Before Father Bohan got to tell the congregation about the chuckle I had given him a little earlier, there was the small matter of a wedding ceremony to take care of.  That, as it always does, involved the exchange of vows and the exchange of rings.  I often position myself in the aisle for this part of the ceremony –  for a number of reasons.  Firstly, it allows me to hang back a little further, which is good because it ensures I don’t inadvertently become the focus of anyone’s attention.  Secondly, it usually gives a good view of the couple – usually, because this is true if they are facing each other, which they often are.  Thirdly, in some churches it’s the only viable place to get a reasonable angle.  Not every church has wings to either side of the altar from which to photograph.  St. Attracta’s Church in Sixmilebridge isn’t any other church though.  In fact it is wider than it is long.  The main aisle effectively runs across the front of the altar, and Sinead’s entrance was from the side, not the back.  That extra width, coupled with a very bright spot light shining on the priest, but not on the bride and groom, when viewed from the normal aisle position, encouraged me to move to the side of the altar, from where I captured this image as Diarmaid completed the formalities.

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There’s some saying about “rain before 7, gone by 11″ or something like that.  Maybe it didn’t start raining until after 7am on Irene and Sean’s wedding day, but sadly it kept going beyond 11am, and as they walked down the aisle I finally conceded that the remainder of the days photography would have to be done indoors.  Thankfully, that wasn’t too drastic an option given that indoors was to be the Bridge House Hotel in Tullamore, which I had visited early that morning for the first time, and which I had left unconcerned about the need to capture photographs there. For such a central hotel in a busy town, it has oodles of charm, not to mention a fantastic staircase.  Perfect for a bride to show off her dress, for instance!  Before we got to that photo, there were a few others to capture.

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The last trick up my sleeve for handling the very strong sunshine (and the very harsh shadows it caused), while photographing Siobhán and Colin’s wedding recently, was to wait until the sun had dipped below the horizon to start the bridal party formal shots.  That was possible for two reasons – firstly, it being so late in the year, the sun would be setting long before the call for dinner, and secondly, it being so cold, the bridal party would welcome the chance to warm up for a while at the drinks reception inside the hotel before heading back outside for formal photographs.  And I was really hoping they’d be willing to come outside again, because the pier in front of the Hodson Bay, together with the early evening light, was going to make for a lovely photo.  The shot above is almost straight out of the camera, so close to what I saw on the screen having captured it.  And, having seen it, I was glad that they had indeed braved the cold one more time.  Long before that shot though, there were others to be taken.

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