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Wedding Movies |
A movie of your wedding will capture many great moments and allow you to relive the joy, see what your bridesmaids and guests saw, and share the experience with friends. Your wedding video will act like a time capsule, forever preserving the voices, sights and sounds of your cherished friends and family. While the majority of brides book a wedding movie as one of their top 5 most important ‘must haves’ for their wedding day, those who didn’t have a wedding movie made often claim that it is their greatest regret. We feel that both moving pictures and photographs are of equal importance.
The movie format
We shoot with Sony and Canon high-definition camcorders, and edit your movie on Apple computer workstations. The finished product is delivered on a DVD-R disk. We use the NTSC TV format (US, Canada & Caribbean) – but most recent European DVD players and TV sets can play NTSC disks without a problem. All our wedding movies are shot and produced in the modern 16:9 (widescreen) ratio for a cinematic “look”. High-definition coverage is available on request.
Sample movies
Alternative download: Beth and Craig : MPEG-4 file (31.7MB)
Alternative download: Erin & Dan's wedding : MPEG-4 file (20.2MB)
How many moviemakers?
For an intimate wedding, one cinematographer may be perfectly adequate, to give you a straightforward movie record of the ceremony. However, having two cinematographers shoot your wedding allows us to make the coverage more comprehensive and more interesting to watch, as we will be able to add multiple angles, close-ups, and reaction shots during the ceremony. It also acts as “insurance” – giving alternate coverage in case the view of the primary cinematographer happens to be blocked for some reason. Once recording has started it is not always practical for a single cinematographer to change location without disrupting the coverage. For big weddings we usually also set up an additional static camera on a tripod to provide a “wide-shot” of the whole scene whenever possible.
A talk with the bride and groom
With all except the smallest movie package, as an integral part of our coverage we like to meet with the bride and groom a day or two beore the wedding and film a short face-to-face chat with each of you. It's very relaxed and easy, and is an opportunity for us to get to know you a little, and also to record your thoughts about the wedding, what's happening, maybe even find out how you met, hear a little of your thoughts about each other and so on. It's totally optional, and you set the tone for what we talk about, but typically it allows us to add a really personal touch to your wedding movie. And having your own voices on the film makes it even more valuable for your children and grandchildren in years to come as a record of your special day. We used this technique in the sample movie above. It is optional, but since it makes such a big difference to the final piece we strongly encourage our couples to set aside some time for this - usually 30-40 minutes is sufficient. We'll usually arrange a convenient time the day before the wedding.
How long is the finished movie?
It varies - but typically we make a tightly-edited piece that runs under ten minutes. As you can see from the sample above, we don't shoot the traditional "wedding video"! Our "highlights" piece is much more watchable than a forty minute old-style video that plods through the day in strict sequence and laborious detail.
So what happens to the rest of the footage?
We add them to the DVD as "extras" - so when you feel like it you can watch the whole ceremony, or listen to the toasts and speeches, whenever you want to.
Video and photography by guests
We are happy for your guests to photograph or shoot video of your wedding day as events unfold. However, we would ask that they give us priority and space to work in order to effectively capture those important and unrepeatable moments on your behalf.
Movie sound
Since we are usually filming outdoors, we cannot always guarantee perfect sound. For the ceremony, we will normally ask the groom to wear a small unobtrusive lapel radio microphone, and we usually have one on the minister as well. This arrangement helps to obtain a clear recording of the ceremony itself. If you plan to have other people apart from the bride, groom and minister taking part in your ceremony – for example relatives or friends giving readings, prayers or songs – please let us know so that we can plan the audio and picture coverage of their contributions. The rest of the movie will be set to music, or use a voice-over. If you are having reception movie coverage and expect there to be speeches, please give us details ahead of time so that we can be ready and place lights or microphones accordingly.
Shooting after dark
Most weddings here in Turks and Caicos take place in the hour before sunset. This is a more comfortable time of day for everybody, and often there is a warm romantic quality to the light which looks great on the movie. However, once the sun dips below the horizon it gets dark very quickly! We use cameras that are capable of shooting in very low light, but bear in mind that some footage taken after dark may be grainier and less clear than that taken in daylight.
Movie lights
Depending on the location, we may be able to bring compact movie lights to your reception or rehearsal dinner to help improve the quality of footage of speeches, cake cutting, or dancing. For best results, we need to use mains-powered lights on stands. We will only turn these on while we are shooting, but bear in mind they are quite bright and will change the ambience of your reception. We can use smaller camera-mounted lights but these are a litle more intrusive and produce a harder light. Without secondary lighting however, reception footage will be dark and grainy as the typical subdued lighting in a restaurant or ballroom is insufficient for clear results, even with modern cameras.
Please consider the above points carefully. We don’t want to spoil the atmosphere of your wedding day but we do want you to have great movie! If you have any questions or special requests, please ask.
