Another day on the railway yesterday, we had a great day for it, perfect for photographs with Norfolk’s famous big blue sky scattered with big cotton wool clouds.

This first shot shows the smoke billowing out as the fire struggles to get underway at the start of the day.

At last the steam reached the right pressure and we were in business!

This little fella was dressed for the part!

The guard signals the train is ready to leave…

There may be other steam railways still running around the country but I doubt any have a view as beautiful as ours.

A picture of happiness!

Mr Linge applies the brake.

For the full gallery of shots from yesterday click here.

Every so often I have a shoot where everything comes together, we get perfect weather, in a great location with subjects that can do no wrong and yesterday was one of those occasions. Guy and Anna had been given a portrait shoot as an engagement present from their parents and chose to have the shoot at Wells beach.

We were walking through the sand barefoot, there wasn’t a breath of wind and the sun was slowly setting after one the warmest days I’ve ever known for April, we’d already got some great shots in the bag and it struck me how lucky I was to be doing this and getting paid for it, I hate to gloat but I love my job!

Below are a small selection of some of my favourite shots of the afternoon, it was tough narrowing down to just these few but you can see the full selection by following the link at the bottom of this post.

Thank you to Guy and Anna for being such fun to work with and for being up for all my daft suggestions, at one point, for a joke, I suggested Anna jump out of the tree into Guy’s arms, the next thing I knew Anna had launched herself at Guy! I had a great time yesterday and hope you both did too.

See the full gallery of shots here – for the best viewing experience turn your speakers on (sorry the music is a bit lame but I’m tied into royalty-free music for this bit) and select the slideshow option.

Spent yesterday afternoon at the home of Libby, Tom and Hermione to photograph them together as a family, we managed to get a few decent shots but Hermione wasn’t in the mood to be smiling for the camera so we did our best and will be returning in a couple of weeks hopefully to a happier Hermione!

Below is a sample of some of the shots and a link to the full gallery is at the bottom of this post.

The full gallery of shots is here.

So, here’s the online album of shots taken over the last few weeks (when it wasn’t raining!) for the Big C Bridal Shop in Norwich, hopefully it should load pretty quickly but it will obviously depend on the speed of your connection. Click on the image below to launch….

This is the second installment of shots done for the Norwich Big C bridal shop of some of the dresses they have for sale. There may be more to follow.

Many thanks to the folks at Voewood for allowing us to use the building and grounds for the last of these shots.

I spent the day yesterday at the North Norfolk Railway once more photographing the chaps that had come along for the driver experience day. It was another grey day but at least there wasn’t snow this time!
Below are a collection of some of my favourite shots and below the last shot is a link to the full gallery of shots, the shots can be viewed individually or using the ‘View Slideshow’ button – I recommend the slideshow.

Please feel free to leave me some comments on the blog (link at bottom of post).

Under the engine, I had to be careful not to get the camera wet here as the ash pans were being flushed (I think that’s what was happening but I’m probably going to get all the terminology wrong here!).

Alan, a Guard on the railway and the Driver Experience Day guide looks on as the rest of us climb down into a pit under the engine.

I like the motion captured in this shot – the technique I’ve used here is known as ‘dragging the shutter’, the shot was taken with a slow shutter speed to capture the blurring of the wheels but also using flash which has frozen part of the picture so it’s not a complete blur.

Jeffrey on the footplate holding onto ‘the big red go-faster bar’ (I have no idea what it’s proper name is, must pay more attention to what the driver is saying next time).

Fireman Ray, lit by the light coming from the ‘firey bit what heats everything up’, it’s probably just called ‘the fire’ but I’m not going to pretend I actually know, I do know that it’s incredibly hot and at some points it was actually burning so fiercely that it was too bright to look at directly.

The driver sorts out the coal while the water tank is filled.

To view the full gallery of images click here.

First wedding of the year for me on Saturday, (it’s been a late start for me this year but it’s also going to be by far my busiest – just all crammed into seven months!).

Rayna and Andy held their wedding at The Broad House Hotel in Wroxham, a beautifully presented boutique hotel and only recently licensed for wedding ceremonies, a very photogenic venue, really friendly staff and awesome food.

Despite awful forecasts the weather couldn’t have been better, OK I suppose it could have been 15 degrees warmer but we’re talking Norfolk here!

