@Long- i don't disagree in any way with your method of working or your point that there will always be those who will pay more for the highest quality. I am not trying to persuade anyone to change their way of working or to only take bookings from the 80% who wouldn't otherwise bother. Rather I would like to raise the profile of wedding video generally so that 100% of the potential market are seriously considering it. You and others would still carry on filming for the same type of clients, but there would be less chance of Video being seen as an expensive niche market if there was more choice available across the board.

@James -documentary style doesn't mean keeping the camera still or not using imaginative shots, it is more about capturing the day as it unfolds, rather than with carefully arranged shots or manipulating situations for the camera. Personally I think that it takes as much skill and experience to capture doc style well, as it does to produce artistic and cinematic styles. Doc style tends to use less equipment and needs the videographer to be able to work very quickly and efficiently, and have the confidence and skill to know how to get the shot whatever the situation.

Roger

Hi Roger,

I understand what you mean and I am not trying to persuade anyone to change their ways either. I also don't want to start offering cheaper packages and attract budget conscious brides because I have enough work at the moment to keep doing what I do the way I enjoy it. The truth is, if most brides would value my work and pay for my service for what it's worth, I would gladly shoot any wedding. However, not everyone does and it seems like only the more fortunate ones or the ones who really care would hire me. But as long as I still have enough business, I can't complain too much.

This is a very interesting debate. And something I really need to think hard about to be honest.

Im with 'Long Truong' here wanting clients that VALUE my work for it's creativity & story because im passionate about being creative.

Problem is, if I want to make this my day job and source of primary income. I need to cater to everybody ... I have had family tell me the same also. Saying you need to consider lowering prices and offering to shoot films doc style where you simply keep the camera still. Record things as it happens and may be inbetween the moments capture one or two creative shots if possible to throw in to the mix.

I have also had family criticize my existing work saying they don't understand the value of my 'creativity' questioning why this is out of focus, or why that is out of focus. The family that have said that are my grandparents and the older folks. The younger generation love the new 'film style' craze.

I still believe the market has completely changed since pro's had access to the likes of the Canon 5D MK2 with it's large sensor. OR everybody would still be offering documentary style films.

Hi James,

I think it is important to have a clear mindset about what we wish to accomplish and where we want our business to be. If I want to offer a specific type of service and attract a specific type of clients, I want to make sure that my entire business model and marketing strategy go in the same direction.

To go back to my initial analogy, I can't open a fine dining restaurant and then offer hot dogs on my menu or have ugly decorations and dirty dishes. Everything has to make sense together for it to work. My films have to be good, my packaging needs to be nice, my website and business cards need to be well-designed and when I approach my clients I need to be confident about the value of my product and service too.

It's not about being superficial and trying to trick clients into buying my product. It's about making sure I don't confuse them and allowing them to know exactly what type of experience they are getting involved in if they ever hire me.

Now if you want to go full blown documentary like Chris Harding or Don Bloom because that's what your style is about, then by all means go for it. But make sure your brides are aware of it and know what to expect from you as well.

James,
When I did do cine style I would spend about 50 to 60 hours on the edit. Anymore than that and frankly IMO it was too ling if you figured out dollar per hour. I didn't rush it, I just knew what I wanted it to look like in my head before I started editing it. Didn't always work and then I would redo the edit before it left my hands and got to the client but in many if not most cases it worked and I never had any complaints so I guess it was OK.
Doc style, I spend about 20 hours for edit. Sometimes a bit less, but keep in mind that very little is cut from the ceremony. Full Mass Catholic ceremonys that run about an hour in real time might be 45 minutes in video time, cut the air, cut the communion of the masses (no one wants to see 200 people go up for communion). I generally have between 3.5 and 4.5 hours total footage including B camera at the ceremony and obviously a bit more when I have 3 or 4 cameras going at the ceremony. Receptions are all done with 1 camera. Have there been times I wish I had 2 or 3? Sure but by and large I have done just fine with 1.
I've done well over 60 in some years and this year (my last in weddings) I'll end up with 20. I know guys around here that would kill to do 20, for me, it's a bad bad year. Except for the fact that it was my choice to keep it at 20. I'm doing enough other work to keep the money coming in and have had about all I can take with weddings. At some point in time, everyone reaches that place and I did about 4 years ago but finally decided now is the time. I'll let the young guys take the weddings from now on. Hell, this last week alone I passed on 3 for the end of this year. I guess I'm finally serious about it! ;-)

the photographers that I know are all telling me that they are seeing fewer videos being taken at weddings

Roger

I call photographer BS. This is a way for them to claim superiority. If anything I've noticed a trend for the weddings where the couple took a short cut with photo because there are so many pseudo-photographers out there with a $600 camera.

J...but keep in mind that very little is cut from the ceremony. Full Mass Catholic ceremonys that run about an hour in real time might be 45 minutes in video time, cut the air, cut the communion of the masses (no one wants to see 200 people go up for communion). )


You say you deliver 45 minutes of video to your customers, just for a Catholic ceremonys and than the rest on top of it?

Good Lord! How long are your films?

@Craig- these are photographers that I have have regularly worked with for years, and who happily recommend me to their own clients, so I have no reason to doubt them. It's also born out by a definite drop in the number of video companies advertising and the fact that wedding shows that I attend that used to have several, now just have me. All good for me of course :-)

@James- my documentary style weddings would be similar to Don's for editing, I usually allow 3 days for a wedding, 1 to film and 2 to edit, although I have edited in one long day.

@Frank- I would agree with Don, as the majority of my Docu style weddings would be beteen 90-120 minutes.

@Long- I have no interest in your financial arragements as it is none of mine or anyone else's business, but I would be interested to know how much time you would spend in total on one of your weddings, including customer liason, filming, editing and delivering. Also how many you would typically take on in a year and what ammoun of your total income would be from weddings. Hopefully relevant questions to your style of working.

Roger

Frank,
A doc style Full Mass Catholic wedding with all the trimming generally will be in total length between 90 and 120 minutes. Most people will watch it once full thru then after that start skipping thru chapters. I usually have about 14 to 18 chapters most of which come in the reception so everything is broken down and they can get to anywhere they want easily.
While it's not the 30 minute edit I did back in the 90s and early 2000's it seems to be what the market demanded and frankly while the money per job is less than a cinematic edit, it is far easier to market, far easier to edit and far less hard on my mental state.

Roger,
we come from the same mold or is it mouldy? lol...Anyway, yep, 2 days of actual edit time although sometimes I stretch it to 2 1/2 just so I can get off the computer earlier on a particular day and I too have done it in one loooooonnnnnng day but I vowed not to do that anymore. My eyes almost fell out of my head the last time I did that but it was a wedding of a member of the armed forces and he was leaving within the week of the wedding (hmmmm, I did the same) so I did what I had to do so that the couple would have it before he left.

@Long- I have no interest in your financial arragements as it is none of mine or anyone else's business, but I would be interested to know how much time you would spend in total on one of your weddings, including customer liason, filming, editing and delivering. Also how many you would typically take on in a year and what ammoun of your total income would be from weddings. Hopefully relevant questions to your style of working.

Roger

Hi Roger,

I usually conduct at least 3 meetings with my couples. The 1st one to meet and connect with them, the 2nd one to sign the contract and the 3rd about a week before their wedding to go over the schedule and collect final payments. I would sometimes go out for a drink with them in between but those are unofficial meetings so I don't really count them as work hours.

I usually spend about 10-15h on the wedding day to cover the event.

Editing time, it depends what they pick in their package but a typical 15-30min short form film normally takes me around 30-40h to edit at my current speed but I can probably work faster if I push myself harder.

As we speak today, I can sign about 10-20 weddings a year and not have to worry about finance. My goal is to eventually raise my price high enough so I can bring it down to 5-10 and then either take it easy with the family or try to work on other non-wedding projects. But I've still got a lot of work to do before I get there.

Frank,
A doc style Full Mass Catholic wedding with all the trimming generally will be in total length between 90 and 120 minutes. Most people will watch it once full thru then after that start skipping thru chapters. I usually have about 14 to 18 chapters most of which come in the reception so everything is broken down and they can get to anywhere they want easily.

Wow - never thought that.

I don't do weddings, except for friends and family.
Having said that, I have done 2 so far - on for my brother in law and one for my girlfriends best friend - and I have no appetite to do more of them, to be honest.

The "long" versions of them are around 20 minutes (I also did condensed 5 minutes versions of them).
And that includes dressing, make-up, hair do, registry, church and the whole party.
LOL, I must sound like a heretic to you guys. But hey, whatever floats your (and their) boat. I just never thought that there is a market for that long weeding films.

.. it is far easier to market, far easier to edit and far less hard on my mental state.
.

And yeah, a 120 minute catholic ceremony would be real hard for my mental state ;-)

@Long - thanks for the info, I find it very interesting the way that people carry out their business in totally different ways to others in the same business.

@Don - strangely, the wedding that I edited in a day was for a UK soldier and his new bride, as he was flying off on a tour of duty a few days after the wedding! I needed a few day off to recover afterwards :-) i must say that I still enjoy filming weddings and have no plans to give up any time soon unless death intervenes!

Roger

Hi Roger,

I usually conduct at least 3 meetings with my couples. The 1st one to meet and connect with them, the 2nd one to sign the contract and the 3rd about a week before their wedding to go over the schedule and collect final payments. I would sometimes go out for a drink with them in between but those are unofficial meetings so I don't really count them as work hours.

I usually spend about 10-15h on the wedding day to cover the event.

Editing time, it depends what they pick in their package but a typical 15-30min short form film normally takes me around 30-40h to edit at my current speed but I can probably work faster if I push myself harder.

As we speak today, I can sign about 10-20 weddings a year and not have to worry about finance. My goal is to eventually raise my price high enough so I can bring it down to 5-10 and then either take it easy with the family or try to work on other non-wedding projects. But I've still got a lot of work to do before I get there.

I would love to work like this.

Sounds like a dream job/way of income for me.

Sadly the reality for me is. An initial consultation if they live within 100miles. Emails back & forth or telephone conversations.

Arriving on the day. Doing my bit. Providing them with the film.

No multiple consultations, no drinks inbetween and not really friends with them afterwards either, I just try to leave them very happy with what they received from me.

Frank,
Not a 120 minute ceremony. I've done ethnic weddings that have lasted that long but a typical Catholic Full Mass is about an hour. the edited version including the prep, preceremony B footage, ceremony, photo shoot, reception and highlight is no more than 120 minutes.

Roger,
I used to feel that way but the last few years have been very hard on me physically and mentally and each year I said would be my last....Ha, sure. well this year is my last for the weddings but I still enjoy shooting so I went out and found some new corporate type clients and even some new AV work (fairly easy, good money) so I'm into another chapter. At 66 years old I want to spend more time doing things I really enjoy like taking more cruises and getting back to playing golf. (I should amend that to attempting to play golf. Something I love to hate) I look at it this way. When I retire from weddings, that opens up a spot for someone else! ;-)

Don, bit off topic here, but I am also 66, having spent my life from 16 onwards until today in audio performing and production, and the last 27 years with video as well, although these days virtually all of my income is through wedding video. My wife is also a superb videographer and editor, so we can take on more than one video per day if required, or second operator. As she is also considerably younger than me, she fully intends to keep it all going even if I eventually get fed up. The way I work and the style of video, gives me the time to indulge the other things that I enjoy, such as sailplane flying, sailing and playing my music. My wife is trying to persuade me to let her do all the editing so that I can fly more, but I still enjoy the video work too much :-)

Roger

Hi Roger

I'm 66 too so it seems like it's a good age to be doing weddings...we don't stress, we have fun and we also have plenty of time for ourselves. A good balance between work time and leisure time is critical!

I wouldn't worry about thread deviation as it went way off course way back on the first page and I'm still puzzled about whether anyone actually gave a straight answer or were they too busy preparing for another bout of fisticuffs??

Seems like us oldies have developed the right formula?

Chris

Frank,
Not a 120 minute ceremony. I've done ethnic weddings that have lasted that long but a typical Catholic Full Mass is about an hour. the edited version including the prep, preceremony B footage, ceremony, photo shoot, reception and highlight is no more than 120 minutes.

Roger,
I used to feel that way but the last few years have been very hard on me physically and mentally and each year I said would be my last....Ha, sure. well this year is my last for the weddings but I still enjoy shooting so I went out and found some new corporate type clients and even some new AV work (fairly easy, good money) so I'm into another chapter. At 66 years old I want to spend more time doing things I really enjoy like taking more cruises and getting back to playing golf. (I should amend that to attempting to play golf. Something I love to hate) I look at it this way. When I retire from weddings, that opens up a spot for someone else! ;-)

Hi Don,

Actually I'm editing a Catholic Ceremony that sits at 1 hour 45 mins on my timeline from Bridal entrance to the couple leaving. I offer uncut Ceremony for Disk 2 so got to edit it all, though I'm sure the couple will prefer a cut down for the Main Video. What I did want to ask, and slightly off topic was how you're venturing into Corporate work. Something I'm looking to expand into myself, so'd appreciate any tips on how you're handling this side of your business.

Steve

Chris and Roger...between us we seem to be qualified for the "wedding videographers old peoples home"
--all we need is 3 nurses and 3 power chairs. Hook up a steadicam arm to the chair and we're off to the races! ;-)
Seriously, we've been around the block and Chris as you know I've been saying I was going to stop doing weddings a few years ago and this year really is the year. I feel good about my decision so I'm sticking to my guns on it.

STEVE.........WOW! an hour and 45 minutes for a ceremony. I think I'd stick a fork in my eye! ;-) I'm sorry but that to me is an officiant that just likes to ramble on and hear themselves talk. Maybe I'm wrong but....
Anyway as to getting back to corporate stuff, I used to do a lot of it before. This time I simply contacted about 400 different businesses mostly small to medium size, introduced myself to them via email and a snail mail piece, sent them to my site, the usual marketing kind of thing, got enough replies to make it worthwhile, did enough face to face meetings to throw around ideas and get enough information to be able to price out a promo or webamercial and from that am getting enough business to make it work. More is coming thru in the form of legacy videos. My wife and her sister started a business doing those and are hiring me to do the work.
So a little of this, a little of that, throw in a sprinkle of the other and the business is good. Plus I still do AV work for certain AV companies in the area as well as certain hotels.
Trying not to keep all my eggs in one basket...someone knocks that basket over, you have scrambled eggs!

Hi Steve,

Hope you don't mind me jumping in on your question to Don, but as I am also in the UK I thought I would add my voice even though we are a bit off topic still.

I have carried out a fair bit of corporate work over the years and still do occasionally, including Tesco, Asda, HL Foods and various other assorted companies. I spent some time sending out letters and leaflets to some of the bigger chains such as Tesco, offering my services at a local level, which yielded some results. Interestingly I have also picked up quite a lot of small corporate work just by talking to people at weddings, especially those families with members who are in business themselves.

What I have found is that once a company has used you successfully, they will come back again, often regularly. The other good area to follow up, is with PR companies, who will often be handling promotion and publicity across the board for a whole range of client businesses.

Roger

I'm 66 too so it seems like it's a good age to be doing weddings...we don't stress, we have fun and we also have plenty of time for ourselves. A good balance between work time and leisure time is critical!

I wouldn't worry about thread deviation as it went way off course way back on the first page and I'm still puzzled about whether anyone actually gave a straight answer or were they too busy preparing for another bout of fisticuffs??

Seems like us oldies have developed the right formula?

Hi Chris,

The thread didn't go way off course. The answers to the initial questions have been given time and time again through the entire discussion.

The only thing is that some people have different definition of what "quality" actually means to them. For some, having a well-composed shot with good focus and capturing the essential content is enough and for some other, it is more than that.

And then comes the question about what is actually "enough" and what is "too much". All of that will be different depending on your own expectations and what your clients expect from you.

It is clear that with all the different approach we have here, all these definitions will be different because we don't value the same thing and our clients don't either.

As Roger had said it, it's quite interesting to exchange ideas and opinions because we all have a different approach to our business. Whether you have been in the industry for XX years or not, as long as you have found a formula that works for you and makes you happy, that's all that matters. But if someone is struggling and asking for help, then we are all free to chip in and provide suggestions. It is up to that person to gather all the information and decide for themselves which ones they want to keep and which one they want to ignore.

It only gets uninteresting when people start criticizing others or try to show that their way of doing things "make more sense". Sometimes, we have to understand that what's important to us can be completely meaningless to others.

The thread didn't go way off course. The answers to the initial questions have been given time and time again through the entire discussion.


+1 :-)

Roger