Virgin Islands Wedding Film

It's been a while since I've posted anything here, it's just been such a busy wedding season I haven't had time to be involved in the forum. I had a great time at this wedding and it came out cool so I thought I would share it with you guys.

Two weeks ago we shot this wedding in St. John. It all took place on this private yacht called the Sea Dream, it's a 400' boat. Ryan Koral from Epic Motion came with me to 2nd shoot, if you haven't seen his work you should check it out.

You would think shooting on a boat would be the best thing ever but it was pretty hard. I only got about 3 hours of sleep the night before the wedding because we were traveling form Puerto Rico to St. John and there were 3 meter waves the whole way over night. I was sleeping in the front of the boat and that section had a ton of movement, it just felt way to weird to sleep......

The other issues we had were dealing with the vibrating decks, very limited 110v plugs, and tight shooting quarters. Every-time we would go to use a tripod, monopod, pegasus ect. it was so shaking looking because of the deck's vibration. It might have been ok with a normal video camera but since we were shooting 5Ds it made very difficult. So for the ceremony we had to try and find the best area to put the tripods so it didn't look like we were shaking the cameras.

As well for the ceremony we had very limited space to move since the back deck was tight with all the chairs and railings. The chuppah made it even worse by adding another pole to obstruct our shots.

But in the end we got it done and had an awesome time shooting with the couple. The party went till 3am but we had to put the cameras away at about 1am when it started getting pretty loose LOL.

This was shot with 2 5DMKIIs, 1 7D, Glidecam 4000 HD, Cinevate Pegasus Carbon. Audio was with the Rode Video Mic on camera and Zoom H4n's for speeches and the ceremony.

Lenses Used -

15 f2.8
24-70 f2.8
24 f1.4
50 f1.4
85 f1.2
70-200 f2.8

You can see the short film here - Kim + Adam - Sea Dream Yacht, Virgin Islands Wedding ~ Joe Simon Productions- International Wedding Cinematography

Thanks for checking it out! All comments, suggestions and questions appreciated.

[Glen Elliott]

Hey Joe, awesome work man. I saw this a while back and was blown away by this piece. I met you at the first ReFrame but didn't know much about your work other than what you showed me (BMX stuff). Your event work is stupendous! :)
This piece alone inspired me so much it prompted me to add you to my short list of votes for the Event DV25. This is some of the best work I've seen that doesn't look like Patrick's. ;)

Btw, your outdoor exposures look so smooth with the brightness squelched quite well. ND filters? If so what kind did you use? How about other gear? Pegasus carbon? Also any other stabilizers other than tripods and glidecam?

PS I was in St.Thomas two days later filming a wedding (11-14-09), my assistant urged me to make it an all 7D shoot. Thankfully I didn't listen- it was blazing HOT there! Thanks for sharing Joe!

[Jose Ortiz]

Originally Posted by Joe Simon

Never had problems with my 5D's overheating. I'm going to push my 7D a bit more on my next shoot and see if it will actually shut down. The overheating thermometer that shows up always scares me so I shut it off for a few minutes. But I've been thinking lately that maybe it will run like that for a while, I'll see this week.

One month ago we also pushed our 7d to the max temp. warning having an error and losing the last file recording on the card. ( we were shooting in 30 frames)