VOWS Awards Nominee and VOWS Awards Ceremony

Long time not update, sorry !

We will be sharing lots and lots of weddings with you over the coming months but first we would like to share with you some news on a recent success. Thanks to our wonderful bride and grooms we were nominated for a VOWS award this year.

VOWS stands for Voted Outstanding Wedding Supplier and is an awards body set up to recognise companies that offer excellent customer service within the Scottish wedding industry.

The awards are voted for by recently wedded couples through marriage or civil partnership and this year out of 14,000 nominations, 1500 Photography was included in the top 10 photographers in the country. On the night itself we sadly didnt scoop the big one but to be nominated in such an incredibly competitive field was a huge achievement and one that we are very proud of.

I would like to thank all our fantastic couples of 2012/13 who cast a vote for us - you guys are amazing. Thank you

[caption id="attachment_3020" align="aligncenter" width="300"] © Kim Cessford[/caption]

Here I am with Gillian and fellow nominees Victoria and Richard from All Dressed Up. It was nice to know that two wedding suppliers from the Loch Lomond area (small world fact : Victoria and I actually went to primary school together) had been recognised. You can see more pictures of the evening awards here

1500 Photography - VOWS Award Nominee 2013

Collodion Wet Plate - Shooting photographs like 100 years ago

Over the summer I had the wonderful experience of meeting artist Alastair Cook and attending his collodion plate workshop in Dunbar.



Collodion plate photography is one of the very earliest forms of photography. It involves coating a glass, mirror or metal plate in a rather nasty chemical mixture, loading the plate into the back of a camera, focussing the subject under a cape and then making a guesstimate exposure of a few seconds. If this sounds like the kind of thing you may have seen in western movies and Victorian period dramas on a Sunday night, then you've got the picture exactly.

  

After a little chat about the history of the process and some stunningly beautiful plates, both antique and from Alastair's own portfolio, we were let loose in the darkroom. It was fantastic. It took me right back to when I had a darkroom in my bedroom aged 17. We took turns posing for each other holding our heads steady for the exposures by jamming a cup against a wall with our heads! Then we removed the back plate from the camera, took it back into the darkroom and washed the plates in the develop mixture.

That's when the silvery fog started to lift and experienced the total thrill (that is now long gone in our digital age) of watching an image ghost into life.

As someone who now goes to a wedding and shoots 1000 images in the space of 2 hours it was such a revelation to go back to the very beginning of photography and slow things way, way down. Alastair pointed out that all these pictures are taken while the sitter has thoughts going through their head and their hearts are beating. A real slice of time rather than today's photography - shot at a 1000th of a second and instantly uploaded onto facebook.

There is a gravity and sincerity inherent in these pictures which is totally captivating.

I loved my experience at the workshop and would urge you all to get along to Alastair's exhibition currently running at Dunbar Town Hall. Its a work of great joy, depth and beautiful images.

 Alastairs Exhibition in Dunbar runs till 20th December

 

Cameron House Wedding - Amanda and Davie

Cameron House Wedding

Our wedding was a trip back to our favourite venue for a Cameron House Wedding. Amanda and Davie had come up from the Scottish Borders to tie the knot on the bonnie banks and brought an intimate party of friends and family to join in their celebrations. Its not often that they hold weddings at Cameron House held in the Drawing Room, in fact, I think this was the first time. The service, conducted by the ubiquitous Rev Miller, was extra hilarious due to a slip of the tongue by the ministers. When discussing the number of colours available for bridesmaids dresses he inadvertently replaces replaced the 'L' with an 'R' when he mentioned a Dulex Colour Chart......



Even without this mishap it was a fun filled day as pretty much all the guests gave Dave some good natured ribbing about his tendency to fall off his motorbike. Even to the point its was suggested that the mini bride and groom on top of the cake were totally inaccurate, because the grooms motorbike was upright.......



