2022 Update
News and update from Sam and Steve
Well, it is 2022 and a very belated Happy New Year to all our customers, customers to be and our friends in the wedding industry! 2021 was our busiest ever year for wedding photography, especially as we had to effectively cover two years worth of weddings in one season! Of course, due to the Covid-19 pandemic, we had lots of postponed weddings to cover from 2020; our big thanks to all our lovely couples for working with us to smoothly transfer their postponed wedding to a new date. It was GREAT to be photographing weddings again! As the year went on, restrictions eased, and number of guests allowed went from 15, to 30 and then eventually no limit.
It was great to be able to photograph dancing at weddings later in 2021. This is from Lydia and Lewis wedding at Cotswolds Hotel and Spa in October 2021
2021 saw us photograph at some new (to us) venues, such as Dorchester Abbey, Whittlebury Hall, Horewood House and Bedales School. And of course, we got to go to back to some of the places we know so well, including Lains Barn, Dovecote Events Adderbury, Bodleian Library, Lincoln College and Keble College, Oxford, Manor Farm Barn, Cotswolds Hotel and Spa, Bicester Hotel Golf and Spa, Tythe Barn Launton, and several church weddings followed by marquee receptions.
Holly and Emma’s lovely wedding at the Convocation House, Bodleian Library, Oxford from August 2021
2021 was also our first full year of using Sony cameras and lenses. After 4 years of using Fujifilm cameras, it was a big change for us to move to Sony, and one that we debated for a long time before finally doing so. In the end, we believed that the larger sensors of the Sony cameras would be better for us in low light situations, and the Sony autofocus technology was superior. We were right in both cases! We feel that the both the quality and consistency of our work went up another level as a result of our change of equipment. We will write a separate article shortly on our 2022 choices for cameras, lenses and other equipment, for the photographers reading this.
2022 will, assuming all goes as plan, be another busy year for us, with 41 weddings currently in our diary. This is more than we normally aim for; however we still have a number of postponed weddings to photograph, rescheduled from 2020. We will be shooting more video than before; our “video-lite” package where we provide a basic videography service in addition to our photography has proved to be a popular option for this years couples (more details here). We also plan to continue with our popular podcast, The Sam and Steve Podcast, although we will now bring out a new episode typically every two or three weeks - don’t forget, if you are a local wedding supplier, we would love to have you on the show!
We are delighted to have once more made the finals of the Guides for Brides Customer Service Awards. This is a tremendous honour, especially as it is based on 5 star reviews on our Guides for Brides page. We were truly humbled to win this prestigious award last year, and the year before; acheiving a “hat-trick” would be a dream come true! We will know more at the awards dinner at Oxford Town Hall on March 9th.
Our 2022 Guides for Brides Customer Services Award Finalist confirmation
Our wedding season fully kicks off in late March, and at this time we are busy with pre-wedding shoots (don’t forget to book yours in) and wedding fairs. Wedding fairs are usually good sources of enquiries for us, and we typically book at least three weddings from each event.
Jack and Kate from their pre wedding shoot last month. We photograph their wedding in April 2022
Finally, looking forward into 2023, we already have a good level of bookings and active enquiries. We plan to go back to our more normal 25 to 30 weddings maximum in 2023 so if you are thinking of booking us, don’t delay to get in touch! You can do so by clicking on the button below.
Take care, peace and stay safe everyone.
Sam and Steve
