Bring on the wedding photography!

Over the past month or so I have put a lot of effort in to the administrative side of my business - meeting with banks to open up a new business bank account, working through my accounts, hiring an accountant and finishing my new website. All this has been very beneficial (and needed) but all I want to do now is get back to actual wedding photography!!

Attending the SWPP convention a couple of weeks ago (see the post below this one) was a great experience (especially winning my award for wedding photography) and very inspiring, but again just made me want to get out there and photograph a wedding.

Luckily I don't have long to wait now as my next wedding, which is at the Belle Époque Brasserie in Knutsford, is only a couple of weeks ago and then they come thick and fast until the end of the year - bring on the photography!

I am the Overall Winner of the SWPP Member's Wedding Photography Competition 2008

I am pleased to annouce that on Sunday evening I was named the Overall Winner of the SWPP Member's Wedding Photography Competition.

The award was presented to me at the SWPP (Society of Wedding and Portrait Photogarphers) Annual Awards Dinner held on Sunday evening in London. The dinner was held during the SWPP's six day convention which sees photographers from all over the world converge on the Novotel Hotel to attend numerous photography seminars, classes and a large trade show. Over the 5 days the convention attracted over 12,000 visitors!

Unfortunately I was only able to attend the convention for part of the Saturday which was a shame as I would have loved to have been there longer (I broke down on the M25 whilst traveling ot the show but's that's a whole other story!). There were a host of great photographers speaking at the event including Joe Photo, Kevin Kubota, Jeff Ascough, Mark Seymour and Jose Villa. With over 400 people in the room, the awards dinner itself was a great experience.

Numerous awards were handed out including 15 category winners from the SWPP monthly competitions and an overall wedding photographer of the year award. My own particular award was voted for by the SWPP members on the society's forum; each week members were invited to submit their favourite wedding image within a particular category with each of the weekly winners going forward to the annual vote - of which my image came top.

I also found out that I also came third in the Traditional Wedding Photographer of the Year Award,  obviously it would have been lovely to win this also but I am more than happy with the award I did receive!

I have posted my winning image below, together with a photo of me collecting my award on stage from Jon Jenkins.  What a great start to 2009!

New website now live on www.neilredfern.com

As of tonight I am pleased to say that my new wedding photography website is live on www.neilredfern.com

My old site is currently in the process of being transferred to www.neilredfern.net (should be completed in next 48 hours), I will keep the old site up temporarily but will likely take it down in the next few weeks.

The feedback I have received so far on my new site has been very good so far but if you have any comments please do let me know!

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year everybody! I hope you all had a great Christmas and New Year.

I'm really looking forward to 2009, I have lots of great weddings coming up (including my own!) at some lovely venues. I also have a number of exciting marketing ideas and additional offerings which I plan to introduce this year so it should be an exciting 12 months...!

So, to all my clients and friends - I wish you all the very best for 2009.

Thought I would post a photograph of Michelle and I from New Year's Eve, don't worry though, I'm not planning on wearing this to weddings...!