Do we have to film accessories?

[Robert Benda]

Now we ask about what is important to them. We know about their something borrowed... et al, and (hopefully) anything else relevant. Examples:
grandma's hankerchief
the semi truck a groom had just bought that the B&G left the church in
next week: the restored camaro with his 1st working speedometer that he got working because of the bride

These are distinct to them and will be filmed. IF we film other things, it will because we're ahead of schedule, and never know if we will need some establishing shots.

[Paul Mailath]

if I have a questionnaire that asks the bride to tick the items she specifically wants me to get footage of - dress, ring, garter etc etc - I'm sure she'll mark them all.

If I tell her that I'm assuming it's the tog's job to get those and my job to document the day which may or may not include specific shots of itmes that the tog has covered anyway - I'm sure sh'ed say - fine!

Don't get me wrong, I usually get slider shots of the dress and shoes because I like to have those sorts of images to cut away to - I just think we need to shed ourselves of the 'need' to shoot them just because it's somehow traditional..

[Chris Harding]

Hey Paul

I don't ask I just do ...I had a situation where the photog had hung the dress on a bright window (there was no-where else to hang it) and the bride was almost ready to get into it so I shot it where it was ...it was horribily underexposed of course since the photog used flash to combat the harsh back lighting so I simply didn't use that clip in the end.

I still think it's up to you to decide what to film that will fit into your concept .. unless the bride asks for something specifically!

Chris

[Robert Benda]

Originally Posted by Chris Harding

I had a situation where the photog had hung the dress on a bright window (there was no-where else to hang it) and the bride was almost ready to get into it so I shot it where it was ...it was horribily underexposed of course since the photog used flash to combat the harsh back lighting so I simply didn't use that clip in the end.

And now Magic Lantern's HDR video could fix that for us Canon DSLR folk.

[George Kilroy]

I'm surprised by the number of people who think that they have to conform to a list of particular shots as though there's a statutory prescribed 'Wedding Video' and that to present anything less will result in the film-maker being sued or reported to some authority. Surely as an independent film-maker what you shoot is up to you. In all of the 20+ years I shot weddings I rarely went to the brides' homes before and even rarer to a groom's, though I started to offer it in the latter years if they wanted it. I never once had anyone complain about not having shots of the dress hanging limp on a hanger or shoes or flowers arranged in an artistic manner. Shots of things such as those were all taken during the natural course of the day when they were being worn. I'd always find a few minutes to get close-up details which I'd sequence together at some point during the video.

I'm not saying that is the right thing to do, just that as an independent creative what goes into any production is up to that person. Obviously if shooting the accessories forms key elements of if what you want to produce, or has been promised, then they should be shot.

I had the benefit (or disadvantage) of starting out when there was no means of comparing my work with others so I developed my own style and comfort naturally. Through feed-back from clients or discussions with potential clients, I found what was important to clients and what they didn't bother with. Now it's so easy to see thousands of examples and too easy to attempt to emulate others way of working which lead to questions such as the one that started this discussion.

[Chris Harding]

Hey George

Nice to see you chip in!! Now you and I both shoot documentary style and that's pretty much as old as when wedding videos first started and yes, we simply record the day as it unfolds and add in what we feel is part of the day...Much later on in the industry DSLR's and the wedding film was created and followers of that regime didn't really have a lot to go on so before developing their unique style of wedding film they probably had to "see what the others guys are doing" to make a doc into a wedding film and I suspect that photogs played a big part in this ..the first "cinematic" wedding films I ever saw did contain a lot of photo shots like dresses, rings, flowers and table centre pieces, artistic, creatively composed and shot on still cameras and these probably found their way into cinematic adaptations so became essentials if you wanted an artistic wedding film. Let's face it if you are creating a wedding film as opposed to a simple run 'n gun documentary then to make it into a wedding film means shooting differently and much more creatively so shooting inanimate objects on a slider needs to be part of the process.

Chris

[Adrian Tan]

Quote from Still Motion: "There are some weddings where we don’t even show the ceremony — if it doesn’t fit in with the best story we can tell, it doesn’t need to be in the film." -- This One’s DifferentBecause It’s Us – stillmotion

I think there's two sides to this accessories coin.

The first is "videographer tradition", passed from person to person (like a virus). I've basically sohot accessories because I was taught to shoot accessories -- in a sort of checklist of must-get shots. And everyone around me also shoots accessories -- photographers, videographers -- so it's catchy.

The other side of the coin is bridal expectation. Brides see lots of videos online, they see the "epic" shots of dresses; and, frankly, they like them. When I watch videos with my partner, she does comment that, despite my beliefs about inanimate objects, she does enjoy seeing these sequences in videos.

