Ian and Rachel - The Imperial Wedding Photographer / May 19, 2025 by Jan

The great thing about weddings is how personalized they can be. Some couples love to do a bouquet toss, other couples prefer to do a walk-out under sparklers. Some want it big, others want something smaller. And just because you’re going for something smaller, doesn’t mean you should be getting less.

Ian and Rachel decided on having a formal wedding ceremony followed by a more informal remaining day, which meant that they only wanted me for a couple of hours of photo coverage.

I started the day photographing Rachel in her hotel room with her father and sister, she was busy adding the final touches to her outfit and once fully ready, we captured the full outfit; the wedding dress, the bouquet, the jewellery.

The clock was ticking so I headed off to the The Imperial’s ceremony room. I always really like their ceremony room and find it such a pleasure to photograph in. I believe the Imperial is taking a break from hosting weddings while they renovate, but I hope they get back to it soon, as it’s a great venue.

As part of the ceremony, the couple lit the candles and I then already found themselves slipping the rings on each other’s fingers. All the while I’m photographing the guests’ laughter and tears, or the embarrassing moment when Ian’s mother realized she had forgotten to bring the rings. Thankfully, they were just in her hotel room and with a quick sprint down the corridors, the crisis was averted.

Rings

“…the embarrassing moment when Ian’s mother realized she had forgotten to bring the rings.”

We were then able to enter the penthouse suite which features this lovely balcony that almost wraps around the whole building. With the views overlooking the city and the sun already being low, we had this amazingly soft light. It was still so radiant, so we had so much colour in the skin tones, making the two love birds just glow!

And as a finishing hurrah, we did the group photos with family and friends.

I always bring my A-game to these kinds of weddings, as that is a lot to squeeze into just a two hour time window, so I come prepared by knowing exactly what I’m photographing and when. I still have to capture a lot of the same moments and details, but with a lot less time on my hands. There’s definitely more pressure on each photo being pergect. It’s a fun challenge and I love how the photos came out! Ian and Rachel thought so too, and were kind enough to leave me this lovely 5-star Google review:

“We hired Jan as our wedding photographer and he did an amazing job. He made us feel very at ease as was very professional. Our pictures turned out amazing. We would highly recommend Jan!”

— Rachel

When it comes to booking a package, it’s important to book a package that fits your idea of what your day should be. I love getting those dancing shots at the end of the evening, when everyone is relaxed and having a blast (which I did here for instance), or photographing the wedding couple with their camper van, which was specially requested by the couple!

Either way, I’d love to hear from you! Say hi to me here and fill me in on what your wedding plans are!

More Wedding Couple Photos at The Imperial

More Wedding Ceremony Photos at The Imperial

Dogs, Dogs, Dogs - Brand Marketing Photographer / May 14, 2025 by Jan

I recently posted a blog called, “Yoga vs Pilates”. This blog post was about two separate photo shoots that I did for a local pilates studio and a yoga studio. In this post I described my approach to creating these marketing or branding photos which are predominantly meant for social media and maybe their own website. And I teased that I would have something a little different coming up.

Well, today’s blog post it’s dogs, dogs, dogs... And an owner. I was approached by Julia, who is the founder of the company Tails & Trails, they specialize in dog harnesses, collars and leads. She already had beautiful product photos, and loads of phone pics of her own dog, but no high-end studio photos of a selection of dogs wearing the different products. So she booked in with me and we headed to the studio.

I immediately came up with a mood board, a selection of photos, to give her an idea of what I was thinking of doing and also one with photos that I didn’t like and wouldn’t want to do. We were both on the same page with what we wanted to achieve from this photo shoot and we both had the same icks when it came to dog photography.

Julia

Founder of the company Tails & Trails

Her company colours are all muted, more earthy colours, such as sand and sage, so we went for a similarly coloured background in the studio. Something I would describe as a sort of clay and sand mix. It fit the brand identity perfectly! With six dogs and many different collar and harness patterns and colours, we tackled the shoot. Dog treats always within reach.

