Doranne and Graeme

Officially the last Wedding of this year, and what a laugh it was too. Doranne and Graeme live in Brighton but Doranne comes from Aberdeen and they had decided to Marry there, I seem to get a lot of Weddings where the couple live either abroad or in other parts of the UK. I’d never met Doranne or Graeme which is never an ideal situation but we had spoken on the phone and I had a feeling we’d get on well. I found Doranne in her dressing gown surrounded by hairdressers so a quick hello then of I went to look round the hotel. This was my first Wedding in Mary Culter House Hotel, it’s an old building with many new parts added on, quite honestly it’s not ideal for Photography, the grounds are lovely and in Summer it would be great, winter – well thats a different story! We were very lucky, the sky was clear and there was little danger of rain. The inside of the hotel seems a little cramped to me, not any spare space to take decent photographs except the residents lounge – but of course that is filled with residents, and it’s a really dark room with very high ceilings.

I was glad there was no rain but acutely aware that we were as close to mid winter as I’d like to be, the sun would soon disappear, leaving us little time for outdoor shots with no flash. I hate flash, I really do. It’s harsh and unflattering. Now, other Photographers will say they flash looks great and can be really nice, I agree, but a Wedding is not the place to be setting up studio flash heads, umbrellas, softboxes, power cables etc so you have to rely on “on camera” flash – and no one can argue that this causes problems.

I found Graeme in his room and introduced myself and we agreed to get some shots of him and his Best man first.



Just for a laugh I always try to find something amusing. Graeme was one of the funniest people I have met, he laughed at everything, even my jokes which was great.

  
Eventually Doranne was ready – just 15 mins late and we headed off to the service room.

The service was conducted by Esther from Banchory register office, she was relaxed about photographs which was good.


The Bridesmaids were all looking great, I’m after one as a model, guess which one!


This would have been better an hour earlier when the sun was just sitting on the river, cloud had come over and it had gone which was a great pity.

3 people came up to me and asked for my card, they all said they liked how relaxed I was and said that they had daughters or cousins or sisters that were getting Married. People often say that I’m very relaxed at a Wedding, I’m not really but I guess I keep it hidden, they are very stressful. It seems that this is  important to people that the photographer is relaxed, I had never really considered it but one person from last night said the last Wedding they were at was ruined by the Photographer shouting at people and going in the huff. I guess you have to remember that the purpose of the day is to 1) Get Married, 2) Have fun and 3) Meet friends. The Photographs are a side issue really and as a Photographer you can’t let it take over the day.

I stayed for Dinner and then photographed the speeches and cake cutting, it was a lovely evening but once I sat down and relaxed a little I felt really tired, I’d been working non stop four hours and on my feet the whole time. The meal was excellent and we all received lottery tickets as favours, when the numbers were read out no one won, I guess I’d keep quiet if I had won the million on someone else's ticket. I did say that if I won the jackpot I’d give them back their fee, that seemed only fair!

Doranne and Graeme are a lovely couple, full of fun and I can;t imagine any time spent with them being boring, they laughed all the time.