Being a typical guy, I'm quite uninterested in clothing; but I can appreciate that things look very different from a bride's point of view, and that the very careful choices she's made about each piece of clothing or jewellery are rich with meaning and significance.

But does there need to be video of this as well as photo? Am I going to keep including accessories in videos after the discussion in this thread? Not sure...

[Clive McLaughlin]

Originally Posted by Long Truong

The general rule of thumb is that if it doesn't support your story, don't shoot it.

What does this mean? I get a little ticked off by this kind of sales talk about the 'story'. The story is a wedding day. On the wedding day, the bide wears things. She paid big money for them most likely. She most likely adores these items. She will want to remember them as much as anything I'd imagine.

In fairness, it depends on what your finished product looks like. My time at the brides house goes only into my highlights trailer and so I don't need any extensive clips. As long as a get 10-15 short creative clips of hair/makeup, champagne and accessories I'm happy enough. I guess if you are wanting more extensive footage of the interactions, then it would seem a distraction.

[Long Truong]

Originally Posted by Clive McLaughlin

What does this mean? I get a little ticked off by this kind of sales talk about the 'story'. The story is a wedding day. On the wedding day, the bide wears things. She paid big money for them most likely. She most likely adores these items. She will want to remember them as much as anything I'd imagine.

In fairness, it depends on what your finished product looks like. My time at the brides house goes only into my highlights trailer and so I don't need any extensive clips. As long as a get 10-15 short creative clips of hair/makeup, champagne and accessories I'm happy enough. I guess if you are wanting more extensive footage of the interactions, then it would seem a distraction.

Clive, storytelling is not a catchy sales gimmick but a universal language.

A wedding day is not a story, it is an event. The story is what you decide to tell from that event through your language, which is the film you make. The way you shoot the event, the content you decide to include or exclude, the way you colour grade your piece, the music you choose, etc. are all ingredients that will affect what people will know from that story.

[Nigel Barker]

Originally Posted by Adrian Tan

Quote from Still Motion: "There are some weddings where we don’t even show the ceremony — if it doesn’t fit in with the best story we can tell, it doesn’t need to be in the film." -- This One’s DifferentBecause It’s Us – stillmotion

Definitely an entry for Pseuds Corner in Private Eye. (For those outside the UK just Google or ask a Brit to explain.)

[Peter Riding]

Many subjects, particularly detail such as flowers dress shoes, rings, greeting cards, rooms dressed for wedding breakfasts etc, work far better as stills than they ever will as movies. So if you have a dSLR with you why not use it for these sorts of subjects. You WILL need to use fill flash especially for backlit subjects so make sure you also have a suitable gun. This can be on camera but it MUST be bounced or your results will look amateurish.

Guns don't need to cost much at all. Check out the Chinese ones reviewed on Lighting Rumours. I can't recommend any as at this point I still only use my five Canon speedlites but colleagues do think highly of them.

When you do the edit don't cut corners with single images per screen - especially if they are portrait aspect - and silly ken burns type effects. For example try bringing in 3 x portrait aspect images one after the other starting left then middle then right, or a landscape aspect one on one side followed by a portrait aspect one on the other side (both the same height), and gently fade to the next screen.

These sorts of subjects are the ones that brides are likely to want to study for more than the few seconds that they would remain on screen as video footage. If she pauses video the image will not be nearly as nice as if she pauses a sparklingly detailed still.

As for SM not even including any parts of the ceremony. Well what can anyone say other than is this the point where SM peak and then get found out :- )

Pete

[Adrian Tan]

Re SM not showing ceremony -- I've no idea, but have got a feeling, though, that they'd probably still supply a video of ceremony and of reception speeches. Maybe ceremony is just occasionally excluded from the main short film.

Another random thought re accessories: one thing that video can give accessories is more 3D-ness. So, if you're doing a slider + pan on a pair of shoes, or if you have at them with a steadicam, you get more dimensionality than from a single frame.

I'd love to be able to say to a bride, "Give me some time before the wedding to shoot inanimate objects, to arrange your dress on a mannequin or in a tree, so I don't have to worry about them on the big day itself." But, very often, the travel time involved, etc is prohibitive. Only has so far happened for destination weddings.

Random gimmick I'm going to use on the next wedding: static shot on a table, then place all the accessories on there one by one. In the edit, cut and dissolve, and if nothing else in the frame changes except each object you palce, then you can create the appearance of accessories magically appearing from nowhere. (Bob Nicolas has done a version of this with a motion-controlled rotating camera doing a panorama of the room as objects fade into view.) The main point of this gimmick, which I'm sure a lot of people have used in the past: hopefully it'll save time.