This Week's Wedding Shoot

[Forever Endeavor]

The wedding I did last night had over 300 people in a church that held probably 290. And the reception was the same way. It was a decent sized hall for a group of maybe 200 but they squeezed 300 in there. What a pain! I could hardly move much less get creative shots. We'll see how it came out. The MOB basically said that she knows alot of people in town and if I did a good job she could get me alot of referrals. Not sure if that was just to get me to do my best or what but anyway...

[HankCastello]

I think I've done a wedding or two there!   :lol:

Our wedding shoot (this past Saturday) was out in a tiny, depressing, half-ghost town of a place that was forty miles from the next tiny, depressing, half-ghost town, no matter which direction you drove.

In fact, (this is the truth!) it was so depressing that after flying out from New Jersey, renting a car and driving to this place, the next day the MOH called the bride and said she couldn't stand to be in such a depressing place and left!  The wedding continued without any bridesmaids at all and only a single groomsman.

At the rehearsal, we learned that the minister was quite inexperienced with weddings and he kept asking us how things should be done, so we basically took over the rehearsal, would give the bride choices then show how it would be done that way.

The church complex had the sanctuary at one end, then a long - I mean LOOOOONG hallway leading to the reception area.  The complex took up a good-size block and the reception building was at one end of the block and the sanctuary at the other.  Since we knew that reception and ceremony would be in the same "building" we didn't bring our little cart (big mistake!).

We looked over the reception hall on rehearsal day and made arrangements to be let in at 2pm the next day so I could setup a jib and tripod there; hook up to the church sound system; shoot b-roll stuff, etc.  The ceremony was set for 4pm the next day.

Lighting was OK in the sanctuary.  Windows were small, all stained-glass, and facing north and south, so the setting sun wasn't going to be an issue.  Interior lighting was dim, but even, instead of the usual top-down harsh lights that give you racoon eyes.  Too dim for our 3-Lux FX1, but still good for the VX2100s.  Reception lighting was super.

At 2pm nobody was there but us.  At 2:30, the bride and her family arrived, but we were all locked out of the church.  Three o'clock came and went.  Finally, at ten after three, we were told they had the reception side unlocked but they couldn't find the key to the church side.

Obviously, this complicated our unloading and setup and the pressure was on!  At 3:40 I still needed to get into the balcony to tap the sound system and setup our rear camera, but nobody could find the key to the stairwell until 3:45.  You can imagine our scurry to shoot preps, find and mic people; setup tripods, etc.  Jean immediately went to cover the bride preps, leaving me to handle setup.  Somehow I found time to go down into the basement and shoot a few hurridely-staged groom preps.  There is NO WAY a single videographer could have properly setup and gotten preps in this amount of time!

The ceremony started at 4:05 (just five minutes late).  I had time to setup three cameras and tap the sound system (got into the balcony at 3:50), but not to setup a fourth camera I'd planned to frame the guests with.  Neither did I get to setup the reception jib and camera until after the ceremony.

DJ was great and allowed us to tap his sound board with our 1/4 inch adapter (he didn't have RCA outs) and to use his last accessible power outlet.  ( I told him we had another extention cord and outlet bar, if needed).

Groom's father was a pain and kept wanting me to shoot stuff that was aparently important to him, but didn't seem like a good idea to me (the vacant, parked, undecorated getaway car; his cousin from Florida (I shoot all the guests by roaming with my camera several times throughout).  I finally told him (as politely as I could, but firmly) that these things were best photographed with his own camera and that I didn't want him disturbing me or Jean anymore because we had a job to do.  That seemed to sink in finally.

Ceremony and reception were like a whirlwind and the couple exited half an hour before our time was up.  As their car drove off, Jean and I looked at each other unbelieving that it was already over.

