I had the absolute pleasure of photographing the wedding of Jess and James at Stock Brook Country Club in Essex.
These two are quite simply an awesome couple. As you can see Jess looked absolutely stunning and gets massive credit for organising such an amazing day within just a couple of months before heading off to Canada. James started out the morning with a game of golf with his best man and ushers. It was possibly the coldest I have ever been and I only managed a couple of holes – however the boys battled through the whole round. Very brave. James is the coolest, most laid back guy I have ever met. Even waiting for Jess to arrive, when he was obviously a little nervous, he was still the coolest guy in the room.
I had a great day photographing Jess and James’ wedding. The venue, the atmosphere and the whole day was absolutely brilliant.
Oh yeah. Take that Jamie Oliver. None of this 15 minutes nonsense. This takes 10 minutes and tastes preposterously good. Always put the seafood in right at the end otherwise it gets a bit tough. The way to keep it to time is to boil the linguine for 10 minutes and whilst that is doing fix the sauce.
For 2 people
WHAT YOU NEED
1 Large Glass of White Wine for you
1 Large Glass of White Wine for the sauce
100g of Philadelphia (you can use Creme Fraiche if you prefer)
1 Chilli finely chopped and deseeded
3 Garlic cloves crushed
1 pack of pre cooked Seafood Mix
200g Linguine (the packs say 75g per person but I always shove in a little bit extra because I am greedy and I love pasta)
Flat Leaf Parsley (fresh is best but dried works fine in this)
Olive Oil
Salt and Pepper for seasoning
WHAT YOU DO
Fill and boil the kettle. Pour the boiling water into a pan and make sure it’s got a good rolling boil going. Add a pinch of salt to the water and put in the linguine. Bring back to the boil and set the timer for 10 minutes. Aaaaaaaaaand you’re off.
Heat some oil in a pan over a medium heat. You don’t need much. Chop and deseed the chilli and add to the oil and crush in the garlic. Stir it around for a minute and then add the wine. Drink some of your wine.
Refill your wine glass.
Let the wine cook with the chilli and the garlic until the sauce thickens a little. It will only take a minute or two. Add in a good handful of parsley and mix it all round.
Scoop out most of the philadelphia and add into the sauce. Stir it round until the whole sauce is really well mixed and the philly has melted.
Add the seafood mix to the sauce and stir round to warm it through. If the sauce seems a bit thick add another splash of white wine. It can’t be too thick as it needs to cover all of the pasta. I do it by eye but the sauce needs to look well balanced and you can add philly to thicken or wine to loosen as you want. Season if you want some.
Drink your wine until the timer for the pasta goes off.
Drain the pasta and drizzle over some oil. Add the pasta to the pan with the sauce and mix it all together.
Serve and add a little more parsley. And some more wine to your glass.
Sometimes you are asked to go shoot in a venue that you just love.
For me that was when I was asked to go and shoot at Becky and Marcelle’s Simply Amazing Wedding at Hermitage Road in Hitchin. This place was gorgeous. So I was desperate to get back there and shoot again. I hope you like the images of Sarah and Dani my two fantastic models for the day.
“Sometimes all you need is 20 seconds of insane courage, just literally 20 seconds of embarrassing bravery, and I promise you something great will come of it.”
That is a quote from Matt Damon’s character, Benjamin Mee, in the film ‘We bought a Zoo’ which I watched last night. A quick side note – if you do not laugh and cry at this film then you may in fact not be a human. It really is a great, very sweet film.
The quote hit me straight away and has stayed with me all day today. If you have read this blog in the past you will have seen a couple of posts relating to what I call ‘The Fear’. A while later on I posted about the tough love required to get through that fear.
The reason a lot of photography businesses end up failing is because no one knows that they are even around. If you want to make money taking photographs and don’t let anyone know you exist then it doesn’t matter if you take the best photographs in the world – no one is ever going to see them and no one is going to hire you. That is why a lot of photography business fail. It’s why a lot of all businesses fail.
It is scary to put yourself out there. People trying to make a living from their own creativity, I believe, are especially susceptible to the terror and therefore to the failure it brings through paralysis.
It has been a really exciting month or so at Benjamin J Photography.
I have met venue managers, dress makers and florists. Next week I am meeting a wedding planner. Just to say hi and let people know I am here. I called the wedding planner out of the blue. The dress makers and the florists – that was even more scary. I filled my pockets with business cards and just walked through the door.
“Hi, I’m Ben and I am a wedding photographer. I am just coming round and introducing myself to people. How are you doing?”
That was it.
And you know what. No one shot me in the face. No one threw things at me. No one shouted at me that I was wasting their precious time and that I obviously could never amount to any small nugget of success.
No one was anything other than absolutely lovely.
Now I have made some fantastic contacts and my marketing plan is off and running.
So why am I telling you about Matt Damon?
“Sometimes all you need is 20 seconds of insane courage, just literally 20 seconds of embarrassing bravery, and I promise you something great will come of it.”
I think back to the moment before I picked up the telephone to cold call the wedding planner. I remember hovering outside the bridal dress shop and tentatively walking towards the florists to introduce myself out of the blue. I remember almost not doing any of it. I remember thinking “I’ll do it tomorrow, maybe they are busy.” Then I remember the voice in my head saying “Just dial the number and say hi, then your in…” and “Just walk in the shop and smile, then your off and you have no choice…”
I didn’t have the right phrase for that process until last night. All it took was 20 seconds of what felt like totally insane courage. Then I was in. I had no choice but to keep talking and engaging and making contacts. 20 seconds was all it took and I was in the door.
“Sometimes all you need is 20 seconds of insane courage, just literally 20 seconds of embarrassing bravery, and I promise you something great will come of it.”
So here is my little challenge for you. Take 20 seconds right now and be brave. Call someone that could be a useful contact for your business. Right now. Just dial the number and say hi. Once you are through that bit you are talking and you are off. All it takes is 20 seconds.
20… 19… 18…
Holly Strang -October 2, 2012 - 3:15 pm
What an inspiring blog. I absolutely love this, SO true. Good luck to all that try it! :0)
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Sounds delicious! x