feature of Saturday’s Wasing Park wedding, but (trying to avoid cliches like dampen the spirits) that did little to cast a cloud (dash, did it) on proceedings. Fab day guys, one of those occasions where as a wedding photographer you have to be at your best when it comes to banter. There was a distinct Australian flavour to the day, groom Nick being an Aussie. He even grasped the opportunity to put the English crew to rights when it came to where the Ashes really belong. Did you manage to finish that whole hog roast Nick? Remember the challenge?
Wasing Park wedding photography
Sunday, July 19th, 2009Just a quick blog to announce that Giovanni and Sabrina’s wedding website has gone live through our client area. Fabulous wedding at Wasing Park and what a party! Incidentally, and this is one for grooms with upcoming stag parties abroad, working as air crew on short haul Sabrina has seen her fair share of stags destined for places like Prague. One poor chap recently boarded dressed as Sesame Street’s Big Bird character (how on earth did he get through Customs???) Once they were at cruising altitude, his mates gleefully announced that he may well be enroute for a weekend’s beer fest, but his suitcase was stored safely back in Blighty. The only thing he had to wear all weekend, was one big feathery yellow costume. Nice one!
Wasing Park wedding photography
Friday, June 19th, 2009I’m spending a reasonable amount of my summer at Wasing photographing weddings and it’s a venue I’m very fond of. A couple of shots from Tom and Anna’s fabulous nuptials as the post edit work now begins. Quick mention too for Wasing Park chef extraordinaire, the wonderful Joe. I quite like, when given the opportunity, to get into the kitchen at a wedding. The wedding banquet is such an important facet of the big day and chef is an important player and unsung hero frankly. When the thanks are read out, the list of key players will oft include the coordinator, for good reasons clearly, but rarely chef. So Joe, incase you get to read this, you’re an absolute star, and I can’t wait to show you the book of stuff I’ve recorded in your kitchen over the last few months.
Wasing Park wedding photography
Sunday, June 14th, 2009For fear of becoming a BBC repeat, I may have mooted this before; keeping up the blog is sometimes like keeping the diary you were bought for Christmas aged 9. (For some reason mine was always a Disney one featuring Mickey and friends. It continued that way well into my teens.) You diligently filled it in for ooh, a good seven days following New Year’s Eve, then it became a series of ‘Got up, had lunch, went to bed’ comments for week two and by week three, it transgressed to a doodle pad at best. However I have a blog guardian it seems in Robbie, who wed Sarah yesterday at Wasing Park. So, Robbie, your enthusiasm for updating noted, some images from yesterday. I look forward to seeing you when you return from your honeymoon in July.
Robert and Sarah
Tuesday, May 12th, 2009Just a quickie before hitting the hay as they say across the pond… have completed Robert and Sarah’s pre-wedding shoot. Great shoot on the farm. I like working in the studio particularly since laying the real wooden floor, but it’s equally as good to get out into the yard. The industrial edge can look fabulous in contrast to what we’ll eventually achieve on the wedding day itself.
A funny thing happened on the way to the first dance…
Saturday, May 9th, 2009A first today, well in wedding photography terms for me. It was the second of two ‘in a row-ers’ at Wasing Estate as I photographed Matt and Adrianna’s wedding. I’m not a shrinking violet when it comes to addressing guests on the big day. I’d like to think, although you’d have to ask the guests to see if they’d corroborate, that I’m politely and respectfully assertive. A lot of people, and certainly photographers, seem to me vocally shy, even awkward when it comes to gathering guests to construct group portraits. I can’t help thinking that many a fabulous photographer chooses to label him or herself a photojournalist, because the idea of having to organise strangers is such a long distance drive out of their comfort zone, that it’s easier to purchase a 300mm lens and shoot guests from afar. And so today it came to the cutting of the cake. It’s not unusual that I take on the task of gathering eager friends and relatives around the sugar zone for the ‘knife snap.’ But on this occasion I had the benefit of a microphone. Ahhh, I thought, the legendary Shure SM58 microphone… always one to warm up a voice if held just at the right pitch from yer’ lips. Rattle your yaffle correctly with a little depth, and they’ll hear you in Norway. So, I said my piece, gathered guests, collected the shots and moved on. Come the first dance, the DJ planted his microphone in my hands and supported by the groom, persuaded me to introduce the first dance. “You don’t seem to be shy, you’ve got a half decent voice, so would you mind?” Mind? Mind? Me? Of course not. A little trip down memory lane from my broadcasting roots of yesteryear. Hopefully, if you read enough of these posts, you will have worked out I don’t use it to talk of a million and one awards and accolades. But maybe, just maybe, I can claim an accolade, a USP perhaps, my peers would find hard to match. Having worked enough stages and reasonably large arenas in my brief affair as a broadcaster with Radio 1 in the early 90s, (clang name drop) I can now make myself available to photograph a wedding and MC the day’s events, as long as you order a Shure SM58 (the sound geeks will register my excitement and understand.) Anyway, before this all becomes really quite self absorbed, some favourite clicks from the initial download featuring the main event of today; Matt and Adrianna. Have a great honeymooon ‘guys.’
Wasing Park wedding photography
Saturday, May 9th, 2009It’s a Wasing weekend this week as I find myself there on two consecutive days. Jay and Katy’s 70 friends and family members witnessed their nuptials yesterday. I love a good tactile wedding, loads of hugs, tub thumpy kind of hearty ‘I love ya mate’ rugby scrum down embraces. This one had plenty!
Low light wedding photography
Tuesday, July 15th, 2008[photopress:wasing_park.jpg,full,alignleft]What I sometimes struggle to understand when talking to fellow pros in the wedding photography industry, is why photogs run inside and strap a speedlight (flash) to their camera body the moment the sun makes an exit from the skies above. I’m a relative newbie to the habit of chasing any light that makes itself available to shoot in and I’ll admit to being inspired by some of the Aussie and World market leading wedding shooters like Ghionis and Schembri in that particular field. But I have definately found that the age old cliche of ‘looking for the light,’ has, if you’ll forgive a hideously contrived company pun, ‘breathed’ life into my passion for capturing wedding images. Alongside those more candid moments that fashionably have become labelled as wedding photojournalism, there’s always time to go look for a shot that hopefully won’t appear in nine out of ten albums. The weekend just passed I photographed at a brand new venue called Wasing Park. A fabulous couple, a fabulous venue… and possibly the biggest bridal suite bed I have ever seen. Anyway, by the by, above – a couple of pics from when the sun went down. I know I know, you’re expecting scenes from the venue, perhaps the obligatory stuff, but nestled in hundreds of acres of prime farming countryside, I couldn’t resist an old Fordson tractor that resided down an overgrown lane, and as Wasing has invested in some of the most incredible lighting features – a shot that reflects the attention to detail that’s gone into downlighting parts of the venue. And then finally, below, I kid you not, a completely unarranged moment, when passing by the best man at the end of the wedding banquet, I spied the chap altering his notes.
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