Sam & Emily
The wedding of Sam and Emily. St Margaret’s Downham wedding. In previous blog posts, I mentioned the 40 or so weddings from 2014 where the weather was perfect, two rained upon. This is one of those two weddings. And the first camera failure of 2014.
With the near-perfect weather of last year, it had to happen, rain, wind, torrential rain, in between, breaks of strong summer sunshine, typical British wedding weather.
The day had started almost perfectly, arriving at Emily’s parent’s house for pre-bridal shots, the heavens opened up. Luckily didn’t last long and soon the sunshine was on the horizon.
With the arrival at the church, black storm clouds were quickly moving in, wind picking up.
Meeting the vicar, very nice and had no problem with me photographing in his church, unlike the one I had a few days previously, very anti wedding photographer and for no reason other than disliking photographers, doesn’t really help the couple whose wedding I might be filming.
The first guests were arriving, shots of the best man and mates, family and bridesmaids, and other family members. Then it happened, taking candid shots, the flash wouldn’t fire. Check batteries, all ok, check power pack, all ok. I changed flash to my backup, no problem.
Must be the camera itself, the Nikon D700’s, normally very reliable, with this being my first major failure of the year, switch to my backup D700 (of three, always make sure the photographer has backup gear). Flash attached, fired, no problem. The hot shoe had failed.
With Emily and her father starting their entrance into the church, everything moved along very smoothly, church, was packed with guests and the sun was starting to make an appearance through the lovely stained glass windows.
Luckily by the time the service was over, the wind had died down and it felt more like a pleasant summer day.
Guests and family shots are done. Sam and Emily’s shots, although the wind did pick up again, managed to get some very nice romantic images.
The reception was being held at the family farm, marquee held in acres of land, just the place for a country wedding. Again the weather was hit and miss, everyone had a good time despite the weather, which can never be planned for, All you can do is make the most of it.
Sam and Emily St Margaret’s Downham and farm
