Many congratulations to Vanessa and Gavin who recently got married at Hengrave Hall in Suffolk.

This was my first wedding in 2012 and probably will be one of my longest journeys as well. Anyhow it was good to be back shooting again after my my last wedding in November. So not too long a break and its always good to get a few early winter weddings under your belt before the summer madness begins.

This was my first ever wedding at Hengrave Hall and it turned out to be a fantastic location with lots of space, interesting architecture and, from a photographic point of view, great light. This is what you need more than anything in the midst of winter and we were lucky with some decent and fairly mild  weather.

Vanessa and Gavin got ready seperately a few doors away from each other so I could easily cover this before the civil ceremony downstairs. Then later in the afternoon a blessing was held in Hengrave’s own church adjacent to the main building. And then it was back again to the main building for drinks and canapes followed by the wedding breakfast, speeches (with some interesting stick on moustaches !) and finally the band and dancing.

Overall a real fun and intimate wedding one that I’m sure the guests and I thoroughly enjoyed and will remember in years to come. An excellent start to 2012 so thank you Vanessa and Gavin for having me. The complete set can be viewed by clicking here and you will need a password which is Vanessa’s surname followed by Gavin’s, all lower case with no gaps. As usual you can see some of my many favourites below so please feel free to add any comments.

Many thanks to everyone who voted in The best of 2011

As promised here are the results, rather appropiately on Valentines day as well -

1st place with 48 votes – Miriam and James Wedding Photo at The Bingham Hotel

2nd place with 35 votes – Jenn and Nick Wedding Photography at Wokefield Park

3rd place with 10 votes – Susan and Darren Wotton Hatch Wedding

So many congratulations to them and they will be receiving their gift vouchers for £150, £75 and £50 in due course.

Next up – Vanessa and Gavins Hengrave Hall Wedding !

Thanks to all those who’ve voted so far. As promised here is an update on how the voting is going so far -

1st place is image No 23 with 38 votes.

2nd place is image No 7 with 25 votes

3rd place is image no 18 with 5 votes

So still plenty to vote for with exactly 1 week to go. Please feel free to forward this on to friends and family and to tweet and post on Facebook. Here is the link you’ll need - http://www.neilpalmerweddings.co.uk/2012/01/wedding-photography-2011/

Some of you may have noticed that your votes aren’t showing. This is a problem I have with WordPress. One of my plug ins is causing this which I can’t figure out at the moment. But do not worry I can see all the votes in my admin area and have included them so far. About 10 votes have not shown but please keep voting as I will see all of them.

Up next – Vanessa and Gavin’s wedding photos at Hengrave Hall

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Sam and Chris’ wedding photos at Northcote House can be viewed by clicking here These will be ready once they return from honeymoon. You will need a password which can be obtained from Sam and Chris. In the meantime you can leave your email address on that website (http://www.everybodysmile.biz/neilpalmerphotography/weds/) to be immediately informed once they are ready.

When ready, Vanessa and Gavin’s wedding photos at Hengrave Hall can be viewed by clicking here

You will need a password which is Vanessa’s surname followed by Gavin’s, all lower case with no gaps. In the meantime you can leave your email on that website (http://www.everybodysmile.biz/cgi-bin/public.cgi?Id=144992) to be immediately notified when the photos are ready. I will of course write a blog post at the same time so watch this space.

Welcome again to my favourite images of the year award. This is the 3rd year and you can see the winning images above. At the very top from 2009 is Ian and Ayla’s winning image taken at Kelmarsh Hall and just below that from 2010 is Rachel and Andy’s winning image taken at The King William lV pub in Speen

So now on to the 2011 weddings. Again another fantastic year with some great venues and couples who have once again shown absolute 100 % faith and trust in what I do. After  travelling to the other side of the world, Sydney Australia to photograph a wedding in 2010 I stayed slightly more local in 2011. In fact my furthest treck was to the Peak District for Lou and Mark’s tipi wedding back in August.

