Christina & Dom / Mickleton Hills Farm, Cotswolds

This was such a fun wedding! Christina and Dom got married at the fab Mickleton Hills Farm – a really super venue in the Cotswolds, with beautiful surrounding grounds, and run by a really lovely couple – and their celebration was actually over two days, with a small intimate ‘official’ wedding on the first day, and a big party and ceremony officiated by a friend on the next day; best of both worlds!

It was my first time as a Mickleton Hills Farm wedding photographer, and honestly, it’s such a great venue; can’t recommend it enough. A really beautiful countryside location, with rolling fields, super wedding barns, and on-site accommodation too.

Enough of the intro, though; as I’ve done for my past few blog posts, I’m going to write some of my thoughts about some of the images below, so, without further ado, here are some of my favourite Mickleton Hills Farm wedding photos from Christina & Dom’s fab day(s):

There was so much confetti! It got *everywhere*, as you’ll see from quite a few photos…!

I like the symmetry in this shot, as a slightly pensive Dom waits for his family and friends – and bride! – to arrive. So much of my work is is about capturing totally natural moments like this, but in artistic/visually-interesting ways – I purposely composed this shot for the symmetry, here, and I think it works nicely.

Again, this is totally un-posed – one of Dom’s groomsmen just waiting for guests to arrive. I like the almost negative-space on the left side of the image, which draws your eye to the usher. I guess you could call it a ‘portrait’, but it’s not, in the traditional sense of the word, as it’s still a totally natural, un-posed capture.

We always have choice, as photographers, with how we choose to frame and capture moments. Here, I purposefully captured the bridesmaids chatting whilst framed through the make-up artist’s arms – I think it makes for a dynamic, interesting composition. By waiting that little bit longer for the laugh, it makes the image so much better than if they were just talking, too.

I do like shooting ‘frames within frames’! Here, the bridal party is arriving, and I like the way that, by shooting to include the window frame, it gives a real sense of depth and context.

I love it when brides do speeches!

I’ve included the two frames above together in this blog post, as they’re just examples of what I’m often doing: Watching, and waiting for moments. They’re two different moments from the same period of a few minutes, and, to me, this is the real essence of wedding photography: Real moments.

I told you the confetti went everywhere…!

A small, subtle moment: Christina’s brother holding her hand, during her ‘final touches’. Sure, there are a lot of ‘big’ moments during a wedding, but these smaller moments are just as important to capture – if not more so.

Side, personal note: I love all the sheep at this venue!

It may seem obvious, but it may also not be something that you think about when viewing images, but by including Christina in the foreground here, the image tells far more of a ‘story’ – if I had only included the bridesmaids, you – as the viewer – wouldn’t be sure what they were actually reacting to. So much about photography is down to our decisions on what to include – or not – in the frame.

Ah yes, there were some super speeches – and reactions! – at this wedding!

Another shot to prove what I said earlier about the confetti…

…and another one…

and one more…!

OK, two more 😉

Christina and Dom, on a packed dancefloor, but totally lost in each other. As it should be!

It’s always super special when a friend does the ceremony. Often get very big laughs like this too!

Gotta love a photobooth reaction!

OK, last one, honest*…!

I’m writing this blog post in early 2021, when the world is still right in the middle of the covid pandemic…gosh, how much are we looking forward to moments like this again? I know I can’t wait to be doing this with my own extended family, and capturing it for people again.