Up in the air

We have worked for a while as specialist property photographers, but the state of the market has reduced the demand for this. We have a 15m telescopic mast and a Canon G9 (a great little camera even if it is a Canon) which can be controlled from the ground. 15m does not sound like much, but can provide a much better view of properties - showing the layout of the site, the gardens behind the building etc.

This picture is of a barn conversion near Redditch - we think the angle makes the scale, layout and gardens more visible.

Kaylee strikes again

Rachel's picture of Kaylee was taken in at Apparicio's hair salon in Worcester for their window display. It has been printed very large - about 46" square and looks great. It just goes to show that you don't need a studio to do glamour.

Wet motorbikes

We have a motorbike (nothing flash - a 1990 BMW K75S), and one of the joys of the Summer is to go out on a Wednesday night to the Bikers Nites, which are at various pubs in the Cotswolds. (Check out the schedule - www.//bikersnite.mysite.wanadoo-members.co.uk) If the weather is good there can be several hundred motorbikes at a tiny Cotswold hostelry. Our good friends at Cotswold Style magazine asked us to take some pictures of the bikes.

Cue black skies, pouring rain and low attendance by fair weather bikers. Having stuck the cameras in the panniers, we took a few pictures, but we still never have done the Cotswold Style shoot because it's rained every Wednesday ever since!

All Yours seeking to expand

Following our very successful Summer, and with plenty of weddings booked for the rest of the year and a growing crop booked for 2009, we have been looking for photographers to join the team. So we placed a small ad on a photography website, with the result that we have been bombarded with portfolios and cv's from all over the UK. Our website viewing figures have gone through the roof!

The problem is, a lot of the photographs that have been sent are just not very good. In fact, some people's best work is so poor that it might have been on the cutting room floor around here. Among all this there are a few real gems, though, and we'll be talking to people in due course to see what we can do.

We've been speaking to couples about their weddings this week, and they have all been to weddings that have been ruined by the photographers. So it's not just about taking the right shots properly, it's also about giving the whole wedding family a decent experience at the same time.

Our experience of photographing small children has come in really useful here - we know how to get the job done quickly. Even a couple with a list of 40 shots don't want to spend 2 minutes per shot i.e. 80 minutes grinning at the camera when there is champagne ready to be drunk! Having the experience to get on with the photography quickly, and the tact and diplomacy to get on with the family nicely is what we strive to do and what we're looking for.

It's nice to be appreciated

Just got off the phone from Pam Flint (see below). Being a celeb family, Pam's been photographed by Hello magazine, and reckons Rachel did a better job without the crew of people. Putting her money where her mouth is, Pam ordered some enlargements for her lovely house. It's great for a little family firm like ours to know that people in the know appreciate our work.

Wedding frenzy

We are just recovering from shooting three weddings in a weekend, including our biggest ever - a big event in Cheltenham Town Hall. This required the biggest group shot we've ever done with 300 people. Fortunately the weather was good. On Saturday we shot weddings in Malvern and Droitwich, in dreadful weather. As always, it is a privilege to be there, and we come away happy and full of energy even after a long day.

Live 24/7 new edition on the streets

The new edition of the glossy Birmingham lifestyle magazine is out and full of our pictures. From pictures of Dennis Waterman's beautiful partner Pam Flint, to tourist scenes of Worcester to advertising shots of food and interiors, there is a lot of our work in there. It's always satisfying to see your pics in print.

International Property photography, don't you know

We were asked to photograph this ski lodge development near Val d'Isere, and who were we to say no? Since we don't ski, going in the Summer was no problem for us. Much of our restaurant and pub photography is along similar lines, but with less snow and more crisps.

The mountain is the fourth highest in Europe, and gives you something to look at as you're doing the washing up.

The pictures will be used in the next revision of the website, but the old one is http://www.balcons-ste-foy.com/ It really is a fabulous part of the world, a couple of hours drive from Geneva

Photobooks arrive!!

Our new photobooks arrived today (well, strictly we collected them by motorbike yesterday because we needed to show them to a couple last night), but this has been the first chance we've had to sit down and look at them properly. They're absolutely beautiful, and we can't wait for customers to see them. We've had a range of sizes produced, from wedding albums to pocket books and we're really proud of them. They are also much less expensive than most albums that couples have to choose from.

We're getting ready for the three weddings we're covering this weekend, and still working on teaching materials for the courses we'll be running in September. It's a long job, but as ex-teachers we know that more preparation leads to better classes.