Family portrait session in Richmond Park

I’ve been very busy with some lovely photo shoots over the last few weeks so blogging and tweeting have fallen a bit by the wayside, which is very wrong and goes against all my good intentions and blogging timetables…

Anyway, I wanted to share this photo shoot that took place at the end of the Easter holidays in April. Despite having rained solidly for the two weeks leading up to it, the sun came out for the shoot which was a great relief to me and probably to the lovely family who had just got back from a holiday in Indonesia so definitely weren’t ready for rain and freezing temperatures! We spent a happy hour in the beautiful Isabella Plantation in Richmond Park where the azaleas were in full bloom and the bluebells just starting to make an appearance.

What I love about these photos is that you can see what a lot of fun the family have together which really is what any photo shoot should capture. I also love the family’s choice of outfits which feature blue, stripes and highlights of pink and now star in my ‘what to wear for your photo shoot’ guide.

famly photo shoot isabella plantation richmond park

The family have ordered some gift prints, a DVD and some other lovely products, one of which is below (modelled by the lovely Poppy to show how big it is) and which will be revealed tomorrow once it has been delivered. Oh, the suspense…

 

Doesn’t time fly… A year on from the Royal Wedding Street Party

royal wedding street party 2011As we get rained on at regular intervals at the moment, it occurred to me today that this time last year we were all praying for a break in the clouds for the Royal Wedding on 29 April.

I was one of the organisers of the St John’s Church street party in Kingston and I can remember the high level of anxiety we were experiencing at this point in time last year since we didn’t know how many people were likely to come to the street party, whether it would stay dry, or if we had bought enough bunting/foil balloons/hot dog rolls… So I can’t imagine how nervous the royal couple must have been feeling in the run-up to their wedding! And I can’t believe that on Sunday it will be a whole year ago. We had a lovely day with all the community involved, about 1,000 visitors, a visit from the Mayor of Kingston – and from the lovely Jeff Brazier since our street party was covered on Channel Five. Already preparations are underfoot for the Diamond Jubilee street party on 2 June. You can see details here www.facebook.com/royalweddingstreetparty

To mark the happy anniversary, I just wanted to share the coverage we got in Families Upon Thames Magazine where we were lucky enough to get some publicity for the street party and I was pleased to have some Sweetheart Studio photos feature both on the cover and inside.

Let’s hope that by the Diamond Jubilee weekend we’re all rained out and the sun shines. Not long to go now…

 

 

 

 

Spring (had) sprung… Baby photo session in Kingston

With all the rain we’re having at the moment, those few days of spring sunshine we had in March seem like a really long time ago! We were lucky with the weather on this photo shoot that took place back in March because although it was really cold, there was a sunshine-y break in the clouds before the rain started. It was one of my spring mini sessions and the very beautiful baby Hattie was a happy and smiley star of the photos (although she seemed quite keen on eating the bunch of daffodils I had taken along which is very wrong and we ran and grabbed them before they reached her mouth…)

spring mini session in the daffodils

The bad weather has meant that a couple of shoots in the last week or so have had to be rescheduled, but I am always happy to do so because if you’ve got your heart set on some lovely natural outdoor shots of your family enjoying time together in a local park, for example, then you won’t want to end up with an indoor portrait session or outdoor shots of you all shivering under an umbrella… I want you to end up with images that you love and which bring back happy memories rather than ones that you look at and think ‘If only we’d waited until the following week when the sun finally came out’. Please contact me for availability. I am booked up until the end of June now for weekend shoots but still have some weekday availability. And there are still two slots left for my (indoor) mini sessions at The Gooseberry Bush Cafe in Wimbledon on Thursday 10 May. Please click below for details.

Mini portrait sessions for kids and babies in Wimbledon

Have had a bit of a blogging break for the last couple of weeks because I’ve been desperately trying to re-design my website before the kids break up for Easter. Nearly there – the perfectionist in me has a few more tweaks to make before the new Sweetheart Studio site goes live… But in the meantime I wanted to announce some lovely mini sessions I have had booked for a while at Gooseberry Bush Cafe in SW19. These will be taking place on Thursday 10 May from 2-5pm. I am really excited about the sessions because it’s such a lovely location. I have done lots of photo shoots there before and it’s light, airy – and I can personally recommend the whoopie pies for sale in the child-friendly cafe downstairs! The cafe also sells a fantastic range of cards, gifts and baby products so you can browse before or after your baby session.

But back to the portrait sessions… I thought you might like to see a photo of the studio to see how lovely and light it is…

gooseberry bush studio sw19 photo shoot

Because it has windows on two sides it is light enough for me not to use a flash, unless it’s a studio-style session like the one I will be doing on 17 November – watch this space for details of a Christmas-themed portrait day!

Here are some of the images from portrait sessions I’ve done over the last four months at Gooseberry Bush.

mini photo sessions at gooseberry bush studio in wimbledon sw19 As you can see, whether it’s a session for babies, kids, girls, boys or beautiful bumps, it makes a lovely location…

mini studio sessions at gooseberry bush cafe in wimbledon sw19You can see further examples of photo shoots at Gooseberry Bush here, here  and here

The sessions will last 20 minutes and start at £95 for the session with five 6×4 prints. I also have some other fantastic packages available for this session which I will blog about later in more detail since I have to go and pick up a very excited Easter-bonnet-wearing daughter from school now…

Session times are 2pm (booked), 2.30pm (booked), 3pm (booked), 3.30pm, 4pm and 4.30pm (booked). Please get in touch for further details or to book…

Headshot photo shoot in Kingston upon Thames

I spent a lovely afternoon on Monday with Hilary Nicholls. She is the very talented face behind frockchicks.com which offers personal styling and wardrobe busting for both men and women. Hilary was in need of some new headshots and photos for her website which is about to undergo a revamp. Although the day started off cold and foggy, by the time we had chatted over a coffee about what Hilary was hoping for from her photo shoot, the sun was shining and the fog had cleared. Despite having a spooky moment straight out of Hitchcock’s The Birds when the wind caught my reflector and made it flap about causing the (what seemed like) hundreds of pigeons nearby to suddenly take to the air all around us in panic – and the rather unwelcome gift that one of the pigeons then deposited into Hilary’s bag –  we had an enjoyable couple of hours down by the river and in lots of the stores around and about Kingston.

headshot session in kingston upon thames

I hope you can see from the photos what an enjoyable photo shoot it was and also what a great sense of style Hilary has. You can sample her talents for yourself because she will be appearing at an exclusive Frock Chicks shopping day in White Stuff, Kingston (by All Saints Church) on Thursday 22 March where you can book a free personal shopping session with her and let her work her magic. Visit the Frock Chicks website for details of how to contact Hilary at www.frockchicks.com or see in store for details.

I just wanted to share one other photo – my favourite from the day…

Headshot photo shoot by Kingston Bridge

FrockChicks.com headshot photo shoot by Kingston Bridge

If after seeing these photos you feel that you would like some updated photos of yourself to use on your website/Facebook page/Twitter profile or LinkedIn then please get in touch. I take the photos on location using natural light and, since I hate having my own photo taken, I try to make it as stress-free as possible so that you can relax and we get natural images of you looking like your normal self rather than a stiff passport-photo-type pose. My headshot sessions are £125 and include a half-hour photo shoot and a password-protected gallery of images from which you can choose your two favourites which are presented to you on DVD. Please call 07711 087636 for details.