I was planning on meeting up with Heidi and Leo the week before the wedding but Heidi fell quite ill and our meeting fell through. I turned up at her door on the morning of her wedding, made my introductions and started trying to build up a bit of rapport. I always find that I work better with people I’ve met before but Heidi was so unbelievably friendly and easy to get along with making my job a piece of cake.

I loved this little frog cupcake and couldn’t resist asking her to do this.

Heidi just has this timeless elegance to her, I didn’t even have to ask her to do anything, she was immediately quite natural in front of the camera.

I met Leo and his groomsmen at the church and snapped of 10 or so quick photos before the bride arrived. I had planned on getting to the church a little earlier but traffic in Sydney at that time of the day is horrendous.

This is Heidi and Leo’s little niece, who’s a gorgeous little kid. She was the flower girl and did a great job of creating a buzz as she walked down the aisle.

Heidi is in a reasonably successful band and one of her band mates played a song as the registry was being signed.

It was getting quite dark by the time we got out of the church and to the park where the photos were going to be taken so I had to be super quick. In the last photo, I had to push my 5D Mk II as hard as it could possibly go (*camera nerd alert*) shooting 1/60th of a second at ISO4000.

The night ended with Heidi and Leo playing a couple of Beatles songs to the crowd (and to each other). What a fantastic night!

Thank you so much for involving me in your day and I hope you guys have a great future together, filled with music and happiness!

Their wedding was held in some beautiful gardens on the Illawarra Escarpment. I’d been having some good luck with weather in recent weddings and this was another prime example.

Prior to Marnie arriving, I met and talked with Marnie’s sister and checked out some fantastic jazz from a local trio containing, unsurprisingly considering the circumstances, a guy I’d gone to primary school with!

Marnie and her dad arrived in a beautiful white vintage car, perfectly suiting their style for the day.

Heath and Marnie have a fantastic sense of humour, and it’s quite obvious where it’s come from for both of them as their dads are absolutely hilarious!

The afternoon sunshine was absolutely wonderful considering we were entering winter and it was apparently fantastic bubble blowing weather with Heath showing he could join in like the best of them!

Who needs a PA system when you have a Marshall Mini-Amplifier?!

Autumn was well and truly into full swing!

It’s hard to get Heath to keep a straight face a lot of the time, but apparently I caught him unguarded for this moment!

We left the gardens and headed to this wonderful vintage theater nearby to take a few more photos.

This is probably my favourite photo from the whole day!

Marnie’s dad had a surprise planned for all the weddings guests and word was going around it was a fireworks show. Apparently that word was right!

Numerous shenanigans took place during the reception including a fantastic quiz performed by Heath’s MC friend (sorry, I’ve forgotten your name!) and plenty of laughs followed by dancing and much enjoyment. Everything they told me they wanted their wedding to be on that first night we met was exactly how it turned out. Thanks to you Marnie and Heath for asking me to photograph your wedding, it was a lot of fun! You guys are made for each other and may you have long and prosperous lives together!

Leah and her bridesmaid Jess both looked stunning, but what can one expect besides that on your wedding day?!

Leah had a *little* moment as she got to the end of the aisle and saw Nick for the first time, perhaps being overwhelmed by happiness. I’d prefer to think it had something to do with the fact that Nick had scrubbed up so well and she was surprised at the man standing there!

When it came time to take the “formal” portraits, both myself and the couple felt pretty comfortable with each other having had our pre-wedding engagement shoot a few weeks earlier. I think that shows in the photos, they look so relaxed and in control of themselves, it’s great as a photographer to be able to document that.

Leah and Jess posed for a photo of themselves and Nick and his best man Dane, being great sports, were more than willing to copy the pose!

Thank you guys so much for honouring me by asking me to photograph your wedding. You’re great friends and it means a lot that I could be involved on the day.

Nick was doing a PhD which required him to travel to the USA for extended periods  meaning Leah was left all in charge of their wedding. Such a lovely thoughtful fella! :)

We went up the local “mountain”, which in all reality is more of a hill, to take these shots. Thankfully, mother nature held off long enough with the rain and gave us some dramatic fog to work with.

Either Nick is extra light or Leah is super strong!

I followed Rowen around, firstly to the groom’s house and then onto the bride’s. It was mostly holding of light stands, adjusting flash output levels and the occasional snap! In fact, in the whole day of 7 hours I took 150 photos!

It always seems like the attention is on the bride…

The wedding was held at their church, followed by an informal gathering in the hall behind the church for all of their friends, including the ones from the church who they weren’t able to invite to the reception. Those little old church ladies can definitely put on a good feed!

Unfortunately, the day was horribly wet and their plans of outdoors wedding photos were foiled and we ended up resorting to photos inside the church and then a few under cover.

So thanks to Rowen for the last minute call up and also to Shane and Victoria handling my lame jokes all day!

They had plans of a wonderful outdoor wedding on the edge of Lake Burley-Griffin in Canberra, but it ended up being one of the wettest days recorded in the city for the last 100 years! It’s a good thing they had a backup plan.

I got to meet both sets of parents before the wedding, including Mick’s dad who was decked out in one of the best retro suits I’ve ever seen. They were such warm and hospitable people, I felt at home with them immediately. It makes my job so much easier and I really hope all parents of couples understand that!

I then hurried over to Amy’s place on the other side of town to get some shots of her getting ready.

Amy is beautiful to begin with so it wasn’t hard to doll her up to make her look perfect for her wedding day! We couldn’t go outside (much) to get any portraits so we had to make do with what we had incide the building where the reception was.

We braved the weather outside for a few minutes, we couldn’t resist getting out the lovely white umbrellas we had! And yes, I did brave the weather and I have to tell you, holding an umbrella and using a camera with your other hand isn’t as hard as it sounds. :)

Mick and Amy partied well into the night with one of the best ever weddings and receptions I’ve been to. Everything was unconventional, with readings from Dr Seuss, participation from friends during the ceremony and plenty of humour throughout (including a mention of the Aussie soap “Neighbours” in the weddings vows!)

Thanks guys, what a fantastic day!

I hung out with the boys before the wedding, while another photographer Sam was with the girls.

Lyndsay looked fantastic (as did James) and it wasn’t surprising that everything including the clothes, decorations, invitations, cakes, etc all matched up considering Lyndsay is a professional designer of wedding/engagement/birthday invitations and cards. The invitation I was sent for this wedding was the most awesome invitation ever!

It was a fantastic day (and weekend), well worth the 18 hour drive there and back!

My friend Becky was the bridesmaid and she looked great decked out in her 1920’s dress and hair!

Justin and Lila were married in a nice, small ceremony surrounded by their family and close friends. The whole affair was very low key and very relaxed with the photos taken on the beach near their reception venue. They’re an ultra good looking couple so photographing them was a piece of cake!

I didn’t photograph this wedding as an official photographer, just a guest with a nice camera. Craig and Nancy loved my stuff (which was stylistically quite different to the photographer they hired) and have the red lighting bridal waltz shot hanging in their house!

A big group hug for both sides of the family!

Even though weddings often have tears, this one had tears of a different variety. Nancy’s father passed away tragically 6 weeks before she was to be married, a heartbreaking loss for their tight knit family. Nancy was the jewel in her father’s eye and Craig had long since been accepted into their family, making the wedding a very bittersweet event. Craig’s father passed away when he was a baby, so it was touching to see Craig and Nancy’s mothers holding each other up on this day.

It was a great night for all of the “boys” from high school, we don’t often get to all be in the same place at the same time but this was one such occasion. They didn’t waste any time looking good for the camera either with their best “Blue Steel” impersonations!