If you’re interested in photographs that are a little bit more interesting than a lot of the ‘picture perfect’ posed pictures you tend to see today have a look at the fantastic 591Photography Blog.

It’s run by a collection of photographers dedicated to photography, pictures, life, love, facts, fiction, imagination, people, places…

They’re currently showing some of my street photographs from Morocco 2009 and I gave them a little insight into what drives me as a photographer.

Here’s a link http://www.591photography.com/2011/07/on-city-streets-and-elswhere.html

You can also see more of my personal work over on my main website here.

Last month Caroline and I had some professional family photographs taken with Corrina over in France. I also had some new profile shots taken for my new website.

For the shoot Pierre-Yves suggested we go for a walk in the beautiful location of Les Haras in Hennebont. With lots of trees, horses and stables in the background we knew he’d be able to capture some lovely natural unposed photographs. And that’s just how it was!

It was a strange experience for me as I’m normally the one behind the camera but I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed the experience! P-Y didn’t give us any direction – he just allowed us to be ourselves and got some really lovely portraits.

Check out the 2nd image below of me in full ninja mode (taking a picture of some horses)…. :D

Caroline and I married in her hometown in France almost 8 years ago. With the birth of Corrina it ranks up there as the best day of our lives. As a wedding photographer myself, I’m often asked who shot our own wedding photographs.

Well, I’m pleased to say that a quiet, unassuming, yet very talented photographer called Pierre-Yves Nicolas photographed our wedding day. Pierre-Yves runs a busy high street wedding and portrait studio in Caroline’s hometown of Hennebont. Looking back at our wedding we hardly noticed he was there. A bit like how I do things, he shot reportage for the most part (and also took a couple of portraits of just the two of us). He really captured the feel and mood of the wedding perfectly.

Looking through the wedding album again with Caroline we can still very much feel the emotions we had that day. I think that’s testament both to his great skills as a photographer and to the power of documentary wedding photography (when done well). The album is one of our most treasured possessions and it will be fantastic to show it off to Corrina when she’s older.

With Pierre-Yves’ great sense of timing and composition we had no doubts that when it came to doing a family photoshoot with him we would have yet another set of photographs to treasure.

Here he is photographing Corrina. I’ll post some of our favourites later in the week.

Today’s the anniversary of the day I met Caroline… So with that in mind, here’s one of my favourite photographs of her taken a couple of years ago up at Torr Head on the Antrim coast.

I’m fortunate to live in Ireland and to have developed a passion for photographing horses. There’s something incredibly peaceful about taking portraits of these beautiful animals. Here’s a few more taken with my Hasselblad XPan – this time from up in the Glens of Antrim.

Apologies for not posting last week. With three weddings in the space of eight days and over 600 miles clocked up in the car, the second half of June feels like it could rival the months of September and December as my busiest time of the year.

Just before my run of recent weddings I was in France shooting the horses of Les Haras in Hennebont where I had some great access to the private area not normally seen by members of the public. Here’s a couple of images just scanned in from the negatives – taken on my Hasselblad Xpan panoramic camera with Ilford HP5 black and white film.

We love appreciation. Especially for the hard work that goes in after the wedding day (which often goes unseen) in terms of the image post production and in getting the album ready.

With many of my clients being located around the world it can seem like quite a challenge sometimes in actually getting the album in their hands (especially in Paris, France where the local couriers seem to be a law unto themselves). Caroline and I always prefer to see our clients one last time here at the studio in Ireland anyway, but that’s not always possible, especially if the clients are based overseas. So it’s always nice to know that the books get shipped safely out to them.

Here’s a couple of lovely notes we received this week.

Sandrine & Didier in France

“Hello Caroline,

Ca y est nous avons enfin récupéré notre album… il est magnifique ! Et merci beaucoup pour la jolie surprise !

On vous embrasse bien fort. Bon courage pour la nouvelle saison de mariage qui doit débuter…

Sandrine, Didier & Zoé”

—

Georgina and Simon in England

“Hi Dylan and Caroline

thank you for our wedding album – it arrived safely and we love it. It’s had it’s first few family viewings now and everyone thinks it’s amazing. Thank you so much.

hope you’re all well
thanks
Georgina”

I just had a look at the stats for the website for the first time and it seems that since the new site was launched last year I’ve had nearly a quarter of a million page views!! I’ve no idea how if this is good or bad compared to others but it sounds like a lot!

Corrina has taken her first steps!

She just loves running (if you hold her little hands in your big hands). So last Sunday morning we took her down to the Marine Promenade in Carrickfergus for a stroll.

Could she walk it to the Castle?

Nearly!

Then she fell asleep all contented in the late morning sun.

The first time I visited Paris was only the third time I’d met Caroline. I remember it was in the autumn and I had caught the Eurostar from London on a Friday.

Needless to say, love was in the air and every time I go back now I always think of that first visit. To me, the city is always in monochrome and how I wish I had some photographs of the moment I stepped off the train at the Gare du Nord to see Caroline waiting at the end of the platform.

That’s the thing with photographs in your head – you only appreciate their true significance (or absence) after the event. Who was to know we’d later marry? Well – I might have had a sneaking suspicion but, don’t tell anyone – ok?

The other thing I get when I visit Paris is the music of Jeff Buckley ringing in my ears, particularly the song ‘Je N’En Connais Pas La Fin from the Live At Sin-É EP – it’s just such a beautiful song.

Anyway, here’s a few photographs taken with my Hasselblad XPan panoramic camera. If you have a big screen you can see them (and more of my personal work) in all their glory over on dylanmcburney.net