Keely & Robert
Remember covid? Remember lockdown? In some ways that feels like a lifetime ago, but then on the other hand it’s an experience that will remain with us - for both good and bad reasons. Many couples had their wedding plans ruined by it. Some of them decided to reschedule to a future date, a lot of them ended up rescheduling again and again as the restrictions changed and stopped/started. But some couples just went for it anyway, a low key intimate wedding with a few lucky guests. That’s what Keely and Rob did. They got married in a family member’s garden, in secret. How cool!
The newly married couple soon had more happy news with the arrival of their son Clay during lockdown.
Fast forward to March 2023, they invited me along to capture their wedding celebration at the Woodend Barn in Banchory.
In the morning the bride and groom parties got ready at separate villas at Inchmarlo golf course. There was a super relaxed vibe all round - of course it helps that you’ve already done the ‘getting married’ bit - so the pressure was off. And it was fantastic to meet a previous couple of mine, Lindsay and Ian. Robert was tasked with getting Clay dressed in his wedding outfit, whilst the groomsmen kept him entertained with a bubble machine (and to distract him from the staircase).
Both Keely and Robert arrived at the venue about an hour or so prior to the ceremony time, making sure things were all sorted, and awaiting the arrival of their guests. But the bus was running a wee bit behind schedule. So photographer Debbie Walker and myself decided to take the bride & groom back to Inchmarlo for a quick pre-ceremony couple shoot - we all managed squeezed into my Fiat Panda, and made it back in time before the guests started to arrive.
During the ceremony celebrant Sheila Lawtie performed a baby-naming ritual, something I’ve never seen before, to officially introduce Clay to the world.
Afterwards the guests mingled with the happy couple, and there was an ice cream vendor which went down really well.
Since this was no ordinary wedding, there was food trucks instead of the traditional three-course meal. Guests could choose between freshly-made pizza, or anything from the fish & chip van. Personally I went for a steak pie and chips - delicious! And there was a pudding table with all sorts of delightful treats - cookies, cake, bakes and more!
Local wedding legends Big Show got the evening started with their unique version of a grand march, which always gets the dance floor filled from the get go. They ended this with some confetti canons - which always make me jump! A couple of ceilidh songs followed so I chose to film these at double-framerate, allowing me to turn this footage into real slow motion in the edit.
“Thank you so so much for getting the wedding video to us so quickly. It’s absolutely amazing! We literally laughed from start to finish of the highlight video and the footage in particular of Clay is just THE BEST! We absolutely love all of the videos and loved having you there as part of our day! You are so talented at what you do and we can’t wait to start showing the videos to all our friends and family!
Thank you so much again and I hope our paths cross again soon.
Keely and Rob x “