The dining room looked really classy, Rayna had chosen to echo the decor of the room in the menus with the tables set to a red, white and black theme.

Rayna arrives…

I have to thank Rayna’s friend and wedding usher – Shankar for the great expressions here, every wedding should have a Shankar, he was great fun and made a great (unpaid) assistant at times too, thanks Shankar!

Andy was very calm throughout the day and even seemed to enjoy having his photo taken – when we first met Andy said he didn’t like having his photo taken (like most people I guess!) but this is where the free Pre-wedding photo shoots I’m doing came in handy – Andy and Rayna already knew how I worked, got used to my daft directions and had confidence in my instruction so we managed to get some great shots on the day without anyone feeling uncomfortable.

I love the colours in this shot, we were walking through a corridor in the hotel when I spotted the opportunity for this shot, there was some great directional light coming through a window and this warm yellow wall continuing into the darker corridor, all we needed was our beautiful bride and hey presto!

So to the speeches before the wedding breakfast was served.

Great wedding cake, one word comes to mind – quirky. Actually two words, quirky and cool.

For the full gallery of images from Rayna & Andy’s wedding follow the link below, I recommend the slideshow option, get yourself a glass of wine, hit play and enjoy! Here’s the gallery —> click here

I just wanted to post a quick thank you message to Jim – Microsoft Technician (sorry Jim that’s all I know you as!) – last week my PC died, wouldn’t even start up. All of my photographs are backed-up onto external hard drives and again onto DVD’s so no worries there but I wasn’t sure I would be so lucky with all of my emails, advertising materials and stationery…. so I called Jim.

The next day it was a mixture of good and bad news – the good news was that Jim had managed to get the computer working and accessed the internal harddrive so he could get all my files out, the bad news was the PC was pretty much scrap metal so we went to the local PC shop, Jim selected all the bits we needed (hardware terrifies me), got a hefty discount in the shop and then built the PC, installed my software again, got my old files back in and even configured my email so I was back up and running within very little time.

Not only did Jim get all this done for me super fast his fees are incredibly reasonable, I can’t recommend him enough, it’s great to know we have someone so knowledgeable and helpful locally.

Jim can be contacted on 07789895603 or jsimmo1059@aol.com

Thanks Jim!

Yesterday I photographed one of the North Norfolk Railway’s Driver Experience Days (click here for info).

It’s a new area of photography I’m investigating – I attend the day with the five or six chaps that have paid/been bought the experience, document their day and make the images available to purchase online (link at the bottom of this post). Unfortunately I wasn’t able to stay for the whole day this time but I will be attending the next one on the 18th April for the whole day.

The ultimate aim is to produce personalised hardbacked books for the attendees containing 40 of their favourite images of the day – these would include images of them driving the trains, of their guests enjoying their train rides and various scenic/detail shots of the trains/stations/etc. (the books can be ordered through the online gallery, link below).

Below are some of my favourite shots from yesterday, it was a pretty damp morning, starting with snow and following with rain and grey skies so I’ve not posted a lot of scenic shots on this blog entry!

I actually really like the close-up details shots, the shapes, textures and colours can make interesting images.

I’ve used a process to replicate a really old photograph on this image, I guess it works considering the subject matter – the train that is, not Peter!

While I can’t claim to be a rail enthusiast it was pretty amazing to actually go underneath a full-sized steam train.

Here the Fire-man stokes up the fire, no chance of getting cold in there!

For the full gallery of shots and online ordering please CLICK HERE

Late last week I was photographing one of my favourite Norfolk wedding venues – Drayton Old Lodge.

Below are some of the shots of the inside of the venue and some of the chef’s creations.  While there we were invited to dine at the restaurant and it was an incredible meal, I had a starter of scallops with grilled black pudding and lobster ravioli with a chervil butter dressing which was superb.  I won’t list the entire meal but it was really lovely and an indication of just how good their food is for wedding receptions.

Below are some panoramics of the inside showing the recently refurbished bar and restaurant.

The scallops with grilled black pudding and lobster ravioli (this is one that the chef prepared for the shoot), having photographed this I knew exactly what I was ordering once we were finished and sat down to eat!

Sea Bass with clams, brown shrimp and puy lentils…

Here’s Head Chef, Ray Maddox at work, can’t beat a bit of a flambe for a dramatic cooking image!