Some of the same considerations involved in selecting a photographer for your wedding photos also apply to choosing the right videographer. Wedding video, however, is a newer art than wedding photography, and the two forms of preserving your memories cannot really be lumped together when shopping for these professional services.
Nowadays, nearly everyone has a home video camera, and the quality of pictures they produce is quite good; better, in fact, than professional equipment could turn out just a few years ago. This has led many people to neglect the importance of using a professional videographer to record once-in-a-lifetime events. Yes, your friend Bob's nifty new handy-dandy super camcorder can turn out some pretty good-looking stuff, but if you depend on friend Bob to provide your wedding video, you are setting yourself up to be sadly disappointed.
First of all, Bob's new camera, while quite snazzy, still will not be up to the level of equipment the serious professional videographer will bring to your wedding. When shopping for video, ask the videographer to explain to you what a 3-chip camera is, and why it makes better video than a home camcorder. Also ask him about the various tape formats used by the pros...SVHS, HI8, Betacam, and get him to explain the advantages of these over standard home formats. Oh, and wouldn't it be nice to have great sound quality on your video, so you can actually hear your wedding vows, and your music? Chances are pretty good that friend Bob won't own the sophisticated wireless microphones the professional uses to record even a whisper.
Ever sat and watched Bob's 6-hour production of Little Bobby's Birthday Party? This brings us to one of the areas where the pros really excel, editing. No, editing is NOT "cutting out" or throwing away any of your wedding video. Editing is an almost magical process whereby the professional videographer refines and assembles the pictures he carefully gathered at your wedding into a polished, pleasing record of your wedding day. Every videographer has his own style, and there are as many types of wedding video available as there are videographers. Look at lots of sample videos, find the videographer with a style that pleases you, and with a personality you can be comfortable with for six or eight hours on your wedding day.
Friday
Wedding Video Tips
Capturing Your Wedding On Video
Today professional videographers have become as natural a part of the wedding as the photographer. Because your wedding day goes by so quickly, recording all of the activities on video will preserve the precious moments for you and your family to enjoy for years to come.
Unlike photographs, a video camera records sounds, action and more of the overall atmosphere of the event. Rather than focusing on just a few people like photographs, video can easily record a little bit of all of your guests.
The typical wedding video package costs anywhere between $500 and $1500, depending on the quality of the equipment, the number of hours of coverage, the number of cameras, the amount of editing, and other factors. As always, remember what's most important to you, determine what you can afford, and go from there.
Recording Your Wedding on a Tight Budget
If you don't have money in the budget for a professional videographer, you have other options. You could ask a close friend or family member with a video camera to record your wedding. Of course don't expect the same quality and coverage that you would get from a professional videographer. Remember, is an awful lot to ask friend or family member to tape the bulk of the wedding day. So, the best way to ensure that your most precious moments get recorded is to make a list. Pick out only a handful of moments that you definitely want on tape, such as the bride walking down the aisle, exchanging vows and rings during the ceremony, the best man's toast, the bride and groom's first dance, etc. Then anything extra that gets on film is a bonus, but you have the important stuff covered.
Special Touches for the Video
A nice touch for your wedding video is to have your videographer or a friend wielding a video camera pull your guests aside throughout the night to record a personal message to the bride and groom. This is something that a friend did for us at our wedding, and it was absolutely wonderful to watch. This is a lovely way to record all of your friends and family who attended your wedding and adds a personal touch to the video.
Another nice idea for the wedding video is to record a short message from the bride and groom to each other. Arrange for the videographer to meet with the bride and groom separately right before the wedding ceremony. Each can talk to the camera as if they were talking to their soon-to-be other half. These messages truly capture all of the love and emotion of the couple on their wedding day. And they are so much fun to watch after the wedding and many years down the road!
Wedding Video - Selecting a Wedding Videographer
Selecting the right wedding videographer is very important because wedding videos hold special moments from your wedding day. Just like you need to find the perfect wedding dress, it should be without question that you need a quality wedding videographer.
