Continue exploring my photography by area and venue, or go straight to my wedding portfolio or photography blog.
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London Wedding Photographer
I’m Allister Freeman, a professional London wedding photographer with almost two decades of experience covering weddings
in a natural and relaxed style across the city and various boroughs
I’ve naturally experienced the rich tapestry of cultures and faiths this incredible place has to offer, creating a portfolio featuring wedding at all kinds of interesting locations across the beautifully diverse city of London; photographing everything from uber-luxury weddings in Westminster and Kensington, to more traditional affairs in Fulham, Islington and Greenwich, to the downright quirky in East London’s Brick Lane!
I love being a London wedding photographer. It’s chaotic, but in the best sense; a real melting pot of cultures, faiths, languages, origins, tastes and views. No two stops or boroughs are the same.
The big smoke, The City, The Capital. However you know it, however close, there's no place like London for diversity…
All of the hidden treasures, secret spots, and world-famous landmarks that London is known and admired for. There’s something for every bride and groom planning their special day in this beautiful city - from traditional and religious ceremonies to large inner-city luxury weddings - right through to the wacky, weird and wonderful.
Natural London wedding photographer
I’ve been a professional wedding photographer in London and the UK, as well as destination weddings, since 2004, capturing the day for hundreds of couples across the city, North, West, South and Greater London, as well as the UK and internationally each year since; my wedding photography style has developed into a distinct form of honest and natural wedding photography.
Unlike a lot of wedding photographers in the UK, I will never ask you to pose, dance, twirl, jump or otherwise play up or act in front of the camera. My aim will always be for you to focus on relaxing and enjoying your wedding day, leaving me to create timeless and authentic images.
Personally, I use small cameras and relatively wide-angle lenses, all of my photography is captured in an exceptionally unobtrusive and quiet manner.
I always apply this approach as a wedding photographer, it not only allows me to work exceptionally closely to wedding guests over the course of the day, but I can do so very discreetly.
Learn more about my approach
My London wedding photography is shot using mostly available light, in fact, I try to avoid using artificial light where possible, from a flash for instance.
As a photographer, this allows me to faithfully record the atmosphere of a wedding, event or occasion. It also gives my reportage photography style a strong and consistent look, wherever the wedding or portrait shoot takes place.
It's not just about cameras and lenses, the body language a wedding photographer uses is also exceptionally important. A combination of these elements, plus years of experience photographing hundreds of weddings in London and further afield, means that I look and act similar to a wedding guest. As such, real wedding guests tend to ignore me!
This minimalistic approach as a London wedding photographer gives my images a particularly personal and intimate feel. My priority is always to depict the mood in a believable way - honest and authentic moments, devoid of awkward, forced smiles.
These natural wedding photos stand the test of time and will be an amazing record to look back on in many years to come.
Looking for good London wedding venues?
Though you’ll find many of the best, luxury wedding venues based in London, the city does have the advantage of being home to hundreds and hundreds of hotels and on a spectrum of prices.
Those looking for a big, luxurious and grand gesture should head to The Landmark Hotel, with its 11 banquet rooms, ornate high ceilings, grand pianos and breath-taking colonial-style reception courtyard. Every room in this lavish London hotel stuns more than the last, it’s every London wedding photographer’s dream!
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Celebrating your love doesn’t have to come at a high cost though, there are some truly gorgeous options right in the heart of the capital waiting to be found – the luxury Hilton at London Bridge, for example, or Belair House in Dulwich - a stunning Georgian manor in East London with ample outdoor space for wedding receptions and the potential for some truly magnificent wedding photos.
The beauty of planning a wedding in London is that there’s just so much room to think outside the box. Those who know London will know about the lush green utopia of nature to explore at The Barbican, also in East London, and be pleased to know that you can actually hold your wedding within its inspirational conservatory.
Create some particularly quirky natural wedding photography in London amidst one of the country’s best oasis of tropical plants, right in the heart of the city! Alternatively, instead of escaping to the jungle, immerse yourself in urban life and say your vows at The Banking Hall, underneath white marble columns
Look through some of the best, most extravagant, luxurious, somewhat corporate, even downright quirky London wedding venues I’ve had the pleasure of photographing at in the picture galleries below. If you’d like to enquire into me being your London wedding photographer, simply get in touch to discuss pricing and availability.
Look through more London wedding photos at venues across the city or view my wedding portfolio.
Documentary London Wedding Photographer
A documentary style wedding photographer is often referred to as ‘reportage wedding photographer’ or 'wedding photojournalist' however essentially, they all refer to the same thing - an observational and unobtrusive approach to photographing a wedding.
Put simply, each London wedding I document with the same ‘hands-off’ photo style, allowing you to completely enjoy what will no doubt be one of the most important days in your whole life.
Finding the right London documentary wedding photographer is an exceptionally important task, and there are hundreds in London!
A professional wedding photographers best and most practised ability is to be exceptionally discreet during weddings. This enables them to create very candid wedding photographs that authentically encapsulate the wedding day. With this in mind, it’s incredibly important to do your research, my blog is crammed full of useful articles, London wedding stories and customer reviews, so be sure to utilise it…documentary style
Weddings are an absolute gold mine for the discerning documentary wedding photographer - the variety of emotions over the course of the day makes a wedding day really quite unique - the pre-wedding ceremony nerves and then the joy of being married, this is often followed by a touch of sadness when, perhaps during the speeches, absent family and friends are reflected upon, then wrapping things up with the high energy and elation of dancing and entertainment.
