This was a military wedding on a U.S. Army base, held in a small chapel and officiated by the Army Chaplain. It was the first time I'd ever heard words like "bastard" utterred by an officiant during a wedding ceremony! (And we thought that sailors were the rough language kings!)

But don't get the wrong idea, these were the nicest, most polite people and the reception was fun, yet dignified. I left feeling even more proud of our military officers than ever. But I'm getting ahead of myself..

During the rehearsal, we saw that the confines of the small chapel coupled with the large pillars, would present problems. Toss in a soloist, tall groomsmen, three photographers, pianist, unknown floral arrangements/locations and we knew we would want to arrive early the next day.

The ceremony was to start at 5:30...no, make that 17:30 hours! The bridal preps were to start at 15:30 hours. We decided we wanted to get to the chapel a little after two (14:00), but first we had to check out the reception venue and setup our camera crane. That would mean getting on base just before 13:00hrs, so we started looking for a place to eat lunch around noon.

Nothing but fast food "restaurants". Not even our Tom-Tom could find a decent restaurant. The tiny IHOP was packed and the line over-flowed into the parking lot. The staff was so disorganized that some people had been waiting for twenty minutes and still weren't even on the waiting list.

By twelve-thirty, I was ready to settle for fast food. We decided we'd get chicken but eat picnic-style on base after setting up the camera crane, since we'd seen numerous picturesque spots with picnic tables the day before.

The reception venue was also on the base and also on the small side. Tables were crowded close together but we found a good, clear spot for our camera crane and got it setup. Since the room was already decorated and the cake was already on display, Jean got some setup shots while I put the jib together.

Afterward, we found a great spot for lunch with a picnic table shaded by trees, next to a bird sanctuary area and with squirrels playing all around. I'd barely finished my first piece of chicken when we noticed tiny black ants climbing up our food containers. We retreated to eat lunch in our cramped, compact car. A car of three people dressed in black stopped and asked if we knew where a certain building was. I figured them for the photogs and momentarily thought of sending them about thirty miles away. :-)

That would have provoked my wife to give me a sharp elbow in the ribs, so I gave the correct directions and owned up to being the videographers for the occasion. They were back in a few minutes pumping us for more info about the ceremony.

I told them about the sabre ceremony. It was not only news to them, but they'd never seen one before. This one was occurring after the ceremony and before the second photo session, but usually they are after the photos, as the couple exits the chapel heading for the reception. The guard forms two lines and holds their swords overhead, making an arch. As the couple walks through the arch, two swords in front are lowered to block their progress and the couple has to kiss before the swords are lifted again. As the couple leave the arch, the head swordsman whacks the bride on the rear with his sabre, saying "Welcome to the Army, Mrs. Smith!". There are minor variations, but basically the same thing is done by the Navy, Air Force, Marines, etc.

As I advised the photogs to keep someone in the rear to get the shot of the "whack" as the bride turns toward the guardsman delivering the stroke (they always do, and with quite an expression!) and the bride's expression, I could see the disbelief in their eyes. "This old fart is trying to throw us a curve!" - was what they seemed to be thinking. Oh well, I did my best.

We got external shots of both reception building and chapel. We unpacked at the chapel, but it was locked up with the chaplain nowhere to be found. He didn't appear until quarter to four! When the doors finally opened, Jean went right to work shooting the bridal preps and I setup stationary cameras and microphones. Afterward, I went into the room holding the groom and groomsmen and got some prep shots.

As I miked the officiant, I reminded him of camera #5 and that he was to stay to one side during the processional. He complained about wearing the mic, saying he'd gained fifteen pounds since he bought his dress blues and no longer had a spare inch for anything on the waistband. He was a captain, so I told him I outranked him and he would wear the transmitter. He knew that I'd once been stationed at the same fort, so he asked what my rank was. Although I'd gotten a lot of pressure to go to OCS when I was in the military, I refused because it would add several months to the time I would spend in the service, so I served my entire two years (once out of training) as acting tech supply sergeant. I answered that I outranked him not by my old military rank but as a tax-paying citizen. He laughed and wore the transmitter.

I'd placed a mic on the organ, aimed at the speakers in the wall behind it. Its receiver was on camera #5 which also had a shotgun mic as backup to all the audio. The two were fed into the camera via a Beachtek adapter.

