Then twice in the same year I was best man. The first wedding had a highly acclaimed professional photographer capturing the day, but I kept my camera on me with the intention of snapping the best mans’ perspective. I was shooting purely for my own amusement, but was delighted to be told by my friend after the wedding who is also a keen photographer himself that he preferred my photos to the pro’s. At this point I was very pleased with this feedback, but it didn’t even cross my mind I could make a go of this. I was very aware of my technical limitations and lack of experience and was just happy to have provided a friend with an alternative record of their day.

Then later that month with my second best man appearance there wasn’t a photographer booked, so working around my best man duties I took a more proactive role in telling the wedding story. I loved it and got another handful of shots I was really proud of, some of which I use in marketing material to this day. The feedback once again was overwhelmingly positive, and came from more than just friends this time, with other wedding goers who didn’t know me encouraging me to do more with it, and even the wedding venue itself posting some of my photos online and on social media to advertise themselves.

At this point I loved the idea, but it just seemed too big an ambition. How could a guy who trained as an electrician and spent over 17 years working in building services become a wedding photographer?! It was a pipedream, something nice to imagine, but nothing more.

Besides, for someone to choose you to photograph their wedding they want to see proof of your work, and I only had some snaps at two weddings. I needed more variety and depth to my portfolio. But in order to increase your portfolio you need to shoot weddings, that nobody will book you for because you don’t have variety and depth to your portfolio! Chicken & egg.

Then one Saturday having been out for a few hours I returned home to see a pretty sign saying “Church” outside our house pointing towards the church in the village. “Ooooh, wedding!” I thought.

I had to make a split second decision. Do I run inside, grab my camera and get down to the church at the bottom of our lane and see if I can get some photos? Or not be so rude and make myself lunch?

Before I knew it, and with “he who dares Rodders” echoing in my head, I found myself running down the lane. I couldn’t have timed it better if I tried. The guests were in the church and the bridesmaids were outside just waiting for the bride. I quickly told one of the bridesmaids and the official photographer I was hoping to have a go at wedding photography and would they would mind me taking some photos? They were happy to do so, and the photographer encouragingly said “we all have to start somewhere”. I am very grateful for his generosity. I quickly got to work, first getting some candid moments, then getting a bit of confidence to set up a couple of shots too.

The bride soon arrived, and I did my best to not mess with her mind as to why a random guy in shorts and a T shirt is taking photos very enthusiastically at her wedding! Luckily they were all absolutely fine with it, and had I not been welcome I would have gone home immediately.

So with everyone in the church I went back home to download the photos, hands still shaking with the excitement. Then whilst sat at my computer the penny dropped…..they will be leaving the church as well! So memory card inserted and camera back in hand I waited outside the church hoping to maybe get my first proper confetti shot!

Thanks to my years of experience photographing my dogs running at great speed, I was able to quickly get my camera set up for a fast paced, blink and you miss it confetti moment. I got about a dozen frames, of which this was the best. Not bad for a first go eh!?

With the bride and groom riding off into the metaphorical sunset, I popped over to thank the maid of honour for being so helpful, and got her email address so that I could forward on the photos for the couple to have (for free of course).

I got home and reflected on a whirlwind hour. I would always prefer regretting doing something, than regret not doing something, and whenever I have a quandary in life now I remind myself of that moment I was torn between making myself lunch, or grabbing my camera!

That evening I set up my Lee Hawley Photography business facebook page, and a few days later I built a very rough early version of www.leehawleyphotography.com armed with now a nice spread of photos. I knew I still had a long way to go, but I now believed there was a chance that I could do this. If nothing else, nobody will work harder than me, so surely with the bit of natural ability I seem to have, it is possible.

The positives from that day didn’t stop there though. A few months later I was contacted by Sarah who is a friend of one of the bridemaids on that day. She was enquiring to whether I could photograph her wedding. By this point I had a (very cheap) price list and a basic business strategy. The initial goal being to build my portfolio with as many weddings as possible, get better camera gear, and get my name out there. Sarah’s wedding wasn’t for a year and a half so plenty of time to hone my service. And hone I did!  By the time of Sarah’s wedding my experience and technical ability had indeed reached new heights, as had my kit bag which had grown to a scarcely believable £10k+. All worth it when you see these:

I have also been contacted by Chelsea, a friend of Sarah, and I’m shooting her wedding as well!

There is obviously a lot more to building Lee Hawley Photography to its current position, lots and lots of hours, initiatives that worked and others that didn’t, but that one decision is certainly one of those defining moments. Another of which was attending my first wedding fayre, which I will write a blog about another time.

I am a very risk averse person. I don’t gamble, I like to know what the plan on a family day out is ahead of time, I’m never late, and although I love the idea of being the sort of person who turns up at an airport with little more than a backpack and passport and goes wherever they can find a flight to, it just isn’t me. So to make such a huge change in direction in my life wasn’t taken lightly or recklessly.