"My natural and unobtrusive style captures the essence of an event without the need for posing. I don't believe in photographic fads and recognise the value in timeless, elegant and authentic documentary wedding photography, where each frame tells a story"
Natural approach to London weddings
The documentary approach I apply when commissioned as a London wedding photographer aims to capture very genuine moments naturally occurring throughout a wedding.
What's more, if this more natural, documentary wedding approach has been truly mastered, the style of wedding photography collections and individual pictures will convey subject and scene honestly and with authenticity.
For me, the aforementioned values far outweigh any qualities that, perhaps, a pretty but relatively meaningless portrait could.
Weddings really lend themselves to my particularly natural style of wedding photography - from striking black and white images of the beautiful and historic London city architecture to natural images capturing the busy boroughs and bustling streets.
“My husband and I are not good with the posing aspect of photography and needed to heavily rely on Allister to capture the priceless moments of our wedding day.
Allister has an amazing ability to blend in and we were largely unaware of his presence. Allister is at his best when left to capture photojournalistic photographs and it’s these that we shall treasure most.” Anne Marie and Andrew Bostock.
There’s always the potential to make incredibly engaging pictures when working as a London wedding photographer; strong narrative and context at their core, this is especially powerful for wedding album design.
Read more on my documentary wedding photography.
Put simply, documentary wedding photography is the art of storytelling through photos. By opting for this style, your wedding photographer won’t be dictating or directing during your London wedding, but rather capturing genuine moments as they naturally occur throughout the day – nothing forced - just authentic and honest wedding photographs.
My years of experience as a London wedding photographer have taught me there's a story to be told around every corner and through every little alley of England’s amazing capital.
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London Reportage Wedding Photographer
Reportage wedding photography is simply another phrase you may come across when researching for your London wedding photographer, as with the term ‘documentary’, it’s one of several terms photographers use to describe the same fundamental photographic approach to weddings - one that doesn’t dictate or direct.
“Reportage is a technique that tells a story entirely through observational pictures.
This discreet and natural wedding photo style allows me to create a sincere, faithful and timeless record of your wedding day that you will treasure for many years to come.”
Reportage wedding photographers focus on the natural emotion and excitement of the wedding day to depict the true essence of a wedding; the personalities, atmosphere, the key stages and all of the beautiful little moments in-between. Look through more natural wedding work in my photography portfolio.
It’s touching to know so many brides and grooms place such responsibility in my hands, it’s a very real and genuine honour to earn my living, frequently working as a London wedding photographer, making particularly personal collections of images that I know will become family heirlooms in years to come.
I’m immensely proud to have been hired to photograph such personal moments. This isn’t just photography of a wedding, or at least as most people know it, this is reportage of life - powerful, emotional wedding photography; images of those little things that often go unnoticed, those subtle emotions and nuances unique to each wedding, to each family and to every couple.
The simplicity of reportage wedding photographs can belie the skills required of a wedding photographer; skills that include perfect timing, intuitive placement and sympathetic awareness of the subtlest of interactions between bride, groom or wedding guests.
This type of coverage is highly relevant and incredibly personal. Its images are full of context and emphasise the environment around a subject rather than a simple headshot, which will unquestionably take a customer back to a particular moment with total clarity. The end result is a timeless and highly significant body of work that has a strong emotional impact on your clients.
With the correct people skills, you don't need to sneak up or hide from people in order to ‘steal shots’, it really is possible to be accepted as the photographer at the wedding, even by the camera-shy and aware.
However, first, you must develop the ability to instantly give people complete faith in your abilities. A good social, reportage, documentary or photojournalist wedding photographer will first and foremost have excellent people skills, an asset that is too regularly overlooked in the wedding photography business.
When employed by a competent photographer these people skills allow them to develop a positive rapport with a subject and to seamlessly become part of and identify with, very personal and often private moments.
The camera and lens is a means to an end. A tool that is at best a passport into a situation and at worst a disruptive influence that can spoil a once in a lifetime moment. For instance, the familiarity I'm able to achieve by approaching a wedding like a guest allows me to make very intimate and honest photographs.
True reportage wedding photography is so much more than just a pretty picture. I fully appreciate those aesthetics come into play, such as the undefinable instant wow factor an image may have. However, that only lasts so long. Images need to have more to them, they need to provoke an interpretation or an emotional connection if they are to stand the test of time - something that I strongly believe many, mainstream London wedding photographers fail to achieve.
A skilled natural-style wedding photographer is one that you shouldn’t notice too much and yet has the competence to spend the entire day in the thick of the action photographing uninhibited interactions between family and friends. Importantly, a photographer should have no impact on the atmosphere or flow of the day itself.
It’s a focus on storytelling, on creating a faithful and elegant reportage coverage of the most important day of your life. The most professional of wedding photographers will capture moments and stories that you didn’t see on the day and tell a story that you may have been too preoccupied to see unfolding around you.
Other than the odd, pre-planned traditional family group photo, I typically spend 95% of the wedding day photographing real and meaningful moments between family and friends. Weddings are full of these beautiful and often fleeting moments - elements that depict the true essence of a wedding day.