Camera #1 (the one manned by Jean) had the officiant's receiver and the father of the bride, which in this case was actually the bride's mother, so she also used a Beachtek. My camera (#2) had the groom's receiver. The soloist and pianist were covered with two Shure microphones, each on a mic stand and fed by XLR cables into our Marantz digital recorder.

As the ceremony began, I was shoulder-mounted and shot over the shoulder of one of the photographers. As the bride arrived at the front, I moved back to my tripod by the second pillar (after first looking across the room to be sure that Jean was covering). Everything went smoothly. Each tiem the soloist sang, I would look over at Jean to see whether she was shooting the soloist. We usually try to get the song's begining; the begining of each chorus and the song's end with close-ups of the singer. Since we knew there would be photogs everywhere, we couldn't decide ahead of time who would cover the soloist, so we played it by ear. I could see that the photographer in front of Jean blocked her view of the soloist, so I covered her.

I shot from my tripod through the ring ceremony and the Unity Candle, then went back to shoulder-mount to cover the recessional (since there would be a photog blocking camera #4 at that point) and to move outside afterward for the sabre ceremony.

I learned just before the ceremony that the groom's mother had ordered a "surprise" horse-drawn carriage for the trip from the chapel to the reception. (There are always 'surprises'!). After getting the sabre ceremony (Jean covering the rear and I'm in front, having threatened the photogs not to ever block my camera), I hurriedly packed up, making sure to get the gear near the altar first so it wouldn't mar the photog's shots at the photo session.

Jean covered the photo session until I was ready to leave, then we raced to the reception. She carried her gear bag and the digital recorder case up the narrow, winding stairway to the reception room (no elevators), then setup her tripod downstairs, out front to shoot the arrival of the carriage.

I carried my gear bag, tripod and mic stand upstairs and went to work. First, I changed tapes and put a wide-angle lens on camera #3 and mounted it (via quick-mounts) to the jib. I hoisted the jib, framed and focused the shot, started recording and locked it down.

Next, I introduced myself to the DJ, got permission to plug my digital recorder into is power outlet bar and setup a mic stand in front of one of his loud speakers. The mic connected to the digital recorder via an XLR cable. One of my presets is mp3 44.1k input: mic, and this is the one I used throughout the wedding shoot.

Finally, I mounted my camera (#2) to the shoulder mount and was about to add the mounting tree that would allow me to have both a shotgun mic and on-camera light, but I could hear Jean telling me (on our Motorola communication radios) that the couple had arrived and were coming up the stairs. I dashed to a position to cover the entrance, and after things had settled down, I returned to where our gear was stashed (in a back corner next to the camera crane) to mount my shotgun and light.

The toasts weren't supposed to start until after the couple had gone around and greeted everyone. Jean would cover some of that. But as I fumbled for the right cable to connect my XLR shotgun to my camera's mini-plug input, I heard the toast begin. I knew they were going to open the first champaign bottle with a slash of a sword but there was no way I could wend through the crowded tables and get there in time to shoot it. I told Jean (via radios) to get as close a shot as she could.

Turns out, she had three photog all get in front of her at once and she had to quickly pull out and shoot from a further-out side angle. She said she got the shot, but it was from much further back and from the side, than her original position would have allowed. (That's where having one camera on a shoulder-mount comes in handy - you can get around those last-minute guests or photogs who block you.)

Everything else went fine. I followed the best man and a groomsman outside to shoot them "decorating" the getaway car. It was raining by now, and I'd put my rain cover on the camera.

Later, we shot dancing, karaoke, garter and bouquet toss and finally, the exit where again, I needed the rain cover. Jean shot the exit from under an awning, while I worked my way around the car.

This was a very well-mannered reception, so much so that I'd thought perhaps they weren't drinking much, but while loading our gear back into the car, we saw several soldiers swaying, making their way precariously down the winding, narrow stairway.

Our time was up at 9:30, but we were shooting until 9:45. It was ten-thirty before we left. To help stay alert on the 200+ mile drive home, Jean read from a new book about sailing we'd bought. Learned a lot of new words - leech, roach, tack, clew, head, foot, alee, weather-side, close-haul, broad reach, etc. Now if we can just find time to get to our slip and sail our new twnety-five foot sailboat!

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Copyright (C) 2007 Alain Georgette / Copyright (C) 2006 Frantisek Hliva. All rights reserved.