Davie took this and the photography (which he was initially a little reticent about) in his stride. Amanda looked beautiful with a dress with not only showed off her slender frame but which was also practical for a cool February day. A really nice couple with a really nice set of friends on a really nice day. Lovely stuff !

Find out more about holding your wedding at Cameron House

Carberry Tower Wedding - Jimmy and Kathy

Carberry Tower Wedding

We kicked off 2013 with a wonderful Carberry Tower Wedding, over in the Lothian area. Jimmy had come 'home' to Scotland to get married as he and Kathy now live in Macau. However Kathy discovered that Scotland is a little further from the equator than Macau the brittle cold of a Scottish winter was something of a shock for her. Furry boots, thermal underwear and stick on heat pads were the order of the day!
We started the photography in some luxury services apartments in Edinburgh with Kathys bridal preparation before making our way to St Peters in Musselburgh. There we enjoyed a lovely, sometime emotional, ceremony before making our way to Carberry Towers.

This is the first time we had visited this venue and my goodness, it was fantastic! We were really impressed with the excellently kept grounds and the space and opulence inside the building was stunning. I do hope we are back shooting another Carberry Tower wedding soon. Kathy and James looked simply wonderful. James in his kilt looked every part the Scotsman back at home and Kathy.......well as you can see from the pictures she is a very beautiful bride. If I couldn't make a good job of her pictures then I really don't deserve a camera !!

Both Kathy and Jimmy and both families were absolutely wonderful to work with and everyone, despite the cold, pulled together to help make a wonderful atmosphere and terrific day. I hope now that Kathy has witnessed a Scottish winter she will one day come back and enjoy a Scottish summer. Although if summer 2012 was anything to go by.....perhaps not!

Carberry Tower wedding by 1500 Photography

 

Cameron House Wedding - Birgit and Armin

Cameron House Wedding

Our last wedding of 2012 and it was a Cameron House wedding, but this one was a little different. It was conducted almost exclusively via sign language !!

Both Birgit and Armin were German and had come over to the 'Bonnie Banks' for not just one wedding ceremony but two. A civil ceremony first in the morning to take care of the legalities of getting married then a traditional Scottish Wedding ceremony complete with 'tying the knot' conducted by a hairy highlander, Scot AnSgeulaiche

The wedding part just consisted of Birgit and Armin with their wedding planners Magdalena and John who specialise in 'destination' weddings from Germany. Birgit and Armin spoke very little English and I speak even less German (for some reason 'schnell' and 'ya' about covers my knowledge). So this meant the finer points of posing the couple and eliciting a reaction in them either through banter, corny jokes and them interacting with each other was taken out of the equation for me.

But when you look at the pictures......it doesn't matter. You wouldn't know that we could barely understand what we were saying to each other, somehow what I wanted to do for Birgit and Armin and what they wanted from the pictures married up perfectly and I left Cameron House that day with one of the best weddings of the year. I am humbled that we got on so well after only spending a few hours together and produced such wonderful results despite our communcation being so limited. It was a magical day and the perfect way to round off what had been a magic year for 1500 Photography.

More Weddings at Cameron House by 1500 Photography

Making the Papers - Awards Winning Wedding Moorpark House

Many thanks to the excellent Paisley Dailey Express for running a feature on our Awards Winning Wedding at Moorpark House

I am delighted to see Clair and Craigs wedding such great exposure - thanks to the team at the PDE !

Weddings at Cameron House - Diane and Brian

Weddings at Cameron House - Diane and Brian

Winter weddings at Cameron House, are all the rage on this blog! This time from Diane and Brian, one of the most romantic weddings of the year for sure, with Brian's poetry featuring heavily on the day. It was also one of the more intimate weddings of 2012 which Cameron House do so well. With only five guests the day was completely personal to Brian and Diane who pretty much got ready together dispensing the old tradition of not seeing each other before the ceremony. Somehow this (to me) seemed to make the whole 'getting ready' part of the day more personal and touching. Watching the groom button the back of the brides dress was a lovely thing to witness.



