Saturday, May 31, 2008

In Paris with Jerry Ghionis - Part Two

Day three - more shooting; walking all over town; in front of museums, the wonderful Eiffel Tower, the Notre Dame cathedral, the Louvre at night; it was all an amazing experience.

We did a lot of walking and meeting of the locals!

Melissa was not only a wonderful model, but also a great guide and translator!

Jerry brought his wife Georgina with him on this trip, and it was her first time to Paris, it was such a sweet moment when he introduced her to the Eiffel Tower for the first time!
Today was the day I had 15 minutes alone with firstly Evgenia, and then Rene and Melissa to see if I had learnt anything from the master himself. By this time, we were at the Trocadero area, with the Eiffel Tower in the background and my creative juices were completely flowing. Evgenia was just so easy to photograph, and I got some amazing shots of her dancing and looking gorgeous! And she had the most amazing red Gucci shoes on!!!
Everyone else also had a chance to work with Evgenia, here is Suzanne from England doing some amazing stuff!
Pieter from Belgium, Maria from England and the very famous Gywn Jones from Wales soaked up the atmosphere!Then all the models were dancing and posing and bumping and grinding in front of the Tower, alongside an accordian player - it was all so typically French!




Jerry proved to be the total professional - shooting the models with a local's point n' shoot!!


I love how his wife Georgina has the real camera in the background here!



Soon it was my turn to shoot Rene and Mellisa in the shadow of the Trocadero, then onto more shots of the wonderful Marco and Liz!! Jerry really gets into the swing of things and pretends to be the groom!

After a quick squint at the underside of the Eiffel Tower, we went to the Notre Dame cathedral. Marco and Liz totally braved it with the Notre Dame pigeons for some totally out there shots! This is Gwyn from Wales and Tracey from England swooning over their shots they got from this amazing moment!

After dinner, we moved onto the Louvre, at dusk - stunning; here is Rene totally soaking up the atmosphere.

It was here Jerry showed u show he gets the best out of his grop formals; Rene was playing the groom, Marco the Father of the Bride, Pieter "Belgium Boy" a Groomsman and Peter "Danish Boy" Father of the Groom!

Meanwhile, Melissa was the bride, Georgina Mother of the Groom, Evgenia Bridesmaid and Liz Mother of the Bride!

Love this moment of Georgina and Melissa totally hamming it up for the cameras!The boys were so funny!And of course the obligatory "group formal"!!One of the most memorable moments of the whole workshop was when we were in the courtyard of the Louvre and as it got dark, the lights of the building came on..... there was a saxaphone player in the corridor... and it was all so romantic.....But soon it was chucking out time at the Louvre so we finished with some night shots in front of the famous glass pyramid. Here is Rene taking his own individual take of this monument...
We did so many great shots in front of the pyramid with video light which is something I have started to use this year, hence one of the reasons for the need for an assistant.


Here are my shots of the day...



Day 4 and 5 were for marketing and critique of our images; loads of ideas to make our businesses sparkle.

All in all, when I made my way back to Glasgow on the Friday, I was exhausted mentally and physically. We had walked all over Paris, we had shot our hearts out, we had made friends and cried the tears of emotion formed through a fellow bond and love for photography.

Here is a daft photo from Jerry's own blog which I hope he won't mind me borrowing for a minute, of the majority of the group about to cross the road; the daft Scots lassie at the front of course is me...

It was a week I shall never forget, and now I am full of new ideas for making NMP wedding photography even better than before! Thank you Jerry and all involved in the week.

In Paris with Jerry Ghionis - Part One

I know I know.................. I have been totally neglecting this blog, but it has been for a good cause, I have been just SO busy!!

Straight after Isla & Stuart's wedding, I jumped on a plane to Paris to spend a week (and a lot of money!) on a workshop run by the amazing Jerry Ghionis. This guy is truely one of the best in the world, so many awards and titles to his name! I have been wanting to attend one of his workshops for years and just finally bit the bullet and booked myself on the Paris workshop even though it was sandwiched in between weddings!

On arrival in Paris on the Sunday night, I had a walk about town with 2 of my fellow workshop attendees, Marco and Michael from South Africa. What a blast, the night was fair and the Eiffel Tower was lit up like a beacon!! Unfortunately on my return to the hotel, I went to start blogging the trip and found that my laptop had blown up!

Monday morning was then spent trying to find someone to repair my laptop, which unfortunately proved to be difficult, it was totally beyond repair! So I ended up spending silly money on a rental laptop just so I could get through the workshop..... Bit of a waste of a morning too but hey...

Registration in the afternoon and straight into critiques of some of our own images (for which I just had to show some images from this blog!!) This was hardcore, no fluffing, no butt-licking, just good honest critique. Didn't go down too well with some, but hey you don't spend over £2,000 to hear "You rock!" I was very pleased with hearing what I could do to improve my images, and was happy to find myself already seeing what Jerry was about to say about others, about halfway into the critique.

There was a true international feel to this workshop - as well as others from the UK, there were photographers from as far flung as Hong Kong, South Africa, Belgium, Denmark, the States and Russia on board!

Day 2 - posing - argh that horrible word! But actually not posing, directing, in order to make beautiful look even more beautiful!! I have gone from a 100% photojournalistic/reportage style of wedding photography to recently bringing in a little contemporary modern shooting style into the couples session part of the day and this was one reason why I wanted to go on this course - I knew that Jerry was truely a master at this style of photography.

