I hate being photographed, by anyone. Not even on holidays. Not even at Christmas, which thankfully I attend with V’s family who are notorious camera dodgers, so no-one makes us line-up for a family photo. When I have to get an ID or passport photo taken I pretend I’m not there and kind of stare at a point just past the person taking the photo, willing them to get the ordeal over with. I never really look like how imagine myself, getting the photos back, there’s always a stranger gawking at me from my ID photo, looking like a cross between my father and a dorkier version of myself, staring vacantly into space against a white background.

I’d rather be at the dentist, at least I don’t recognize myself in X-rays of my teeth. If it wasn’t for V we’d have no photos of the two of us in all the odd places we’ve been to, or photos of our friends at picnics and social gatherings. This week I had to go through a whole bunch of images of us from the last 12 years that we have been together, sorting them into folders, arranging them neatly to go into an album. My conclusion after four days of this is that I’d rather not know I was being photographed and I can understand why our grooms are so nervous about the photos. I’m with you, we do try make it painless. V on the other hand looks good in all her photos.

So with this in mind, we travelled out to The Cradle Restaurant for Linda and Sean’s rocking wedding which was filled with emotion, beauty and just happiness. I do love The Cradle and it’s amazing views, my favorite part of the day had to be the groom’s prayer which took place just before Linda walked down the aisle. It was a nice moment. Oh, and we had a bunch of the kids tracking us through the bush while we went for our photoshoot as the sun was setting. You really can’t beat the soft Highveld winter sunset.

Right, more images from Linda and Sean’s Cradle wedding can be found on our Facebook page.

More images from Linda and Sean’s Cradle wedding can be found on our Facebook page.

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Did I ever tell you that my mother’s side of the family is Italian? When I was young, like in single figures, they used to speak to me in a mixture of Italian, Hebrew and Arabic – I was a very confused toddler. So Saturday I was at Shepstone Gardens and Maria’s mom turns to her and says something in Italian, and I’m instantly transported to my grandmother’s balcony, sun shining on my face and everything just being ok. The kind of ok that you grow out once you hit teenagedom. Earlier I’d spotted them setting up a cappuccino machine in the lobby, and I could hear the throaty sounds of the Maserati that had arrived to take Maria to the church. It was promising to be an awesome wedding.

Ok, so pretty much everyone was a rockstar at this wedding. Craig and Maria, just super fun to be around, kind of shy at being photographed, but in a cool 1930s Hollywood kind of way. Everyone was just cool, and it was just a huge big family affair, kind like I imagine a backyard wedding in Italy would go down, right down to Maria’s dad handing out grappa at the end of the evening.

Not really much to add to that, my hand still won’t bend to the right, I feel like I’ve gone 12 rounds with that guy in the Twista Chopper infomercial. That beautiful winter light we’ve been having is coming to an end and the richer yellower tones of spring are starting to kick in. I will blog about RE.INVENT at some point, if you came, thank you we really appreciated it.

Ok, some pics, more pics of Maria and Craig’s killer bee winter wedding can be found on our Facebook page. Also a reminder to please not steal our images.

Phew, that was a lot of pics, errrm there are more on our facebook page.

BTW if you’re thinking of going unplugged for your wedding, apparently all the cool kids are doing it (who knew!), we spotted some templates for wording at Offbeat Bride – I do really like Ariel and her badass brides.

I generally don’t mind other people photographing as long as it isn’t during the ceremony or the portrait shoot, but if you’re worried, have a chat to us, we’ve been to a lot of weddings.

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Our neighbor wakes up at 3am every morning, plays some music with a trumpet in it while he shaves and gets ready for work. That jazzy trumpet wakes me up during the week. I don’t mind, it could be me getting ready for work in a cubicle somewhere, and that music is perfect for an early morning. Anyways, I like waking up early and getting some editing done before V wakes up. Drinking that first cup of coffee while watching the shadows blend back into reality, jazz and the hopeful sounds of another day starting.

I seem to have become fascinated lately by the photo of the father of the bride walking her down the aisle, they always look so proud and chuffed with themselves. I suspect it’s a pivotal moment in every dad’s life. V seems to always nail the images of the bride outside the just before the doors open, but for me the moment is when they walk down the aisle, just before the groom sees her for the first time.

We get a lot of comments about how lucky we are to always have gorgeous clients, good light, amazing venues and really beautiful edgy spots to shoot at – around the world previous and future clients are nodding their heads, yep, gorgeous clients – I think those are the easy photos for wedding photographers. Trying to capture the emotion of the moment when you’re walking down the aisle and your stomach feels like it’s dropped somewhere around your knees … that’s a little bit harder.

So now it’s days later, I’m editing those moments with a stupid grin on my face, a good indicator that the emotions of the day are reflected in the images (or that the cappuccino machine is working again). You can see that Liesl looked killer bee and that Quinton brought rockstar swagger to their photoshoot, hopefully you can also see some of the joy and pride and happiness that marked their day. We have even more pics from their rocking Avianto wedding on our facebook page.

We have even more pics from their rocking Avianto wedding on our facebook page.

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If you’ve seen me in the last two weeks, you’ll have probably noticed my bandaged right hand. Not fantastic when you’re trying to balance a camera at 1/15th of a second, also not great when you’re editing. Anyway, it’s slowing me down a bit. It may take me a couple of days longer than usual to get this weekend’s blog posts finished. They’re pretty killer bee though, and well worth the extra couple of days.

It’s winter out here in Radiokop, the heaters are on, we’re waking up a little bit later every day, kind of waiting for the sun to make it above the neighbor’s roof and into the bedroom window before heading out from under the duvet. The days are a long oil slick of late night editing, coffee and the occasional venture out into the yard to see if summer is on it’s way. We’re not holding our breath.

We’re also tidying up, repainting the house, backing up old photos, working on the next portfolio, servicing the cameras, checking the batteries. In the last season I have gone through less flash batteries than I have ever before. I seem to be going back to my roots, unobtrusive, natural light documentary work. Natural light for me is all about the emotion of that moment, it’s about the atmosphere of the room and the little smiles between couples.

In an industry where the norm seems to be images that are lit by several off-camera flashes, sharpened to a crisp, having had the atmosphere surgically removed, I prefer the quiet moments, something more organic, not so over-sharpened and dehumanized. A quiet moment, captured quietly. I prefer the glow of candlelight, fairy lights or even a videographer’s spotlight to the hyperreality pumped out by a flash. I think that the atmosphere of the reception room says as much about the moment as the expressions on people’s faces. It doesn’t have to be perfect, but it has to say something. You know what I’m trying to say? Sometimes the photos look so very digital, they look like the life was sucked out of them. I prefer the imperfections. The moments not caught in a flash.

Anyway, the cats are wondering when summer will be back. I’m off to make another cup of coffee, I can hear the intro music to House on the telly.

I’m busy editing Alex and Reyna’s deserted island wedding, and I just can’t help smiling (and wanting to say Nature … with Zan). All I can say is that it’s freezing and I wish I was back in Zanzibar where it is warm and the food is out of this world.

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