ABOUT ME

Hi there, I'm Jeff Ascough and a warm welcome to my blog.

This is the bit where I tell you a little bit about me. Those that know me will tell you that I'm quite shy and retiring :)) Ok so that's not strictly true - but talking about myself doesn't come as easy to me as it does to others in this profession, so please bear with me!!

So where do I start? Well, I was born on Christmas Day in 1967 in Bristol. Throughout my childhood I spent quite a few years moving from place to place as my Dad moved a lot with his career. I lived in Cambridgeshire, Cheshire, Lincolnshire, Staffordshire and eventually Leicestershire where I spent my teenage years.

School was ok, and I left education with 11 'O' Levels, and three 'A' Levels. Throughout school I was always better at the 'creative' subjects - and I suppose all through my life I wanted to find an avenue to express myself. Initially, and like many young guys, I wanted to be a pro musician. I played guitar in a number of 'Indie' bands, but after a while with no prospect of getting that elusive recording contract :) I spent a year working for a couple of high street stores while I pondered my next move, which was looking more and more like a University degree in Psychology. Around about the same time, my Dad started up a photography business and asked if I wanted to join. Let's just say I never did go to University!!

In 1989, I met my wife Sarah while I was playing in a band at a gig in Derby. In 1994 we married and I started my own business in Derby, where we stayed for nearly 14 years. November 1998, saw the birth of my daughter which was truly a life changing moment, and we acquired a manic Basset Hound called Jess in 2000, which wasn't one of my better ideas (Basset owners will know exactly what I mean!).

In July 2008 we moved our home and business lock, stock, and barrel 125 miles to the North West coast. We now live in the beautiful coastal town of Lytham in Lancashire, a place that has always been dear to our hearts (we even honeymooned here all those years ago).

Outside of photography (which is really my whole life), I'm a passionate Wigan Warriors Rugby League fan. I have been for nearly 25 years since the day my uncle took me to a Rugby League match as a teenager. I'm also a huge Manchester United fan, which is probably a product of being an impressionable young lad living in Cheshire!! I love cooking, and watching movies (mainly action and sci-fi stuff - I can't be doing with 'intellectual' movies!!) and I adore my music - currently The KIllers, Editors, Bloc Party, Doves, Joy Division, Radiohead, Muse, that sort of thing.

However, my biggest passion in life is photography. Not just any photography, but one specific genre - documentary photography. I truly believe that photography has the power to change our lives, and the lives of others. I also believe that photography should be about capturing the moment, not making it. This passion for documentary photography, and in particular the work of Henri Cartier-Bresson, Sebastiao Salgado, and James Nachtwey, changed the course of my career some ten years ago, when I decided to look at the wedding day as an event to be documented sympathetically, artistically, and unobtrusively.

Over the course of my career I've shot well over 1000 weddings, and my work has received global recognition which I'm truly proud of. My career hghlights include being named as one of the ten best wedding photographers in the world by American Photo Magazine; being the first ever British wedding photographer to be featured in The Washington Post; featuring in the 'Masters of Wedding Photography' documentary as one of the five top photographers in the world; and being invited to join the Canon 'Ambassadors' program as their first wedding photographer.

As a wedding photographer, I've been to some wonderful places, photographed some fantastic people, and have been blessed with a great business. The passion for my work is as strong as it was nearly twenty years ago, and through the pages of this blog I hope to share some of that passion with you.

Enjoy!!

Jeff