Cécile & Joe

Cécile and Joe are the loveliest people you could ever hope to meet. They have 2 beautiful boys and although they were already married they decided to hold a reception party gathering their nearest and dearest making it official. Cécile approached me in May, and we met for the first time over a glass of wine to discuss the itinerary for the day and the type of photos that she was looking. I love meeting clients beforehand because by the time it comes to the big day you're both familiar with each other and it makes everything flow easier.

We shot the initial photos in Wolfson College (one of the Oxford University colleges) and later they made their way via punt to Cherwell Boat House just down the river. So here are some photos of the gorgeous couple and their fabulous guests!

For the day I had 3 lenses that I used. My 50mm f1.8, 17-85mm and the 70-200mm. The 70-200mm let's me disappear into the background while still letting me capture intimate moments. It's one of my favourite lenses when it comes to weddings and events.. although as much as I love it, it comes second place to the 85mm 1.2. Now that lens makes me drool.. mmm... ok ok back to the photos!

 Cécile's sister played the violin.. gotta admit it had us all nearly in tears. It was beautiful.

All in all it was a beautiful day and Cécile and Joe thank you both so much for allowing me to be a part of it.

<3

Nicky's family

Earlier this summer I had the pleasure of being contacted by Nicky who I'd met last summer at Anna's wedding where I was the photographer. She liked the photos I took of her sons so much that she wanted me to come over for a family portrait session to capture the energy and nature of her beautiful boys. 

When it comes to family sessions with young kids I always recommend to my clients for it to take place somewhere familiar to the young ones. Usually for me the back garden, a nearby field, a park or even in their own home is perfect as the mood for the session is light and the idea is to have fun!

Activities are great for getting high energy shots plus it distracts the subject allowing me to get some sneaky shots where there's no barriers in expressions and it's in these moments where I know I'm capturing something special. I guess I just like to be invisible and keeping the kids playing and entertaining themselves let's me capture the moments I want as well as summing up what they enjoy in this point in their life.. plus it's fun to join in with all the fun and games :D

Anyhoo have a look at this gorgeous family and let me know what you think! 

♥

Lydia and Chris Wedding

Lydia and Chris got married an hour north of Malaga deep in the Spanish countryside surrounded by friends and family who'd traveled to be there from all parts of the world. It was in Spain where Chris proposed to Lydia as this place holds dear memories for the two of them.

This was my first wedding of the summer and on top of that it was also my first destination wedding and I couldn't have had more fun. I've never seen a happier family.

Thank you both for allowing me to be a part of your big day.

Feel free to check out more photos on my facebook page :)

Vinyl love..

Sitting in the garden with some green tea and I can’t help smiling as I flick through and select photos from the weekend. There was a conceptual band shoot on Saturday and on Sunday I traveled into the English countryside to shoot a family portrait session (more on that laters).

I had the pleasure of shooting a Brighton based band called Heavy Dials. They contacted me through a mutual contact whose collection I shot last year and whose wedding I had the honour of shooting in Spain earlier this year. It’s amazing how effective word of mouth is, it’s how I’ve gotten the majority of my jobs and opportunities! What can I say I’ve been fortunate to have some amazing clients :)

Anyhoo we shot the images in Stanmer Park, Brighton (haha any day that I get to shoot amongst trees and moss is a good day!). There were 3 band members, 2 assistants, a dog, me and a TON of props ranging from chairs to a keyboard, a cello and even a giant glass bottle (heavy!). This is just one of the 400 and something photos we took on Saturday. The entire shoot took just over a couple of hours as a lot of the prep was done prior to and earlier that day. We’d already planned out the photos that we wanted to take so everyone knew (generally speaking) what was required for each shot. We did leave room for some randomness and I think in the end we completed 6 scenes and each one is so special because it really was a group effort.

Since I can’t share the photos for a while here’s a couple of behind the scenes shots :)

Photos by John Dryden

what's your passion?

