Bournemouth Winter Wedding at the Miramar Hotel, Jenny and Darren

The first of our December weddings from this year (2008!).

Both the ceremony and reception were at the Miramar Hotel in Bournemouth, there was a festive Christmas theme with candles which worked really well with the colours Jenny and Darren had chosen.

Normally the weather is the weather and everyone has a great time no matter, winter weddings are often dry but this was a warm day as well as having a blue sky in December, perfect! :)

Morning was spent with Teri going over to visit with the bridal party at Salon 1336 in Parkstone while I met up with the guys at the hotel.

We knew Jenny and Darren definitely wanted to use the beach for some of the wedding images so we all jumped into the wedding car directly after the ceremony. Daylight is always at a premium for winter weddings so we didn't spent long at the beach just enough to get some cool pics then back to the hotel to warm up.

Music was a large part of the day, Jenny herself plays in a Dorset based string quartet Bravado String Quartet and 3 members of her quartet (plus a stand in!) played throughout the wedding day. The musical theme went right through to Jenny's dads band playing at the reception, we loved the live music and the fact that everyone playing was a friend of Jenny and Darrens made it even more special.

Quick shout also to Alex and Paula the videographers at Jenny and Darren's Miramar Beach Wedding in Bournemouth, they were a pleasure to work with Wedding Videographers in Bournemouth :)

Portland Castle Dorset Medieval Wedding Mel and Lee

We wanted to go back and blog a few more weddings from this summer, it's been an amazing year and we'd like to thank all our couples for letting us be part of their wedding days, it is special to us and a privilege, thank you :)

Mel and Lee's Wedding at Portland Castle in Dorset was the most unusual 2008 wedding and one of the most fun and relaxed, both Teri and I dressed in medieval costume for the occasion (I'm sure we would have felt out of place if we hadn't!).

Mel's medieval wedding dress was custom made by The Costume Company who also supplied Lee's suit of armour and the majority of the wedding guests costumes, they did a great job and the craftmanship on all the costumes was top notch.

Everyone looked amazing and really entered into the spirit of the day, Portland Castle was perfect as a Medieval Wedding venue. Built in 1539 by Henry VIII to defend the harbour against possible French and Spanish invasion, it's later history includes Civil war sieges and use a prison by Oliver Cromwell.

Anna and William, Beach Pre-Wedding Shoot

Hengistbury Head nature reserve and beach provides a lot of neat areas for engagement images and Anna and Will were up for a ride on the land train and didn't mind going off the beaten track a little :)

Umbrellas have become a mini theme during 2008, being featured in quite a few weddings and pre-wedding shoots!

Travels With My Camera (Italy!)

Ahh,, they say that Italian is the language of love, it's not hard to see why once you've been to Italy and met the people there :)

I got to 'discover' Italy myself this past September as I tagged along with Zoe Richards to participate in photographing the wonderfully romantic destination wedding of Jules and Mick. As I get time I'll write a few blog entries covering the adventures Zoe and I had, as well as a few favorite images from Jules and Mick's pre wedding session in the glorious medieval hillside village of Castellabate on Friday and their wedding in the amazing Castellabate Castle on saturday.

So now for a few personal images from Italy. It's rare these days that I get time to shoot for fun, but it was hard to put my camera down. If you do plan to visit Italy, I highly recommend a visit to Castellabate. The views from the top of the hillside, where the Castle looms over Santa Maria, is absolutely breathtaking.

Teri