Again, that ProAm jib did a super job with a VX2100 and wide-angle lens to cover dance floor; guests; wherever I needed it.  We kept that camera running continuously to help synch up the other two cams.  Nobody can block a camera that is eight to ten feet high and shooting wide!  Setup and break-down was a snap.  Jean set her tripod up so she'd be ninety degrees off axis from the stationary cam and I tried to stay on the far-side of her with my shoulder-mounted vx2100 to cover dancing & events.  During dancing and other times, I'd often wander among the tables shooting guests from my moving, hand-held camera.

I've got the next weekend off (as far as weddings go), our first free weekend in a long, long time, so it'll be two weeks before I post another wedding shoot.

[Forever Endeavor]

Oh yeah, you reminded me that the DJ at the wedding I did would not let me tap into his audio (I think that's a first). He didn't say why or even try. He just said no. I put a mic in front of the speaker and it worked great. The lighting was also terrible. I mean terrible. The PD 170 even had a hard time with it. It was a tough shoot. Sounds like yours was no picnic either!

I'd often wander among the tables shooting guests

I've felt like that sometimes too  :lol:

[On a Roll]

This was my second weekend off from weddings, and all in all, it was actually a really fun change from the norm.

On Friday, I went "up north" to shoot a video for a band that wants a new demo on their website. We had a great time, and the band was a really great act. They played their music well, and they were funny.

The performing venue was little more than a glorified bar, but it was really spacious, and we had a lot of room to set up. The band let us do whatever we wanted, so I got to take a lot of neat shots from the stage, and really have fun with it.

Our biggest gripe about the venue was the smoke. Minnesota lawmakers signed a public smoking ban into law effective October 1, just a hair over a half-hour from the time of posting this. So, being the last Friday that you can smoke in bars, the place was packed, and EVERYONE was smoking. Looking at the footage, you'd think we had a fog machine going! Well, aside from my grave fear for my cameras (an they got aired out and smell fine once again, thank goodness!), both my wife and I have asthma. If we were ever to smoke ourselves, it would probably kill us on the first drag. So we alternated taking turns to step outside and hack up a lung. But really, aside from that, it was a blast.

Then today, we got the contract for the St. Paul Public Library's 125th anniversary, which was also the founding date of the St. Paul Schubert Club, a close ally of the library's. Let me tell you, we had a lot of fun with this one! There were performers, book readings, presentations, a speech by the city Mayor. It was a REALLY packed day. Honestly, it was a little too packed for my taste. They often had two, and sometimes three events going on simultaneously. Well, we don't have 6 cameras, and the events moved all over, so we naturally didn't have two cameras at every event. Still, they only want a couple short clips, so I really don't need that footage except for selling it to them later for more promos, but all the same I wish we could have had at least two cameras in every room for every event. I won't complain though. There was no rehearsal the day before, the event day itself was only 4-1/2 hours (as opposed to those wonderful 12-18 hour wedding days!), and it's paying as much as a regular wedding. Plus, the gal who hired us loves our other work, and she's trying to get us in as the permanent exclusive contractor for all of the St. Paul Library's video production work. Can we say "awesome!"?

And finally, tomorrow morning I'm driving back to the Minneapolis area to shoot interior and exterior shots of a condemned house that is going to be torn down. The owners of the property, a non-profit that rebuilds bad neighborhoods, needs to document the condition of the house in case there is a dispute over it's value after the home has been demolished. It's a new experience for me personally, and I have to admit, I'm a little nervous about one aspect. I'm a big guy, and I'm not talking 190 lb. big, I mean REAL big. I don't mind walking across solid floors, but I am a hair concerned about crawling around in a house that has been deemed unfit for human occupation, and is due to be torn down in just a few days. But that's just me, I'm sure all will be fine.

All in all, it's a great weekend for me. I got my Saturday off (well, I was editing footage, but still...) and I made about as much as if I had done two weddings. That's my kind of weekend.