Here then are some of my favourites below. One from each of the 25 weddings I photographed. It was tough choosing from literally tens of thousands of images but I’ve finally managed to narrow it down to 25. So what I’d like you to do is vote for your favourite and feel free to say why you chose it. To do this please go to the comments box at the foot of this post. As before I will be offering the following – 1st prize a £150 gift voucher, 2nd prize a £75 gift voucher, 3rd prize a £50 gift voucher  These can be used more or less for any product or service  at my studio (except for albums) or can be passed on to a friend or relation and will be valid until March 2013. So get voting now and I’ll be updating next week. I want as many votes as possible so please feel free to Tweet, add to Facebook, Linked In, Google + etc……  (buttons below). The competition closes on the 12th February with the results to be announced on Valentines Day.

Image No 1  – Michaela and Dave

Silchester House Wedding Photography

Image No 2 – Charlene and Jon

Wedding Photography at Latimer Place

Image No 3 -  Jane and Peter

Berkshire Wedding Photogapher

Image No 4 – Gemma and Mark

Orsett Hall Wedding Photography

Image No 5 – Kat and Tony

Wedding Photography at Nonsuch Mansion

Image No 6 – Jenni and Chris

The Drapers Arms Islington Wedding Photography

Image No 7 – Jenn and Nick

Wedding Photography Wokefield Park

Image No 8 – Emma and John Paul

Wedding Photographer Orsett Hall

Image No 9 – Sarah and Alex

Wedding Photography in The Cotswolds

Image No 10 – Lizzie and Ian

Kelmarsh Hall Wedding Photography

Image No 11 – Louise and Ben

Trunkwell House Wedding Photography

Image No 12a – Caroline and Matt

Stratford Upon Avon Wedding Photography

Image No 12b – Debbie and Brian

Wedding Photographer Reading

Image No 14 – Amy and Kieran

Wedding Photography at Frimley Hall Hotel

Image No 15 – Louise and Mark

Old Luxters Barn Wedding Photography

Image No 16 – Lou and Mark

Marquee and Tipi Wedding Photography

Image No 17 – Hannah and Stephan

Wedding Photography Salisbury

Image No 18 – Susan and Darren

Wedding Photography at The Wotton Hatch Guildford

Image No 19 – Amy and George

Wyck Hill House Hotel Wedding Photography

Image No 20 – Camille and Michael

Wedding Photography at The Royal Berkshire Hotel in Ascot

Image No 21 – Angela and Kostas

Great Fosters Wedding Photography

Image No 22 – Petrina and Richard

Wedding Photography at The Compleat Angler in Marlow

Image No 23 – Miriam and James

Wedding Photography at The Bingham Hotel in Richmond

Image No 24 – Laura and Dwain

Wedding Photography at Great Fosters

Image No 25 – Maegan and Garreth

Wedding Photography at Bluebells Restaurant in Sunningdale

After a very successful and enjoyable 2011 its now full steam ahead for 2012. This is traditionally the quieter time of year in terms of shooting but there’s still a hell of a lot to do.

First and foremost its a chance to sit back and review the previous year, to look at your successes and failures and then to implement plans (if any). And then to look also at your marketing, pricing, products and photography. Last year was very good for me so not too many sweeping changes. One thing I have been meaning to improve is my overall branding having introduced a new logo last year. So I recently discovered a really cool company that makes branded USB memory sticks. I had also been considering moving away from dvd’s as they can be unreliable and also having been asked several times from clients for alternatives. So here are the results below which will be brand new for all my 2012 clients. Pretty cool looking or what !

Secondly I wanted an alternative light source to the traditional flash gun. You probably all know how much I hate using flash and how I try to avoid it all costs. But there are situations where its so dark you have no choice and some sort of artificial light is an absolute necessity. I have toyed with video lights and off camera flash before but found the gear not only bulky and cumbersome but also difficult to use at times as well as time consuming. I was speaking with my good friend and fellow wedding photographer Stephen Bunn about this and he mentioned some really cool video lights. Not only are these small and very light (they fit in the palm of your hand) they cost only £15 ! They come with a bracket so it can sit to the side of the camera or alternatively fix onto the camera’s hot shoe. And because of their size and weight they can even be held in your other non camera hand whilst shooting. I’ve had a quick play around with them and it looks very promising. So I hope to post some images soon.

