Wedding Video Ideas

April 21st, 2009

When planning a wedding, there are a number of things that you and your partner must decide on when planning your wedding video. The first and probably most important of theses decisions is whether or not you want video coverage at all, and if you do, will it be DIY (do it yourself), or will you hire a professional. To most couples, video coverage is quite essential. You and your partner will want to remember the day you had your matrimonial union in vivid detail. Looking for a good camera person is another decision you have to make before the wedding day as well. Weeks before the wedding if you can.

Planning Your Wedding Video

You may want to hire a professional that has been in the trade for quite some time, or a college student that is eager to take his or her skills to the field. you may hire a company that deals with video coverage and photography or tell a friend to shoot the video for them. It is entirely up to them to decide on what is most appealing to them. Whatever you decide on, you should ensure that the camera person follows your instructions on the approach the video should take, since this activity can only be done once. It is up to you and your partner to decide to do it free form, documentary style, formal, informal, by the book or off the wall.

You need to plan out the day anyway, and this info will help create the video plan too, so a script for the entire wedding video can be created.  Normally, This plan will be like a movie script for the whole day, with special instructions for each aspect of the formal and informal activities that take place. For instance, you could begin with the pre-ceremony footage, sometimes called “Love Story”, which explains how you met and fell in love. 15 to 30 minute footage will be a good length for this wedding movie.

Shooting of the day can start at the brides and/or grooms location early in the m

On the day of the wedding, you and your partner, depending on your ideas, may want to have shots of the setting of the wedding. The musicians entertaining as the guests arrive, the catering people setting up the place if it is a garden wedding the vicar or priest or the official conducting the service while preparing for the ceremony and also the preparations of both the bride and groom where the camera person has full access to bring out the pre-wedding jitters. It is wise to cover the whole ceremony as it progresses. That is why it is emphasized for a wedding to have more than one camera for full coverage.

You also need to coordinate with the minister that will be doing the marrying. The minister will tell you the rules and procedures regarding the intrusion of cameras and microphones etc. The safest thing to do is pin a lapel mic on each participant, or an arrangement of shotgun microphones, or a combination. Video is only as good as its sound track, especially during the ceremony. Bad audio = bad video.

Wedding Reception Videos

During the reception, one could ask the videographer to plug directly into the wedding DJ’s sound system so that sound can be outputted in good quality exactly how it was during the ceremony. Another great way to get the music is to use a wireless microphone near the speaker and even a second for the room. Let the wedding videographer participate in the whole process. the videographer can dance with the croud, interact and enhance the event. Play with it. It’s those precious few classic shots that will make anyone re-enjoy the day again and again whenever they see the footage. A good DJ can work with the videographer to help them keep in step and in gear.

Extra wedding cameras

Even if you hire someone to take care of the video, you can still have other friends or volunteers shoot footage.

1. You can pass an iphone around to each table and let them all make a small personal video congratulations.
2. Ask your friends and family if they would like to perform something special at the wedding like a song and dance, a recital, a speech, a riddle, a skit to mention a few ideas. Tell them you will have a little area set aside in the building where they video can be shot in, and arrange for someone to run the camera. Keep it short, 2 hours at the most, if you are using a volunteer. If you are dealing with a hired wedding video service company, your budget can help balance that decision in terms of extra hours.
3. Have someone available with a camera available to the guests in the room to request to be videotaped for posterity any time they need to record an event. You can rent a camera and entrust it to someone NOT in the bridal party, to keep their eye on it and pass it around or shoot on request. This is a great activity for the outgoing camera person that enjoys meeting so many new people in one night.
4. Make sure you have microphones that plug into the camera for personal interviews in the noisy environment, and make sure the camera person has good headphones on to monitor the sound recording. (to make sure it is even on) You can easily rent these microphones for 10 dollars a day. (even wireless) Your videographer should take care of the details and logistics.

After the wedding

If you and your partner are planning to have honeymoon footage, you can ask for it to be added to the whole footage as a highlight reel. And when the work is done, do not insist on a lot of effects. A good flow is good as it portrays real time events nicely. Insist that the cameraperson makes a copy of the whole event raw; unedited. It is a good idea as it helps to see all the parts that were edited out. A paid camera person or wedding videography company for that matter, is supposed to follow the above things as they are being paid to make sure the wedding video is their highest priority.