After a first class service by Rev Ian Miller (as you would expect), the couple mingled with their guests, had a little champagne then nipped outside for a few shots before it got too dark outside. The only part of the day that wasn't chilled out and relaxed was that we needed one of the Cameron House gillies to run down to Alexandria Registry Office with the marriage schedule before they closed for Christmas. Otherwise the wedding wouldn't have been legal until 2013 ! I am delighted to report that all went well.

With this being the 21st December and with us only having 5 guests at the wedding I thought this was going to be my smallest and last wedding of 2012. However there was a wee suprise still to come and it was another wedding at Cameron House with an even smaller wedding party..........

Weddings at Cameron House by 1500 Photography

Cameron House Wedding - Stephanie and Alvin

Cameron House Wedding - Stephanie and Alvin

In early December last year we were back at Loch Lomond for a Cameron House Wedding, Stephanie and Alvin had come all the way down from Dornach to get married on the bonnie banks. It was a beautifully bright, crisp day with a very still loch, which was a nice contrast to Stephanie's room  beforehand which was the busiest and most bustling room of the year by far! Stephanie had chosen a really striking colour scheme for the day of black, white and red which given the time of year was very apt. It was one of the best looking wedding parties we had shot all year.



I know with every post I seem to go on about what a nice couple the bride and groom where but I promise you, its always true. Stephanie and Al are superb company and the kind of people that, after spending 5 minutes in their company, feel like old friends. In fact the whole wedding party were absolutely lovely to work with, which is handy as I am booked to shoot Stephanie's step sisters wedding in July, so I'll be seeing a lot of them again!



Stephanie was willing to brave the elements outside and we got some beautiful wintery pictures on the jetty and in Cameron Houses grounds. The snow dusted Ben Lomond was the perfect shot to (almost) round off 2012. Little did I realise at the time but that snow cap would still be there in April !!

More Cameron House Weddings by 1500 Photography

Blysthwood Hotel Wedding - Niki and Stephen

Blythswood Hotel Wedding

Niki and Stephens Blysthwood Hotel Wedding was a wonderful day which I will remember for a long long time. Niki the bride is, like me, bit of a film buff the echos of movies were present throughout the whole day. We started off with Niki and Stephen both getting ready at the Blythswood Hotel, so I was able to flit between both room to get both bride and groom preparation shots.



After that we were onto the magnificent Glasgow Cathedral for a ceremony in some of the most dramatic settings imaginable. When the ceremony concluded we nipped back inside for a few shots of just the couple on the alter before making our way back to the Blythswood. This was my first wedding at the Blythswood Hotel & Spa since its 2009 reopening and my goodness what a change from its old RAC days! We did manage to shoot a few images across in the square (in the freezing cold) before settling in to shoot the rest of the wedding pictures inside.



Niki had asked us to stay on and cover the evenings entertainment and that is where we really got to strech our creative muscles. First of all, in keeping with the movie theme, we put Niki "in" The Birds. Hitchcock films had been running all evening in the Blythswoods own private cinema and the tables were all named after Hitchcock movies, so the temptation to combine both was irresistible. Then we popped outside into the Glasgow night and had some fun with sparklers. The results from both shots were stunning but if you get a chance, pop over to our facebook page and see how the sparkler shot was created. Scott McKenzie of Mckenzie Wedding Films 'very kindly' captured the"creative process" (ie Gillian and I running around the couple like a couple of wallies!!)



Then back inside to catch Niki throwing some shapes on the dancefloor...... It was a fantastic day and Niki and Stephen were amazing on the day. Their enthusiasm, sense of humour and love for photography allowed me to create an absolutely stunning wedding album. Working with both of them was brilliant experience and a wedding which I loved to be a part of. Thank you both x

Glasgow Wedding Photographer - 1500 Photography