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A new addition to my range of albums is a small 6×4.5 inch hard backed album. Although small they feel very robust, the pages are thicker than the usual small albums are and the quality is amazing!
They are a copy of your big album and at £299 for four books excellent value.
The pictures below are albums that I designed for the Lulworth Castle Wedding. The pages are perfect for showing all the detail of the day without being too small.
One of my favourite venues to visit is Lulworth Castle. For weddings its simply perfect, the stunning castle never fails to impress the guests!
The selection of pictures I have added here are from a wedding I shot back in August 2011 at the Castle. The day went fantastically well despite the downpour, but that only lasted 10 mins. The food was amazing too thanks to Nomad www.nomadfood.co.uk
I always find that the day goes so quickly at Lulworth, the couples always say that too, I think its because we are all having such a good time!
I have now added some more pictures from the amazing Lake Garda wedding I shot back in August 2011.
85% of the wedding was shot using my M9 the rest was shot using my D700 and a 70-200 2.8 VR (my back up set, and heavy with it!)
I recently had a quick chat with a guy at one of my weddings. He asked me why I use such a old looking, compact (referring to my M9) He was using a D3 with 70-200 2.8 lens. He said “surely being a pro you need to use the biggest and best equipment” Unfortunately or perhaps fortunately for him I didn’t have the time to explain the history and quality of Leica, but when he mentioned “cheap looking” I gave him a smile!
Anyway using a D3 and 70-200 and having to carry it around for the day is not my idea of fun! Trust me after 15 years of shooting weddings your Chiropractor bill gets pretty big! The M9 certainly helps in that area!
I was just wondering where Leica go from the M9? How can you improve on it? More pixels perhaps? although not really needed, certainly make it a bit faster in capturing pictures, speed up the buffer, perhaps a higher resolution screen? Although I don’t use it that much Leica owners “just know” when its right ;>) A friend of mine suggested Live View! That would kill off 100 years of photography for Leica, thankfully I’m confident they wouldn’t do that.
I can’t wait to get back to Italy! Amazing place to take pictures, everything looks perfect!
Lake Garda is the perfect place for an overseas wedding!
I have had a number of photographers and fellow professionals ask me what its like to shoot a wedding using my Leica M9. Most seem surprised at the fact I shoot a majority of the day using my M9. I have been shooting weddings this way for two years and I am really pleased with the results, there are certainly a few small pit falls using the M9 though, here are the pros and cons:
Pros – Discrete to use, quiet, amazing sharpness and clarity, huge file sizes when using uncompressed RAW (110 mg Tiffs) some would see this as a negative but if you want to print big then its a good thing, you can also crop and still get amazing results.
Cons – Buffer slow to clear, LCD screen not the clearest and marks easily, you need to be comfortable with using a rangefinder, with practise its quick to use and so much more accurate than AF, ISO not so good after 1600.
I still use a Nikon D700 alongside my M9 as sometimes I need a longer lens, the M system tops out at 135mm. You learn to shoot differently with the Leica, as its light to hold you have it with you all the time ready for the next shot, with the Nikon you put it down or in your bag. I have used dozens of different cameras over the years to shoot my weddings with, I have listed them below with a brief rating.