Next week should be interesting. I'm going to the Videomaker conference in New York (Well, Newark, but close enough), and I might even have a job while I'm there. A friend from up there is a Comedian, and he wants a video done from one of his weekend performances. That would be super neat! I'm not sure exactly what I'll wind up learning from the conference itself, but I see it as a great networking op, and if nothing else, it gives my the reason to write off a vacation to New England in the fall, supposedly a beautiful thing.

[HankCastello]

At least one of us had fun this weekend!  :-)

Jim, my contract states that we will not work in a smoke-filled environment.  We refuse to cover weddings/events where there will be smoking.

[On a Roll]

Hank-

Yeah, I have the same clause in my wedding agreement as well, but I figured for as much as these guys were paying me for two hours of work, I could take a little smoke. Of course, I forgot it was the last weekend before the smoking ban, and that all the smokers would be out enjoying the last smoke-filled bar-going weekend in Minnesota history.

On the uber bright side, I can be guaranteed that at least at my Minnesota video shoots, I'll never have to worry about smoking again.

Oh yeah, you reminded me that the DJ at the wedding I did would not let me tap into his audio (I think that's a first). He didn't say why or even try. He just said no. I put a mic in front of the speaker and it worked great.

I've only run into one DJ who said no to plugging in. I told him that I keep a list of cooperative vendors, and many of my brides use that list to help them decide who to hire. He eventually gave in, and yes, he's now on the list.  

At a wedding a few weeks ago, we had a terrible DJ. I mean, a horrid, rotten, simply awful DJ that I not only will never recommend, but I will go out of my way to ensure that nobody I work with hires him. I mean, he was sincerely the worst DJ I have ever seen.

First off, let's talk some more about smoking. He was so hooked on his nicotine death sticks that he would literally come inside, chance the CD's, and step back out to smoke for 10 minutes or more at a time. Several times throughout the night he was out there so long that his song cue rolled back over to the first disc again. There was one moment where the same two songs repeated three times before he came back in, swapped songs, and went back out to smoke.

As dinner was getting started, he was (of course) outside smoking, and the family wanted to have a prayer and say a few words. Nobody could find him (it turns out he ran out of smokes and drove to the nearest store, about 3 miles away), and so I wound up taking charge, muting his music and turning up the levels on his wireless mics so the show could get going. Of course, because of this, my camera missed the first few moments of this important part of the night. Ugh!

When he finally did show up, it was time to play the montage video we made for the couple. Normally we have our own amp & speakers for this (I don't trust DJ's as a rule-nothing personal), but this guy was insistent that we could run the sound from our laptop into his board. Big mistake on our part. He plugged our line output into his board, into a channel that he accidentally had cranked to the maximum level. When the DVD started, the audio probably would have deafened anyone within 20 feet of the speakers. Of course, I later overheard him talking to the MOH, trying to blame us for having levels that were "way too hot". Of course, at this point, everyone was tired of this guy, so she didn't take it seriously at all.

Fast forward to the dances. We actually nail the guy down for 15 minutes to do the First dance, F/D, M/S, and wedding party dances. Actually, we didn't nail him down. More like he would go start a song, run out and suck one down, and get back barely in time for the next song. Anyway, he put the CD in for the first dance, and it wouldn't read in his CD player. Now seriously, this is one of the most important events at the reception, the first dance between husband & wife. You'd think he would have checked the CD earlier.

Fortunately, by the sheer grace of the good Lord, I happened to have that song on my laptop from another event we did, and I once again plugged in and saved the day. This time, I took control of the mixing board though. No more of his deafening booms that he'll try to pawn off on me!

At this point, the couple have been standing out on the dance floor for about 2 minutes with no music, and it's getting a little awkward. Seriously, If you haven't tested the disc yet, don't call the couple to the dance floor. But that was the thing, he was trying to "get it over with" so he could go back to playing songs while he slipped off to smoke.

Once these events were over, he said "The dance floor's open everybody, come on out!" and put on a song. That was 100% of the crowd building this guy did. After the song started going, he would slip off and smoke. For the vast majority of the evening, either nobody was dancing, or it was only people in the wedding party, trying to liven things up themselves. Many times, his two songs would wind up repeating over ant over, and a few times I got tired of hearing the same set of songs back to back, and I went up and swapped songs for him, and for the sake of the crowd.

