Just home from a cracking day working with Jamie. Shooting a civil partnership and Alan and Neil were fabulous. They both got through some some lenghty vows with no mistakes. Unfortunately the registrars have a no photography rule. We could shoot them coming in and going out but there is a blanket ban on photography during the ceremony. We had a very good chat with the registrars and I can fully understand their stance. They have a very important job to do and it is not best served by a photographer resting a len on their shoulder. So thay have a no photography rule. That impacts negatively on those of us who have respect for the occasion, who can pick a shot or two without having to adversely impact on the registrars. So we were very limited in the shots we could take but the lead registrar did let me take some pics of them actually signing which was most welcome.

It will live with me though the image of Neil's face, over Alan's shoulder, embracing after they exchanged vows and rings. It was an image that just begged to be taken and I was not allowed to take it. It will never be replaced, it can never be replayed. All I can do is hope that photographers learn to behave so we don't all end up being penalised.

Here we go here we go........

Batteries all charged and the first wedding of the season beckons. A civil partnership on Saturday with Jamie (weddings by James) First chance to put the D700's through their paces and being a civil partnership means different setups for us. Done my homework and I hope I have a few good ideas that will help Jamie on the day. Sounds very much like we should have some fun and integrating on the day is all part of the job. There is a balance to be had between being a wallflower to get those candids and being in the thick of it to get some order out of chaos. A bit of both is usually required and it's knowing which to do and when that helps make the day go smoothly.

Here we go, here we go, here we go.....:)

More boudoir on the way

Booked the gorgeous RebeccaAmy for a shoot on the 14th so looking forward to shooting some more classic boudoir images.

Also booked a studio for the afternoon and have some ideas I want to explore that involve tigers!

Watch this space! :)

I have my very first wedding fayre coming up in May so as usual my preparation started early. I don't do last minute! I have worked at some really big exhibitions in the past that cost hundreds of thousands of pounds. Huge efforts that took up serious acreage at the NEC. So I'm kind of used to this kind of thing. But it is a little funny when doing it for yourself. I have got my roller banner delivered, six sample albums from all three suppliers all sorted and will be finished in the next week or two. I have been busily preparing pricing schedules, contact forms and bought a large photo frame that actually makes a very good job of showing off photos! Beats my laptop hands down!

Looking forward to my own little mini exhibition, all I need now is mints and customers :)

Boudoir Albums too

Having shot some really good images of the lovely Rebecca at the Yerbury Seminar, I was keen to practice putting them together in a coherent album. I always find that it is one thing shooting the images and working on them in post processing but as a relative novice to album design I like to practice as much as I can with sets of images to work them into the finished product.

I've found some great 8x8 and 10x10 albums that I think are going to suit this style very well so have more on order. Time to go and shoot some more images!

It's album time

For this coming year I wanted to source some different albums that I thought would appeal to my customer base so I have been busy with album design after Focus in March and I have the samples at the printers for the printed albums and I have been busily working on the design and printing for the others. Here is one that I've just finished and I have to say it's looking rather good.

And another from the Boudoir Workshop with Trevor and Faye Yerbury.