Leica M9 – Perfect for me, light, quick and so so good! 9.5/10
Nikon D700 – Very good at high ISO’s sharp Nikon lenses, 7/10
Pentax 645D – Camera good , slow to use, poor viewfinder, lenses average, too many gimmicks, too heavy, 5/10
Hasselblad HD3II – Pretty quick to use, fast focusing, nice viewfinder, way too heavy, battery hopeless lasts an hour, 5/10
Nikon D3 – HEAVY! solid, fantastic at high ISO’s, do you need 10 frames per second? 6/10
Mamiya ZD – NICE! very slow buffer, like 2 mins to clear with a fast card! Dam good files, not too heavy, huge sensor means smooth sharp files, 7/10
Nikon D7000 – Great second camera, small, light, slow buffer, very nice files, sharp, pretty cheap at around £800! 8/10
Canon 5D mk1 – Landmark wedding camera, light, robust, great files, large and sharp, great viewfinder, fast to use, battery goes on all day long, hard to fault really – 8.5/10
Canon 1DS mk2 – Way too heavy! great files, very fast to use, no advantage over the 5D mk1 though – 6/10
Canon 1D mk2 – Not a wedding camera! its a sports/press camera, unless you want to reel off 11 fPS? why? Too heavy – 5/10
Canon 5D mk2 – Take the perfect wedding camera (5D mk1) chuck more pixels on the same size sensor, add some gizmos, like video, make it more plasticy, bump up the price and hay presto! 6/10
Fuji S2 – Another landmark wedding camera, mainly as there was not anything else about at the time but it was really good, you could still use it today and get great results! 6/10
Leica S2 – Although I have not shot a wedding using this camera I have taken one for a test drive, its pretty quick to use, simply the best viewfinder you will ever look though, HUGE files, but overkill for a wedding and high ISO poor, M9 files almost as good! 6/10
So to sum up, 2x Leica M9′s and a few “nice ” Leica lenses and you have the perfect wedding set up, however if you are new to rangefinders then practise for a year first and if you usually shoot 1000 plus frames per wedding, stick to your 5D mk2
Lens wise I use 28mm, 50 (Noc) and 90 all I need. The Leica lovers will swoon at the Noctilux but its only the f/1 version not the new f0.95 ….yet ;>P
If I have any more interest about shooting a wedding using a Leica M9 then I am going to do a one day course for interested parties, there is quite a bit to learn, but get it right and its worth it!
Just returned from a memorable 3 days in Lake Garda Italy to photograph the wedding of Lauren & Don. As you can see its an amazing place! This has to be one of the best wedding experiences I have been involved with, everything was perfect! Even my M9 felt at home ;>)
Full pictures will be on my weddings website in a few weeks time, editing will be hard though as every picture looks great and involves at least 5 mins of reminiscing!
Three weeks ago I was lucky enough to spend the day with Lara Jade at Mind Studios in London. Lara is a very talented, world renowned fashion photographer, see her amazing work for yourself! www.larajade.co.uk
I had a fantastic day and I am really pleased with the finished pictures!
I have been really inspired by her photography and I am in the process of arranging some fashion shoots of my own and also practising some of the techniques learned with her for my wedding photography – watch this space!
If anyone is interested in taking their photography to a higher level and learn new creative styles and lighting techniques I recommend that you book one of Lara’s Workshops - http://www.larajade.co.uk/workshops/ Be quick though! They get booked up very quickly! If you can’t get to Hawaii or New York then try Dungeness in August! 15th/16th/17th - all very exciting!
Now that the new iPad 2 is available I thought it was time to offer my brides a new “digital” album ;>)
Ultra thin at only 8.8mm thick and a 10 hour battery life, the new iPad 2 is the perfect way to present all your wedding pictures.
Available in black or white the 16GB memory will hold all your wedding pictures in high-resolution jpg format, ready to print with the rights signed over to you for reproduction.
So the iPad 2 offers the best of both worlds, all your amazing pictures with the copy rights included and the iPad 2 you’ve always wanted!
Price £1750 including 8 hours of photography, all editing costs, travel, on-line wedding album and of course the iPad 2.
Welcome to my new blog! I thought it was about time that Nikos Photography had a blog, so here it is! I will be adding information about my photography as well as other interesting areas of my business and what I get up to.
The first thing I wanted to upload was my 2011 album designs. I’m really excited about these designs. I have had one album now produced and it looks fabulous. The album will be on show in my showroom as well as at the wedding shows forthcoming. The shows I will be attending in the near future are the Ashford International Hotel Wedding Fayre on the 3rd of January, the BIC Wedding Show in Bournemouth on the 4th-6th of February, the National Wedding Show, Olympia, London on the 18th-20th of February, the Lulworth Castle Wedding Fayre on the 27th of February and the Little Silver Hotel Wedding Fayre, Tenterden, Kent on the 13th of March.
So here they are, my latest page designs for next year’s albums.
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19/01/2012
Nikos
