An English, a Welsh and a Scots wedding...

Not the start of a bad joke, simply a description of my July. A reminder though of how every wedding I shoot ends up being unique in some way. City, village, countryside... Quaker, Anglican, Civil... Posed, Reportage, Contemporary... Band, Disco, Ceilidh... definitely avoiding falling into the trap of treating all jobs as the same, as is always the danger with some schools of wedding photography.

First up was Emma and Gregory in Edinburgh. Emma and Gregory's was an interesting one in

that they had two ceremonies. The first was a very low-key Quaker meeting in their local

meeting house before the official ceremony, a much grander Church of Scotland one. They asked for no photography at all during the actual ceremonies and so instead the start of the day was their

reception venue at the Mansfield Traquair... and what a venue! While I wouldn't go so far as to call it "The Sistine Chapel of Edinburgh" as the bumf goes, this recently renovated old church is a staggering and vast space, covered with some truly remarkable murals. It also has a shockingly high minstrel's gallery which is where I spent many of the quiet moments of the evening clutching white-knuckled to a single bar of scaffolding while trying to do some justice to what was going on below.

And, what better way to finish a Scottish wedding than the timeless

tradition of a Ceilidh. With a wedding party that was mostly English and French, there were always bound to be a bit of confusion with some of the dances, but they didn't do at all badly and I managed to get some pretty good picture from it too.

Straight after that came Paul and Elen in the Brecon Beacons. The reception was in a Georgian spa with a splendid view out of the rear balconies down a steep river valley. I made the drive across to Wales the day beforehand to get a proper look round the venues and get myself fully prepared. It really makes a difference to wake up right in the place where a wedding takes place instead of needing to catch an early morning train.

Despite the usual protestations of being unphotogenic, Paul and Elen were a dream to shoot and very keen to take some time out from the bustle of the day to make sure they had some really stunning portraits. One of their requests was to get photos which captured the scenery and we were able to use a disused coach-house on the main road to the reception to get some great vistas down the valley. They were also certainly not going to let a little thing like a stile after rainy weather get in the way of some good pics.

Finally, Harvey and Sarah were married in the village church a few hundred yards from their newly rennovated house and garden in Essex which iswhere their reception took place. When I visited them a month earlier everything was still in chaos but on the day you could see the love and

hard work which had gone into making both their wedding venue and their home. The day was almost completely reportage owing to a distinct aversion to cameras from both bride and groom, but I think I managed to catch the spirit of the day while letting both Harvey and Sarah enjoy themselves.

Got a short trip away next week but back again for the tail end of the season in September.

Somone told me it's all happening at the zoo...

Dan and Ebony's was definitely a first for me, married as they were in a zoo. Let me rephrase that. Port of Lympne zoo is essentially a turn of the century stately home... complete with safari park. And when you think about it, a first rate wedding venue. After all, what better way to start a marriage than several lorry-loads of wedding guests and one photographer on a safari tour of wild African fauna wandering around the green fields of Kent? Inspired!

With the wedding season winding down in a few months it's time to turn back to child and maternity shoots and include a couple from a recent at-home shoot. Not the

easiest job trying to turn a client's living room into a home studio but a reflector a couple of flash units and of course some dark sheets can produce wonders.

On the move throughout July with three weddings in England, Scotland and Wales in nearly as many weeks. Need go and watch that George Clooney film which everyone keeps telling me about.

And we're off

Two weekends, two countries, two weddings, a small volcanic crisis and an awful lot of work to be getting on with.

First up were Genevieve and Dominic in Surrey. WIth 120 plus evening guests this was a sizeable wedding with over twenty immediate family on one side and a large Spanish contingent on the other. It was also my first shoot with Alex Brenner who was a pleasure to work with and produced some first rate shots. It really does make a difference when clients request a second photographer as simply having cameras in two places at once makes huge difference and also meant that I could spend longer with the bride than normal as she got ready at her parents' house, knowing that Alex was at the church. It also means twice as many pictures to go through afterwards of course, but hey.

The following Saturday was the much more informal Anders and Mia in Västra Götaland, fortunately catching one of the last flights across before a small volcano managed to shut down half of European airspace. While a smaller party, they more than made up for it in enthusiasm. Like all good Swedish weddings, there were speeches, songs and poems to the newly-weds aplenty ranging from the comic to deeply moving and from what seemed like nearly everybody present. We were also lucky enough to have some very dramatic light coming through the woodland around the venue which was perfect for a portrait session before the guests arrived.

Was supposed to be flying back to Britain tomorrow but without any fixed appointments until next week I can afford to wait a while to see what happens before joining the luckless hordes trying to catch boats from Copenhagen. Provisionally my flight has been rebooked to next Tuesday, but we'll have to see if Ryanair holds good for me. Luckily with two weddings now on my hard disc in RAW, I've got plenty to be getting on with.

First post

So it's taken a little while to get going, but here is my first official blog posting.

It's been a tricky last few months taking advantage of the lull to get myself familiar with Göteborg, Swedish and to prepare some long overdue administration for the coming year.

The highlight was definitely the

SWPP conference in London with some fascinating talks by some of the big names in the profession even if the trade show ended up

being more expensive than I'd counted on. A lot of inspiration and ideas which I'm looking forward to putting into practice.

It's also a wonderful country for making contacts and, while I'm expecting to be in the UK more than Sweden this year, there are definitely plenty of opportunities presenting themselves here including clients and studio access for portrait work, more of which another time.

Still the downtime is over and while the Swedish winter seems to be thawing into a very soggy Spring, there are daffodils in England and two weddings for me to attend to this month which I've been visiting venues for. It's great fun to see spend a bit of time with the couple while they're relaxed in the places they'll be getting married shortly. And surprisingly their plans had not changed completely since we last met in August. Good to have some people back behind the lens again and hopefully there'll be some shots in my next post.

Until then...