And so it’s time for the bridal party photo shoot. This typically happens on every wedding day, Rob and Sanja’s wedding was no different. Regular readers of this blog will be familiar with Rob and Sanja’s story so far, theirs was a Macedonian wedding with all the traditions. Our day had started many hours ago with dancing, food, drink, laughter, family. If you’ve missed it, you can catch up on Rob and Sanja’s wedding here.

The wedding ceremony and family photos over, we left the Brisbane Golf Club bound for the leafy surrounds of Chelmer. Friends of Rob and Sanja had kindly offered their Queenslander as a possible photo location. We were there in a heartbeat. A beautiful home, sexy light, a gorgeous bridal party, bottles of Dom Perignon, (me and my camera) does wedding photography get better than this?

My style of wedding photography is largely documentary. My approach to photographing a bridal party and the bride and groom is different to most other photographers. For me, it is all about “the experience” my couple and their friends have while being photographed.

My photography mantra is simple, if my couples are having a great time, I’m getting great pictures. As a wedding photographer, I believe it is It is my job to help people relax, forget about the camera and create an environment where they can be themselves and show real expressions. Of course this is all in concert with finding and using the light, composing beautiful photos, operating a camera and story telling with images. Wedding photographers have to be able to do this in all weather conditions, with small time windows and cope with all contingencies that arise on the run. When you buy a shiny new Nikon or Canon digital SLR to photograph a friends wedding, this part of being a photographer is mysteriously missing from the instruction manual or program modes.

Our time at Chelmer was precious moments for the bridal party to relax, chill out and share wedding day stories thus far. The light at Chelmer was just delightful. I’m loving using shadows and lens flare at the moment, this is offering a different perspective to what we see normally. The garden was the perfect setting to share a bottle of dom; our best man Shawn is the sommelier at Il Centro Restaurant so we were in good hands.

Rob and Sanja wanted images including the Brisbane CBD and the river, I knew that views from Kangaroo Point would be perfect. Have you taken a moment to appreciate how beautiful our city is? Bathed in late afternoon light, the scene in front of me was hard to reconcile with my memories of the Brisbane floods earlier this year.

The Brisbane Club is our final destination,Rob and Sanja had chosen the club for their wedding reception venue. On arrival, we were escorted down to the cellar to enjoy canapés and glasses of wine. With food and wine being themes for the day, how apt it was to be surrounded by racks containing thousands of bottles.

A night of dancing and celebration awaits. Guests were arriving above us and getting ready for the dancing to start. I left Rob and Sanja to enjoy time with their bridal party, I headed upstairs to photograph their reception room before it became filled with guests.

The dancing is about to start, the reception is about to begin. To see photos from Rob and Sanja’s wedding reception at The Brisbane Club, click here.