I purposefully set up the lighting so that the dogs had a wide area to sit and pose for us. They didn’t have to hit the mark perfectly, like I might expect a human to. That made life a lot easier and allowed the dogs to get comfortable where they felt comfortable, which resulted in some surprisingly lovely poses, smiles and down-the-barrel ‘Blue Steel’.

5-star Google Review

These kind of marketing photo shoots are always lovely to be a part of. It’s so exciting to see other businesses expand their presence on the internet and make that next step with a beautiful website and online shop or some gorgeous Instagram posts. And as Julia also mentioned in her 5-star Google review, it’s great to make someone else’s vision into a reality:

“Jan and Nikki were both absolutely brilliant. The shoot went very smoothly and they knew exactly what shots would look best (even though they were given the difficult task of shooting with dogs). I couldn’t be happier with the outcome, looking forward to working with them again in the future.”

— Julia from Tails & Trails

So if your business needs some marketing photography, or you want your online presence to better suit your brand identity or you’re an up and coming business, say hi to me here. I’m also good at photographing humans!

O&R - Garryvoe Wedding Photographer / April 23, 2025 by Jan

A wedding at the Garryvoe Hotel. Strange, usually when I’m in east Cork for a wedding it’s in Ballycotton.

This was my first wedding of the year between Oisín and Rachel. It was still winter, in the middle of February, so too cold for cliff backgrounds or beach photos, but we did have the lovely, cozy warm ambiance of the Garryvoe Hotel.

I always like to highlight three things that stood out to me at a wedding.

1) An Indoor Couple Shoot

I have done partial couple shoots indoors or unexpected ones indoors because the weather changed suddenly but this was a couple shoot I planned from the get go to be inside. With the Garryvoe Hotel having this lovely library that I could set up as a photography studio with my lighting equipment was amazing! As always, I had to move some furniture out of the way with the help of some strong waiters but the effort was worth it and I love how these photos came out!

Before every wedding, I get in do a video call with the couple to get to know them and to understand what’s important to them on their big day. Oisín and Rachel had mentioned that as much as they wanted to have a couple shoot, it wasn’t something that was that important to them. This isn’t uncommon and those couples often find it more important to be around friends and family. And I absolutely understand that, so this couple shoot actually just took 10 minutes. They were delighted. They had some beautiful shots of them as a newly wed couple and didn’t miss a thing.

2) The ‘Friends’ Ceremony

Oisín and Rachel had such a laid back and funny ceremony, no doubt because of the celebrant who did a fantastic job on the day. But amazingly, it turned out that the celebrant was the uncle. Because of that he was able to create such a unique ceremony for them and part of that was reading out Joey’s (from Friends) best man speech:

“We are gathered here today on this joyous occasion to celebrate the special love that Oisín and Rachel share.

It is a love based on giving and receiving as well as having and sharing. And the love that they give and have is shared and received. And through this having and giving and sharing and receiving, we too can share and love and have... and receive…”

It had everyone in stitches!

3) The Entrance Song

This was just a small element of the day, but it stood out to me. When entering the dinner hall for the speeches and the dinner, couples will often have a special entrance for that moment, sometimes accompanied by music. On this day, Oisín and Rachel chose a very untypical song for a wedding; “The Next Episode” by Dr Dre featuring Snoop Dogg.

They came dancing out, absolutely loving it. They really made their big day uniquely theirs, and I love to see that!

5-star Google Review

Rachel left us a lovely review, I thought I’d share it here.

“We would highly recommend Jan and Nikki to anyone looking for a wedding photographer.
They were very professional and attentive and truly made us feel at ease. The photos are brilliant and we got them back very fast.
Thanks again Jan and Nikki”

— Rachel

If you would like to tempt me away from Ballycotton and shoot at the Garryvoe or somewhere else in east Cork, say hi to me here for wedding packages and the chance to book in for a video call with me.