Orleans House Gallery & West London Pub Wedding - Aisha & Thom

Weddings

12 Dec

Bride is embraced by her friend as her veil billows out in the strong summer breeze.

A wedding venue, who has recently invited me to join their wedding photographers suppliers list, asked me to summarise why I love to photograph weddings and what my unique selling points are. Don’t you hate those kind of questions? ‘I just take the pictures’ is what I want to answer, ‘and if my clients love their pictures, that is all’.

The fact is that this is the main question when choosing a wedding photographer - do you like their pictures, their style and perhaps their variety artistry in that, but that all seems a bit obvious. I thought again and realise there are some other things that are interconnected and important for clients to think about. If you look at my reviews and more recently my google reviews - you will see that people refer quite often to their whole experience with me as their photographer as well as their pictures - before during and after their wedding day and I think that is perhaps also my USP.

Preparing to get wed can be stressful. You are investing in something that you want to be perfect in whatever way ‘perfect’ is to you; you want to give your family and guests a wonderful party, you want to relax with nothing more to worry about than getting into that wedding dress, having a leisurely breakfast before stepping out and savouring every minute of this unique and precious day in your lives.

When it comes to the photography, I believe the best photographers are not those who just tip up on the day and take photos without any prior knowledge of what makes their client’s tick or what they want from their wedding photographs. They listen and have some understanding of their clients beforehand, and they get organised ahead of the day whatever style they are going to be shooting in. On the day, they know, instinctively through experience when to quietly observe and document (whether it be with candid fleeting moments or with more considered crafted compositions or with beautiful portraits in great or not so great light) and at at the same time they are able to integrate and connect with people and be part of the occasion with their cameras. After the day, the best photographers will spend time carefully editing and perfecting the images to produce a beautiful curated story that resonates with the tapestry of your day in all its unique character, ritual and quirkiness.

So yes ultimately it’s all about the resulting pictures, not just for you but for my own artistic satisfaction and pride, but it is supremely important to me that you trust that I am there for you throughout the whole process from when you first get in touch to receiving your wedding photographs.

Aisha and Thom’s were married on a stunning summer’s day in June this year (2023) here in my community of Richmond-upon-Thames. Their brief to me was very clear. They did not want to pose, they did want a very few swift family group photographs, but swift and swiftly we did them (with proper forward planning by me to ensure they were). They had a little baby boy who was equally important to the day as they were; they wanted everything to just to play out and with pictures that were real and natural. They wanted to throw a fabulous party for those they love with dancing in the sunshine and they wanted me to capture the quirky, humorous, unforetold moments as much as the key ones.

This was Aisha’s response to the pictures:
'From the beginning Anna assured us she would go with a candid style - we wanted our wedding to be relaxed, and we didn’t want to be pulled away from our guests - just in the moment. Anna weaved her way through our wedding and party and found the special moments to capture without us knowing it was happening. She was also a lot of fun and had a great sense of humour which helped both us and our guests to relax. Each time we go through the pictures, we feel even more overwhelmed than the first time we saw them.’

From Aisha’s and Thom’s summer West London wedding day at Orleans House Gallery and The Victoria in Sheen.

Get in touch and fill out my contact form or call me on 97811 242266 if you like what you see and are looking for a photographer. I’d love to hear from you.