So this year is looking very promising with me being just ahead of my target compared to this time last year. I’ll be returning to my favourite venue Syon Park in May and have also booked some more of my favourite venues – The Elvetham, Monkey Island, Hengrave Hall (the end of this month), Warbrook House and Wokefield Park. June is by far my busiest month with 6 bookings and will conclude with a wedding in Portugal, something I’m really looking forward to. I love Asian weddings and am really pleased to be photographing Lena and Andrew’s Hindu celebrations in September. This will be over 4 days with its conclusion at West Wycombe Estate.

So a busy year ahead with lots to look forward to. Many thanks to all those who’ve already booked me and I look forward to working with you and creating great images. Watch this space.

Next up a review of 2011 with a competition thrown in ! Followed by Vanessa and Gavin’s wedding photography at Hengrave Hall – my first wedding of 2012.

First of all let me wish everyone a happy new year.

I thought this would be a good time to show some personal work before I get into the full swing of weddings and portraits. Here are a selection of images I took last August and September on a short family break to North Devon. This has the most amazing beaches and landscapes you could ever wish to photograph. Anyway I thought it would be a great opportunity to try out my fairly new Fuji X100. I must admit despite the rave reviews it has got I’m still in 2 minds about it. There are things I love about it and equally things I hate. I’ve used it a few times on weddings and also some portrait shoots as well and I’m very pleased with how it handled here. But I don’t trust it 100% like I do my usual Nikons. Too many settings and complicated menus for my liking as well as a few niggly things.

Anyhow feel free to have a look at the images below and feel free to add any comments -

Welcome to my first blog post of 2012. Now that I’m just about upto date with all my weddings from 2011 I thought I’d start off with a recent engagement session.

Here we have Vanessa and Gavin and just before Christmas, on the shortest day in fact, I travelled upto London to do their engagement session. We chose to do it in and around St Paul’s cathedral, rather fittingly as this is where Gavin proposed to Vanessa. We also took some shots on the Millenium bridge (the one that wobbles) and at the nearby Borough Market which I never knew existed. This was teeming with people and along with the general hustle and bustle made it quite a challenge but resulted in some quite interesting shots.

Anyway I’ll be doing Vanessa and Gavin’s wedding photography at Hengrave Hall at the end of this month. It will be my first visit there and I must say it looks a really great venue, one that I’m really looking forward to. Below are some more favourites so please feel free to add any comments -

Here’s some favourite images from Petrina and Richard’s wedding at The Compleat Angler in Marlow  This was a warm and gloriously sunny day in October. It was in fact better than most of the summer days  we’ve had this year.

I started the coverage from the Church in  Beaconsfield old town. This is a really large church with great light and which gave me plenty of opportunities inside and out for some really cool shots. After the ceremony and some formal family groups on the lawn we all made the short trip to the reception in Marlow. With the fantastic weather we again had some great opportunities for the photos particularly as the sun started to drop. I love working with flare and low light, it just makes the results so much more unpredictable and the images that much more interesting. Finally as dusk arrived it was time for the wedding breakfast, some memorable speeches and then the cake cutting. All in all a really nice and intimate wedding which seems so far off now that I’m writing this post at 3:25pm in the afternoon and its almost pitch black outside with driving wind and rain !

Many thanks also to my good friend Mark Andrews who accompanied me and took some great shots as well. I hope it was useful for you Mark. The complete set can be viewed by clicking here but in the meantime please feel free to have a look at my favourites below and to leave any comments.

Finally, this is my last blog post before Christmas and I would therefore like to take this opportunity to wish all my friends, colleagues and clients a very Merry Christmas and a happy and prosperous 2012. Also to thank all my couples from this year and before for their trust and belief in me and for giving me the freedom to shoot in my own particular style. It means a lot and makes my job so much more enjoyable. Thank you !