Now I don’t mean a wedding videographer that asks Aunt Gretchen to say a few words about her little niece Sharon who is all grown up. And I don’t mean a wedding videographer that likes to force everyone to smile in the middle of dinner time because he is always in your face with that video camera. Run from those wedding videographers.
The Right Wedding Videographer
Albert Ling of Encore Weddings, was the right videographer for me. He was unobtrusive (we hardly knew he was around), he didn’t use crazy special effects in his previous wedding videos and he had a demeanor that made it easy to feel comfortable around him. Don’t worry, the right wedding videographer for you is out there. And once you find him, hold on tight because he is an important part of your wedding budget and he (along with the wedding photographer) has your once in your lifetime moments in his hands. Make sure your wedding videographer is experienced. You wouldn’t believe how easy it is for someone to just call themselves a videographer. Do you really want to be one of their early wedding video mistakes? Albert had hundreds of video that my husband went through with him during the consultation but even though he had done so many wedding videos, our wedding video was still different from all the others.
I just popped in my wedding DVD (that’s right, I didn’t get my wedding video on VHS) in order to give you some important tips on what to look for in your wedding videographer’s portfolio. Yes, you need to see the wedding videographer’s portfolio.
The Wedding Videographer’s Portfolio
You need to make sure he hasn’t done 1,000 wedding videos that are exactly the opposite approach you want. It also matters if he clearly understands what you want from him. Can he produce that? And has he done that before? You don’t have to see all his videos but you don’t want to see a video montage of what he thinks are his best clips. You want to see what he has done from start to finish. See if the videos were steady if he uses a hand held video camera instead of a tripod. Watch for editing – do they make sense? Are you going from the wedding ceremony to the reception or from the reception decorations to the ceremony? Has he captured all of the members of the wedding party? Was he too slow and didn’t get the “here comes the bride” entrance? Where the close ups “too close up”? Are you having an outdoor wedding? What if it is windy? Does he have unobtrusive mikes for the wedding party? Or will you end up with the sound of wind on the wedding video and muted voices? You also want to be able to speak with happy clients from the wedding videos you liked the most.
One Videographer or Two? One Video Camera or Two?
For my wedding, we had one videographer with one handheld camera. Having a second camera can help obtain extra points of view which may be needed during editing and sometimes if the first camera man is unable to get a shot, the second camera will hopefully be able to pick it up. Our wedding videographer was experienced so we didn’t feel like we needed a second camera or videographer.
Wedding Video on DVD or VHS?
After watching the wedding video once, most people don’t sit through it in full many times after. They usually fast forward to parts that they like which over time wears out your wedding video. If you choose to have your wedding video on DVD, you can easily jump to the parts you want to highlight instead of having to sit through a few hours or constantly fast forward and rewind your videotape.
And speaking of wedding videos that last a few hours - please spare your friends and family. You don’t need every single moment from your wedding day on the wedding video. My wedding video is 30 minutes long. It was set up like a story book with scenes from throughout the day highlighting the wedding ceremony, my father’s speech and the cutting of the cake. The other scenes were played with one of four songs we chose.
Special Additions to Your Wedding Video
The wedding videographer will probably offer you a few additions to your package. I personally felt they were unnecessary but you may feel differently. You may include a prelude of some wedding planning, commentary about the couple from their family and friends, photo montages and video from before the couple met and special effects (slow motion and fading in and out).
Wedding Videographer Cost
You can expect to pay anywhere from $1,000 to $10,000 for your wedding video. The wedding videographer will be one of your biggest wedding budget expenses.
And now some advice that was given to me that I want to share with you.
My matron of honor gave me some advice when I was planning my wedding … even if you are on the fence about a wedding video – just get it! You may never watch it or your grandmother may be the only one that watches it but one day if you want to watch it and you don’t have a wedding video, you will feel incredibly sad about not having one to watch.
One last thing! Make sure you include your wedding videographer (and camera man) on the list for a meal at the reception or else you risk having them take an hour break so they can get some lunch/dinner. (Remember they are working straight close to 8 hours if not more! Feed them! No exceptions.)