I have, and continue to take a planned and methodical approach, step by step. But it has taken a few bold moments like crashing that wedding. Just setting up my business facebook page made me very self-conscious at the time. Who was I to say I thought my photos were good enough for people to spend money on? What if people laughed at me putting myself on a pedestal? I thought how If this doesn’t work out, it’s going to be public and very embarrassing.

But my advice to anyone experiencing those emotions, is have a go, by doing so you have immediately put yourself in a tiny percentage of people who have tried. As legendary wordsmith David Brent once said, “I can live without being a success, I couldn’t have lived without trying”.

The exciting thing for me is I still feel like this adventure is only just beginning. I have so many targets on my list, with a few more bold steps planned along the way. One of which will be the production of more video blogging throughout this year with a dedicated page on my new website gradually growing in content which you can see here. Just like setting up my facebook business page all that time ago, I originally was full of negative thoughts like “who would want to see me talk about wedding photography?”, “what if it doesn’t work, that’ll be embarrassing!” and “everyone will just think its cringey!” but I have more confidence now to go with my gut. I enjoy making them and would rather be as open as possible so future clients can see what they are buying into, as wedding photography is so much more than a few pretty photos on a website.

Reminiscing about this early exposure to wedding photography in order to write this blog has been a real joy and those photo’s will always hold a special place for me. I owe Kirsty and Stu a debt of gratitude for tolerating me shooting outside of their ceremony, and I hope they take some satisfaction in the springboard it gave me.

Thanks for reading, and to jump forward in time to see my latest work, check out my Galleries and Recent Weddings pages.

Siobhan and Matt decided to do what is known as a reveal just prior to the ceremony. This is simply where the bride and groom get to see each other for the first time privately, with me capturing it. They were happy to leave it to me to set up, so on my research trip this was something to work out. There’s a bit to consider because you need somewhere discrete, but also ideally that will look pretty to the camera. It also can’t be a huge distance away or via any public spaces as you don’t want any of the guests seeing the bride at this stage. Fortunately The Fleece has the perfect spot, and after finding a quiet entrance for Siobhan the plan was set! Once you’ve read this blog, watch my video diary at the end of this post for the video!

I loved it!

The ceremony was a happy and emotional one. It never stops feeling like such an honour to be invited to capture moments like these.

With the early summer sun in full force the outdoor drinks reception was just perfect.

One of my priorities for capturing couples portraits is to not take the couple away from their party for more than 10-15 mins, ideally less. It’s for me to work efficiently and not for you to spend ages playing the model! So Siobhan, Matt and I spent 5 minutes during the reception to bag these, then later in the day at sunset got a few more with the beautiful evening light. More on that later!

A brilliant hog roast buffet followed, along with some great speeches.

To capture certain moments in a wedding needs planning. Snapping a sunset pic tends not to happen by chance, so during our consultation before the wedding we planned out the timings of the first dance so we could then nip out for 15 minutes down the lane to catch the last of the sun. And man did it not disappoint!

• Hair – creativehairblackminster.co.uk
• Dress – ASOS.com
• Shoes – irregularchoice.com
• Suits & Kilts – slaters.co.uk
• Flowers – esty.com & The Flower Man on the Prom
• Cake – marksandspencer.com
• Rings – alisonmoore.co.uk
• Venue – thefleeceinn.co.uk

I’m always looking to refine and evolve what I do, so I have had my first go at video blogging, or Vlogging to the uninitiated.

The idea being to give my couples and future clients a better idea of how I work, and what it’s like to have me along at your wedding. I’ve learnt a lot from this first go, and can’t wait to tweak bits here and there over time, I have also learnt how alien it is talking to camera, which is basically like talking to yourself! Hopefully that will become easier with time.

The number one priority in doing this, is that it doesn’t impact on my couples or their day, and by filming a lot with the tiny GoPro sat on one of my cameras I achieve that, with the selfie videos done away from everyone before I start and after I finish shooting. In the future I might get some clips with couples, but this will all be with their consent and only if they’re comfortable. The benefit is that hopefully they will feel having a copy of my footage is a nice little bonus to take away from their day.

Click below to view. Remember to comment with feedback or subscribe for more Vlogs throughout the year.

​A gentle start to the year then, yet despite just the 4 hours shooting, Louise & Martin still received over 500 images from their day, and it was a real joy to shoot at Tortworth Court, especially in their stunning orangery. It is genuinely like being outside but with none of the drawbacks!

The weather stayed dry for the important bits, and we bagged some couples shots nice and early with rain forecast, which turned out to be a good call as you can see from my Vlog!

I am back to Tortworth Court two more times this year, shooting another wedding in August and exhibiting at their wedding fayre on October 9th.

I hope you enjoy these highlights.

Iv never entered an awards competition before, mostly because I’m still relatively new to the industry and have been so busy with the real important job of serving my couples, I haven’t been able to commit the time to researching, entering and often paying to compete in them. However the Matara Centre made it pretty straight forward when they emailed me asking for my entry!

So into my first ever competition I went submitting the maximum of 5 photo’s. These went to a board of judges to whittle them down to a select few categories, and to my delight I had 3 photo’s make the cut!