During the dollar dances, he was pretty much forced to stay up on stage, but honestly, I wish he wouldn't have. One thing I haven't mentioned yet is that his girlfriend came to the reception as well. She wasn't quite as bad about smoking as he was, but just about. Anyway, while they're playing the dollar dance songs, this guy and his girlfriend are up on the stage where the DJ gear was set up, and essentially dirty dancing...to slow dance songs!!! It was truly disgusting in so many ways. Weddings are about love, and they were essentially participating in a lust match, right there on stage, while the crowd is trying to do dollar dances.

The crowd was insanely thin by the end of our evening, and a week later I was speaking with the bride, telling her I didn't want to charge her for the last few hours, since I really didn't get any useful footage, due to the DJ. She told me she wanted to pay me anyway, because had I not been there to do his job for him, a lot of the evening would have been a whole lot worse, not to mention the fact that we saved them on their first dance.

Seriously, up until that wedding, I didn't have a list of vendors that I recommended not hiring. Now I do, and His service is number one on the list.

[Jordan Berry]

Jim,

That's a great story (i mean bad story, i mean it's a good story, about a bad situation), thanks for sharing it with us.

Now my dad is a professional DJ and he takes his job very seriously. His wife and him self basically do it full time and making a good living doing it. They have recently gotten jobs at the Kansas City Speedway (Nascar track, its huge) doing big sound systems, etc.

Well i've grown up around him, my dads handsome, he has an amazing talent of working the crowd, he has like 200,000 songs and 190,000 karaoke. And he is consistantly doing what you described in  your story. Saving the day. I don't know how many times i've seen him stall the bride and groom so the photographers could get the right shot, or basically plan the wedding because someone else missed it, it just blows me away.

Well a few weeks back my grandpa was shooting off fireworks for a wedding so i went out to the wedding with him. I started rapping with the DJ (Rapping = talking) and he was talking about his skills, and his equipment and his collection, and was basically just bragging for 30 minutes while we talked.. Eventually I was like, this is enough, i can't handle any more and sat down somewhere else.

Well it comes time for the reception, he doesn't play any music. Finally someone comes up and asks, could we have some music? So he opens up his laptop, and ... PULLS UP WINDOWS MEDIA PLAYER! Hello! My dad uses PC DJ that has advanced automatic transitioning effects, he makes hundreds of playlists based on billboard top songs, experience ect. This damn DJ was using windows media player, and it looked like he only had a few thousand songs! There was a silence between each song because it doesn't transition them, could have at least used like iTunes.. haha!

Well we got music now. So its time for the best man speech, but guess what, the mic doesn't make it the 86' to the head table. So heres the groom's brother, telling his heart (and this is true, he's crying) and it was one of the best speeches i've heard in a long time, but during the whole thing you could hear all the interference, and s**t. But he just kept going.

Now it's time for the first dance, he plays the wrong song.. One he had played earlier. The bride stops dancing, looks at him and goes "no, no, no", i want _____. Amazingly he has it and begins playing it.

We shot off fireworks and then i left, who knows what else happened.

It's amazing at the quality of work you can find, truly amazing.

[Forever Endeavor]

It amazes me how many people can be in this business when they obviously don't care and treat it like any other job. I'm in this business because I love it (as most of you are too...ok all of you) and anyone who is just here for a paycheck doesn't deserve to be.

I had a wedding a month or so back where the DJ just didn't know what he was doing and he kept making stupid mistakes. Then he kept blaming it on the equipment or someone else. The brides dad called his boss during the reception to complain. He was so thrilled that I was doing so great a job that he tipped me $100 at the end of the day. Just getting paid for this makes me smile. Getting a tip on top of it makes me giggle like a school girl  :lol: