Streaming for modern weddings and their social media crowd

Chris Harding · February 16th, 2017, 12:02 AM

Hi Pete

With over 2000 weddings under my belt I'm well aware of the logistics of a wedding. Our main cameras have wifi encoders so I can move within a 100' radius if needed to cover shots. The last time I heard most wedding videographers have plenty of unmanned cameras at ceremonies. We only use static cameras for things like speeches and such. Yes you can have situations where there is no reception but we also record to card the conventional way and do the couple a delayed broadcast if needed. We can still live mix and record the edited footage directly to the computer even if we don't have broadcast reception. Most venues will give us between 20 - 30 mbps upload which is plenty.

The USA is obviously a different market but here every pimple faced kid owns a DSLR discount house camera and claims to be a wedding videographer! I don't like competing in that market at all!!

Pete Cofrancesco · February 16th, 2017, 08:24 AM

Sounds like you've mastered that method and works for you. I guess we all have our different views on things and that's not a bad thing.

Chris Harding · February 16th, 2017, 07:28 PM

Admiitedly I do like technology and being able to mix multi cameras at receptions is fun ..however technology doesn't sell weddings! The reason to go to a more cost effective shooting method was purely to contend with our local market ... One has to be sensible and I often wonder if wedding videographers actually cost out a wedding? Hell, I feel I'm worth $100 an hour and if you take a 12 hour wedding, 30 hours of post and media creation plus travel costs/consultations etc etc you really need to charge at least $4500 for a wedding to make your hourly rate, yet I see local yokels offer "all day weddings with 2 shooters and extensive post edit promises for a third of that price or even less! Yes there are brides with $40K budgets around but they are few and far between and certainly not enough to keep the huge number of advertised videographers with food on the table so one must assume they are doing it for beer money.

Apart from having a fair amount of overseas people getting married on our sunny beaches we also have a massive amount of simple weddings here .... a dozen guests, wedding in a park or beach and it's all done and dusted!! Those sort of people want memories but not a Hollywood style production so a live feed works really well in these cases. You have to remember that marriage celebrants here are allowed to do ceremonies anywhere! so you can get married all up for as little as $300 and a lot of couples do just that!

Noa Put · February 17th, 2017, 02:05 AM

You seem to keep comparing your market which is quite unique with every else in the world, it doesn't work like that. Move to where I live and set up your streaming business for weddings and you'd be begging for a regular wedding within a year because hardly no-one will book you and that's in a country where you would have no competition. There is just no interest here for that kind of business where I live to make a decent living out of it.

If weddingvideo would be my only source of income I would include photography and probably do 80% photo and 20% video, photographers here can charge more, work less hours in total and have a more easy day the day of the wedding.

Chris Harding · February 17th, 2017, 04:09 AM

All areas are unique Noa with different market requirements.You have obviously researched the market with a view to doing live weddings and have had a poor response and discovered that it doesn't work in Belgium?

It works here and that's fine with me. I'm comparing MY market right here and nowhere else simply to justify the comments that are put there saying "I don't see anyone paying for this service" Well, they do and celebrants too are very enthusiastic about the concept.

Whatever works for you in your market is the area you need to follow. I just prefer the comment from Giroud "Personnaly , i avoid the "shoot first , edit after" and try to do everything "live" because it cut the work almost in half"

Please realise that I'm not suggesting for one minute that everyone throw out what they have done for countless years and take up the live broadcast approach ..I just telling you why I decided on it.

Noa Put · February 17th, 2017, 05:52 AM

I have yet to encounter a weddingvideographer where I live that is offering live wedding streams, there is no reason to do so and for who? For those 6 guests that are not able to make it? My country is 2 hours drive border to border so distance is not a reason not to attend, we don't have have tropical beaches that attract worldwide brides to have their wedding and those who come from abroad want a creative film of the entire day, not a cctv recording of their ceremony and they are willing to pay for it. There are also plenty weekend warriors that work for so low prices that it would just be a small extra cost to have the entire day filmed.

I only know of Turkisch weddings that sometimes do live streams but that market is dominated by Turkish videographers or they do it by themselves probably with a smartphone based on the very poor resolution of such a recording that I have seen. They only care about the dancing part to be livestreamed and don't expect decent payment for those kind of recordings.

Pete Cofrancesco · February 17th, 2017, 06:53 AM

I agree with Noa streaming/live mixing isn't in demand for normal areas. Sounds like you live in a tourist destination where its common for people to want to stream their wedding back home to friends and family who couldn't afford to fly out to your location. So if people are requesting and paying sufficiently for it then good for you. Where I am I could see offering streaming as an add on to attract more clients but for myself like I said wouldn't want to offer anything that makes more work for myself.

If the whole live editing/streaming works for you that's great. Sometimes the best thing you can do in business is find a niche and offer something that no one else is.

What you said about having to complete against people willing to work for peanuts has been a reality of the business ever since inexpensive cameras became available.

Chris Harding · February 17th, 2017, 07:31 AM

Aha - Pete you get it!!

Nope not a tourist area at all but hugely multi-cultural ... We have people here with lots of family in New Zealand, UK immigrants with parents and grand parents in the UK and yes even couples with family in the USA as well as South Africa. Australia seems to be "the place to go" if you leave your home country

and yes a niche market is always a good idea for any business. It's tough being a new plumber when there are already 300 in your area

Just because one format of business wouldn't work in your area doesn't mean it's a bad idea .. it's just a bad idea for where you live.

So far in the first two months of this year we have doubled our bookings ..not bad for a bad idea

Noa Put · February 17th, 2017, 09:59 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pete Cofrancesco

What you said about having to complete against people willing to work for peanuts has been a reality of the business ever since inexpensive cameras became available.

Here you can also say that every one that has a dslr can call themselves a videographer but if you have to fear weekendwarriors who are working for peanuts means your work is not better then theirs. The difference between me and them is not only my price but the quality of my work and you don't need to be a professional to see the difference. I never had to worry about "pimple faced kid owning a DSLR discount house camera", because it takes a lot more then just a camera to become a good videographer.

February 16th, 2017, 12:02 AM	#16
Chris Harding Inner Circle Join Date: Jul 2009 Location: Perth, Western Australia Posts: 8,441	Re: Streaming for modern weddings and their social media crowd Hi Pete With over 2000 weddings under my belt I'm well aware of the logistics of a wedding. Our main cameras have wifi encoders so I can move within a 100' radius if needed to cover shots. The last time I heard most wedding videographers have plenty of unmanned cameras at ceremonies. We only use static cameras for things like speeches and such. Yes you can have situations where there is no reception but we also record to card the conventional way and do the couple a delayed broadcast if needed. We can still live mix and record the edited footage directly to the computer even if we don't have broadcast reception. Most venues will give us between 20 - 30 mbps upload which is plenty. The USA is obviously a different market but here every pimple faced kid owns a DSLR discount house camera and claims to be a wedding videographer! I don't like competing in that market at all!!

February 16th, 2017, 08:24 AM	#17
Pete Cofrancesco Inner Circle Join Date: May 2004 Location: USA Posts: 3,005	Re: Streaming for modern weddings and their social media crowd Sounds like you've mastered that method and works for you. I guess we all have our different views on things and that's not a bad thing.

February 16th, 2017, 07:28 PM	#18
Chris Harding Inner Circle Join Date: Jul 2009 Location: Perth, Western Australia Posts: 8,441	Re: Streaming for modern weddings and their social media crowd Admiitedly I do like technology and being able to mix multi cameras at receptions is fun ..however technology doesn't sell weddings! The reason to go to a more cost effective shooting method was purely to contend with our local market ... One has to be sensible and I often wonder if wedding videographers actually cost out a wedding? Hell, I feel I'm worth $100 an hour and if you take a 12 hour wedding, 30 hours of post and media creation plus travel costs/consultations etc etc you really need to charge at least $4500 for a wedding to make your hourly rate, yet I see local yokels offer "all day weddings with 2 shooters and extensive post edit promises for a third of that price or even less! Yes there are brides with $40K budgets around but they are few and far between and certainly not enough to keep the huge number of advertised videographers with food on the table so one must assume they are doing it for beer money. Apart from having a fair amount of overseas people getting married on our sunny beaches we also have a massive amount of simple weddings here .... a dozen guests, wedding in a park or beach and it's all done and dusted!! Those sort of people want memories but not a Hollywood style production so a live feed works really well in these cases. You have to remember that marriage celebrants here are allowed to do ceremonies anywhere! so you can get married all up for as little as $300 and a lot of couples do just that!

February 17th, 2017, 02:05 AM	#19
Noa Put Inner Circle Join Date: Jun 2007 Location: Belgium Posts: 9,510	Re: Streaming for modern weddings and their social media crowd You seem to keep comparing your market which is quite unique with every else in the world, it doesn't work like that. Move to where I live and set up your streaming business for weddings and you'd be begging for a regular wedding within a year because hardly no-one will book you and that's in a country where you would have no competition. There is just no interest here for that kind of business where I live to make a decent living out of it. If weddingvideo would be my only source of income I would include photography and probably do 80% photo and 20% video, photographers here can charge more, work less hours in total and have a more easy day the day of the wedding.

February 17th, 2017, 04:09 AM	#20
Chris Harding Inner Circle Join Date: Jul 2009 Location: Perth, Western Australia Posts: 8,441	Re: Streaming for modern weddings and their social media crowd All areas are unique Noa with different market requirements.You have obviously researched the market with a view to doing live weddings and have had a poor response and discovered that it doesn't work in Belgium? It works here and that's fine with me. I'm comparing MY market right here and nowhere else simply to justify the comments that are put there saying "I don't see anyone paying for this service" Well, they do and celebrants too are very enthusiastic about the concept. Whatever works for you in your market is the area you need to follow. I just prefer the comment from Giroud "Personnaly , i avoid the "shoot first , edit after" and try to do everything "live" because it cut the work almost in half" Please realise that I'm not suggesting for one minute that everyone throw out what they have done for countless years and take up the live broadcast approach ..I just telling you why I decided on it.

February 17th, 2017, 05:52 AM	#21
Noa Put Inner Circle Join Date: Jun 2007 Location: Belgium Posts: 9,510	Re: Streaming for modern weddings and their social media crowd I have yet to encounter a weddingvideographer where I live that is offering live wedding streams, there is no reason to do so and for who? For those 6 guests that are not able to make it? My country is 2 hours drive border to border so distance is not a reason not to attend, we don't have have tropical beaches that attract worldwide brides to have their wedding and those who come from abroad want a creative film of the entire day, not a cctv recording of their ceremony and they are willing to pay for it. There are also plenty weekend warriors that work for so low prices that it would just be a small extra cost to have the entire day filmed. I only know of Turkisch weddings that sometimes do live streams but that market is dominated by Turkish videographers or they do it by themselves probably with a smartphone based on the very poor resolution of such a recording that I have seen. They only care about the dancing part to be livestreamed and don't expect decent payment for those kind of recordings.

February 17th, 2017, 06:53 AM	#22
Pete Cofrancesco Inner Circle Join Date: May 2004 Location: USA Posts: 3,005	Re: Streaming for modern weddings and their social media crowd I agree with Noa streaming/live mixing isn't in demand for normal areas. Sounds like you live in a tourist destination where its common for people to want to stream their wedding back home to friends and family who couldn't afford to fly out to your location. So if people are requesting and paying sufficiently for it then good for you. Where I am I could see offering streaming as an add on to attract more clients but for myself like I said wouldn't want to offer anything that makes more work for myself. If the whole live editing/streaming works for you that's great. Sometimes the best thing you can do in business is find a niche and offer something that no one else is. What you said about having to complete against people willing to work for peanuts has been a reality of the business ever since inexpensive cameras became available.

February 17th, 2017, 07:31 AM	#23
Chris Harding Inner Circle Join Date: Jul 2009 Location: Perth, Western Australia Posts: 8,441	Re: Streaming for modern weddings and their social media crowd Aha - Pete you get it!! Nope not a tourist area at all but hugely multi-cultural ... We have people here with lots of family in New Zealand, UK immigrants with parents and grand parents in the UK and yes even couples with family in the USA as well as South Africa. Australia seems to be "the place to go" if you leave your home country and yes a niche market is always a good idea for any business. It's tough being a new plumber when there are already 300 in your area Just because one format of business wouldn't work in your area doesn't mean it's a bad idea .. it's just a bad idea for where you live. So far in the first two months of this year we have doubled our bookings ..not bad for a bad idea