Can’t believe it’s been a year since this photo! It’s funny how 2011 has thrown a lot of different photography work my way (despite all the uni stress). I’ve shot architectural photos for a company in Birmingham, been flown to cover a wedding in Spain, organised some personal shoots that I will show soon and later in the month I’ll be shooting promotional photos for a band in Brighton and have a couple more weddings lined up..phew! It’s all fun and experience. Wedding are a big deal, each time I come away feeling humbled that the couple picked me to record possibly the biggest day of their lives to date! These people that place their trust in my vision give me the confidence to push myself harder and to believe in myself that little bit more.

Photography for me was there ever since I was a child, as the oldest of three my Dad would entrust me with with the camera (and actually who would blame him, I have two younger brothers and I still don’t trust them with my camera!) I think because no one else in our family would really use it or record anything at some point I became obsessed with taking pictures, I think I was about 8. Suddenly I realised that in the 8 years I was alive there were only 2 albums that summed up our lives and all the memories and stories outside the photos in those albums had slipped away.

I guess since then I’ve nearly always had a camera on me, to be honest most of the photos don’t get seen by anyone else but me but that’s ok. Photography for me particularly after I bought a dSLR, opened up a world where I meet people and through that there are more opportunities. I’m a yes person. I’ll always say yes to every thing that comes my way. Right now I’m at a cross roads but I know that whatever I choose for whatever reason, photography for me isn’t going to go away any time soon and that’s kinda comforting.

So I’m curious, what’s your passion? What interest has always been there in your life?

B

Unspoken..

It's been 7 years since I began my Architecture course in the autumn of 2004. The years were the longest and most challenging yet. I made wonderful friends along the way, moved out of home and learnt a lot about myself. Although I do enjoy the subject, photography for me began as an escapism from it all, architecture and my life. Last week was a big week, after countless sleepless nights (and cups of coffee) I handed in my last ever piece of coursework. A few days later I learnt I passed (yay!!) it seems I'll be graduating with a Masters in Architecture after all!

Now that I'm at the end of this road I feel nostalgic for all the memories and the strange little bubble I was in. I feel as though I'm at a crossroads.. having to choose between something I've worked so long and hard for and my passion. I've given myself the summer to travel, work and decide or .. not decide and just see where the road takes me..

:)

Treasure Dress shoot

The blog post for this is long overdue! I was commissioned by TreasureDress (a gorgeous online boutique) to shoot 3 stories for their launch. This photo is from the Enchantment series. Megan (the model) was a pleasure to work with and so was her friend Kelsey. I had a great team whom I'd worked with a few weeks before so felt secure in the knowledge that no matter what happened that day three heads would definitely be better than one :)

All the photos were shot in Brighton. Initially we started at the seafront and later moved to Stanmer Park. I was a little worried about that as I didn't have a chance to scout it before and was going on Vicky's recommendation. It turned out to be perfect.

Equipment wise I was using my Canon 450d and my 17-85mm Canon lens as well as my trusty 50mm f1.8 and used natural light for all the shots.

Right from the morning to when we finished in the evening there was lots of laughter, silliness and fun! Here are some of the photos from the day.. the rest can be seen on my website under commissions and also on my facebook page :)

Model - Megan Waters & Kelsey Birchmore

Hair & Makeup by Lydia Pankhurst

Styling by Vicky Smith

Clothes from TreasureDress

and.. the outtakes :D

Haha Megan's face!

:)

nothing's gonna bring me down..

This is a photo of one of a very close friend! We have lots of fun together and keep each other sane in the madness that is doing a Masters of Architecture :s

I actually regularly ask myself why on earth I am putting myself through this course when it's clearly not something that I can see myself doing in the future and I've come to the realisation that it's probably because I'm stubborn. I've put myself through 3 crap years of undergrad and a year working in a practice I wasn't happy in and getting this qualification means that it was all worthwhile even if it is a little pointless in the grand scheme of things :p

I have learnt that if I can do this! Then I can do anything! I'm stronger because of it, learnt that I can take knocks and get up again and mainly the importance of having good friends! What can I say the pain of architecture has brought us all together..

Anyhoo this photo was taken on the beach in Brighton and it summed up the fun Friday we had. From now on we're gonna make every Friday a Fun Friday.

ps. I now have a twitter :)

Hope you're all well!