After a great session in the morning, we went out shooting in the afternoon with models. Rene and Melissa from Boston are already known to me, and it was wonderful to meet up with them again. Marco and Liz from Boston are getting married this August, what a hot and steamy couple they are! And the last model was Evgenia, originally from Russia but now living and working in Boston. All the models are photographers themselves and they were all amazingly patient with us all!

We walked about town, Jerry just stopping every so often when there was some interesting light or location. I don't want to know what he was asking Evgenia here...........
Jerry was excellent at directing the model and gave us a load of tips on getting the best out of what were already gorgeous people!
He really does love his work!
We were in Park Monceau, the light was amazing, the Parisians were enjoying the sun and we were all having a ball!
Mind you, some of the Parisians loved watching beautiful people "get it on" too!
We even did some amazing night shots using the most bizarre of light sources! We ended up at the Arc D'Trioumphe both above and underground!
There are so many amazing images to show from this time away, and Jerry has very kindly allowed us to blog these images so for me the best way to show them off is via slideshow!




Suitably appropriate music by the wonderful Caroline!

Sunday, May 18, 2008

Isla & Stuart's wedding - Balgonie Castle & Balbirnie House

It is always nice to go back to venues that are special; Balbirnie is always special to me having got married there myself nearly 9 years ago.

It is also special to photograph weddings for people that have already played a part in my life before I started the business 8 years ago - this was the case with Isla who I worked with, many many years ago.

Isla and Stuart are a gorgeous couple in all senses of the word; daft about each other as well as in themselves, he even proposed up a mountain, as stated on the back of the table name of the top table! After a gorgeous wedding at Balgonie Castle, it was back to Balbirnie for a laugh and a cuddle!
One important guest of honour was Fluke the dog.
The father/daughter speech always gets me, this moment straight after dad finished his speech is just adorable!And a romantic first dance to finish a glorious day!
With many thanks to Chris for his assistance on the day, and proving the entertainment for the kids by the look of this image!
If you would like to see the complete portfolio of images from this wedding, when it is released online (the couple will see them first on return from honeymoon), email me on nikki@nikkimcleodphotography.com with the groom's surname and bride's maiden name in the email, and I can send you the password when it is released.
Some wedding details;
Wedding venue; Balgonie Castle
Band; Big Night Out
Bride’s dress & Bridesmaids dresses; bought at Butterflies in Edinburgh
Stationery: bride made herself with calligraphy by her 90 year old uncle
Phew, blogging on the day is hard work! But needs must as I jump on a plane tomorrow for a trip to Paris with an amazing Australian photographer who is going to teach me how to take even more amazing images!!

Sunday, May 04, 2008

Katie & Keith's wedding - St Mary Magdalene's Church & Invercarse Hotel, Dundee

Well I am on a blogging roll just now, so I may as well blog yesterday's wedding too!! And what a cracker it was!!

Katie & Keith are my kinda couple; lovely personalities, good-looking, so in love with each other, and totally "into" photography. They knew that in order to get the photography I show on the website and blog, and in my sample albums, I need some time with them alone. At the recce, we decided that this would be best done in their church which is so beautiful.

Aye and the groom's no bad looking either.....
And as for katie's girls..... wow when they turned up, I thought they were going to upstage Katie on her big day, stunning, stunning, stunning....I love this photojournalistic image, the last moment with her dad before she walks down the aisle....
But guess what, Katie was............... an angel almost!I love this image too, quite cool in tones compared to what I normally shoot, but I just love it.....I mean, come on, isn't this just a beautiful young lady...........? I absolutely loved her Ronald Joyce dress.Aye he's still no badlooking either............ But again, look at these lassies; aren't they just like something of a page of Vogue?! I said at the start that they valued the photography.....this really hit home when the starter was just about to served at the wedding breakfast and Keith approached me..

"Nikki, I don't think I have ever seen Katie look so stunning, and I want to make sure there is as many pictures of her as possible, is there somewhere else in the hotel we can take some more?"

I was gobsmacked!! Not only was the meal just about to be served, but here was a couple that actually wanted MORE of a couples session!!!!! And as if I would say no!! This is my favourite part of the day!

And you know what, I ended up getting the best images of the day, in this 5 minute shoot!



And aren't these guys just the cutest?!

Enjoy Thailand guys, see you on your return.

And thanks to Stefan for being my assistant for the day!

If you would like to see the complete portfolio of images from this wedding, when it is released online (the couple will see them first on return from honeymoon), email me on nikki@nikkimcleodphotography.com with the groom's surname and bride's maiden name in the email, and I can send you the password when it is released.

Some wedding details;

Wedding ceremony venue; St Mary Magdalene's Church, Dundee

Ceremony venue; Invercarse Hotel, Dundee

Bride's dress; designed by Ronald Joyce, bought from The Wedding Shop, Colchester

Flowers; POD Flowers and Stucio and Waow Flowers, Dundee
Transport; Chauffeurs of Carnoustie
Bridesmaids dresses; designed and bought at Coast
Make-up; Chanel
Hair; Bruce Sutherland, Newport on Tay
Stationery: the bride
Cake; Scrumptious Cakes, Dundee

Nikki McLeod Photography

Nikki McLeod Photography
tel 01383 821498