As it stands my social media numbers pale when compared to some of the guys and gals who’ve been doing this much longer than I have, so I made the effort to ask friends, family and clients to have a look and vote if they felt inclined. I’m very grateful for all the votes, as after a total of nearly 1200 votes, one of my photo’s came out on top and won the Couples Moment of the year award!r day.

I love this photo so much. It has a heart-breaking back story that makes it even more beautiful in my eyes, but I will keep the details private out of respect for those involved. It is lovely to know though that even judged on face value, it is an image that has motivated people to vote for it.

Thank you if you voted for me. To win an award of any description so early in my wedding photography career is so exciting. Thank you also to everyone at the Matara Centre. It is a wonderful venue to shoot at, and they made me very welcome throughout the day. A truly beautiful venue.

The awards evening itself was brilliant. It was great to meet some other wedding suppliers and talk shop, as well as speaking to other photographers and hear about some of their experiences.

Tara and the team put on a wonderful meal, and a really personal and thoughtful prize giving. It was great to see some of my peers work and nobody could have left the night not feeling how incredibly creative and professional Gloucestershire wedding suppliers are. Despite desperately wanting to, I deliberately left my camera at home as not look like a complete nerd, so had to resort to a few silly Instagram stories!

As a wedding photographer I have to be a web designer, SEO specialist, graphic designer, accountant, finance dept, marketing team, social media expert, salesman, account manager, oh and a photographer! I can now maybe add to that the roll of entering end of year competitions. I’m still to be convinced those type of awards are worth entering. Many of which you have to pay for, and the voting system is by a panel not a public vote. But I can’t lie, it was really nice to win some recognition.

But first, I need to  nail another year of what is the most important thing, which is capturing more creative and natural wedding day moments! I cannot wait!

Google Analytics tells you some useful info about your website. Mostly things like what pages have been visited, where those visitors clicked from (google/facebook etc) and how long they hung around. Without getting too Big Brothery it does also tell you a couple of things about the people who visit too! Don’t worry, its nothing too personal, it is basically what county they were in, their average age, and quite interestingly, gender.

As it is usually a bride that I have most of my dealings with I assumed that females would outnumber men by some margin for visits to my website, but in fact male visitors shade it with 54.15%!

Perhaps I shouldn’t have been surprised. My portfolio benefits from same-sex male weddings which would boost those numbers, and often photography can be seen as a more male pursuit.

Whatever the reason, I’m happy to have you guys, so here’s a blog for you.

As with my approach for couples shots, there’s no awkward poses here. Some of the best guy-shots are the natural interactions, and making sure you are in the right place at the right time.

But I also like to set up simple scenarios in order to create more specific images. The great thing with most groups of mates, is these scenarios quickly turn into a disorganised laugh-fest. Which is exactly what I want!

It’s not all fun and games though. Your wedding day is a day you’ll be looking your best. One to show the kids in years to come, so I have to catch the guys looking swarve too.

I wouldn’t be doing my job if I didn’t get some of the nervy looks prior to the big moment itself.

It’s not all laddish antics though. Far from it in fact. Nothing brings out a guys softer side more than his wedding. Be it some touching words in his speech, a little gift the morning of the wedding, or simply that look when he sees his bride to be for the first time of “bloody hell I’m a lucky sod”.

The speeches can also get a little rowdy of course. Usually because of the best man, and sometimes the father of the bride!

Although often more restrained than the ladies, the guys can be known to let their hair down.

Wedding photography doesn’t have to be posed, formal and uncomfortable. I approach much of the day as if I’m one of your friends, who happens to have a camera! By doing this not only do you not realise you’re having your photo taken half the time, but it gets me shots that wouldn’t otherwise be possible.

Typically a wedding is about the bride, but that’s not to say the guys are forgotten, certainly not with me!

Curve ball time (pun intended). Whilst I’ve got you guys, I’m going to remind you to check your balls. It could save your life. Click the photo above for more info!

Thanks for reading

Lee
www.leehawleyphotography.com

Being a man, I love a stat and a list, so after a wonderful year I thought I would gather a few numbers to go with all the laughs and emotion of 2017.

I hope they shed some light on the behind the scenes life of a wedding photographer!

The plan next was to head up to Leckhampton hill for 15 mins on the way to The Daffodil to get some nice shots with the camper and scenery. There was a sunny break in the clouds so surely this would be perfect!

Until we got to the agreed meet point to find thick fog!! A photography nightmare, as if you can’t see your subject it’s you can’t really photograph it! However a key skill in being a photographer is to not fall apart when the going gets tough, and to be able to think on your feet. We didn’t get the full range of shot’s I had in mind, but with a little creativity we got some that are even better than we would have got on a clear day.

Thank you to Eloise & Rich. It was such a fun day, and is always so rewarding working with people so enthusiastic about their photographs. Their review on my facebook is so lovely, it is always reassuring that the feeling I have with my couples that it’s like working with friends, is felt by the couples too. It’s so central to my approach and it’s great to hear.