What do you do if it rains?

[Adrian Tan]

Originally Posted by Chris Harding

If your package/coverage lists various parts of the whole day that you say you will cover and due to the weather you simply cannot do it (or the couple really don't want to do it) do you "make it up to them" with something like extra reception footage or do you simply just leave out that coverage and they get less than they should have?

Hey Chris, I guess one question is -- why do you need to specify the parts of the day and tell them the video will contain x, y, z? Does it help to engender more trust in the couple, and make them feel like they've got more control over what exactly they're getting? I guess most videographers I know talk more in terms of hours of coverage, and the couples take it for granted they're going to capture all the usual parts anyway.

[Jeremy Lee]

I had a wedding last month were it did rain. When we had our video chat prior to the wedding we talked about why she was getting married on the beach and part of the reason was because she had wanted a beach wedding every since she was a little girl. Before the wedding we were presented with the option to have the wedding under the beach house facing out toward the Gulf, but we chose to just get some bags and make it happen. Luckily it wasn't a flood type of rain, but it was still kind of heavy at times. In the end everything worked out and it gave the film a nice tone. Please enjoy their trailer.

Danielle and Ryan | Pensacola Beach Wedding Pensacola Beach, Mississippi Wedding Videographer on Vimeo

[Adrian Tan]

Awesome work.

[Noa Put]

Originally Posted by Jeremy Lee

I had a wedding last month were it did rain.

Did you use umbrella's above your camera's? I would have hated to shoot under those conditions. 2 years ago I had to shoot a weddingceremony out in an open field, when I drove to that locations it was pouring rain but when I arrived it had stopped and heard they still where planning to do the wedding outside, eventhough heavy rain was predicted on that day. I had set up 3 camera's on tripods and just when the ceremony started I felt the first drops, within a timeframe of one minute it was raining so hard everyone had to run for shelter, I had picked up my camera's and was hiding under an umbrella but had to go to my car as it got worse and worse and a heavy wind was pulling my umbrella in all directions, all guests had parked their cars several 100 meters down the road as there was no parking space in the middle of that field and they all ended up soaking wet at the venue where they eventually had to do the ceremony, that was a horrible start of their weddingday.

[Adrian Tan]

I'm actually doing a photoshoot tomorrow (pre-wedding engagement photos), and we've got rain predicted. Rather than change location to somewhere safe, I'm going to try to persuade the couple to shoot firstly with umbrellas, and then without umbrellas, so that they're running around drenched. I think it will be epic. Just need to backlight the rain, with my non-existent skills at using a flash, so that you can see the raindrops.

Whether this is adaptable for weddings... Most weddings, not really. She won't want to ruin her dress, hair, make-up. But I have worked with photographers before you have gone for the umbrella shots.

[Chris Harding]

Hey Adrian

I'm sure you will get away with it for pre-wedding but when a bride has spent a fortune on hair, makeup and a $3000 wedding gown, I think she would be a little hesitant. In April we literally had 10 drops come out of the sky after the Church ceremony and the bride freaked about her hair! It stopped as fast as it started so the video shoot went without a hitch!

Now here is an idea for video ... How about an umbrella with a short stem with an "L" bracket that could attach to your video camera or stills camera and sit neatly above it ...Something I have used before was a round umbrella that had a circular frame with elastic straps in between and you wore it like a hat so it was totally hands free ...dunno where I found it though !

Good luck dodging the rain !

Chris

[Mike Beckett]

I live in Ireland.

What do you mean 'IF' it rains!!!

[Noa Put]

You could start your own thread with the title: "what do you do when the sun shines?" :)

[Chris Harding]

Hi Mike

I guess the term "Emerald Isle" is taken from all the greenery caused by the almost constant rain.

As tropical as it is, someone once wrote about Fiji that the main attraction there for him was the Brewery as they had free tours and free beer and planning the weather was easy. If you couldn't see the Brewery from your hotel balcony then it was raining and if you could see it then that meant it was about to rain!

Gosh Mike, you must be an expert now on how to keep your camera dry

Chris

[Peter Riding]

Be very careful about taking risks with your kit - its not supposed to be submerged :- )

Just found a gallery of mine from a few years ago in which the heavens opened whilst we were a very long walk away from shelter. First off the group tried to take cover under some trees:

Ref 162-0579-04_srm Ashton Lamont Photography, Copyright

But that wasn't enough and we had to abandon it:

Ref 168-8568-03_srm Ashton Lamont Photography, Copyright

Ref 171-8574-03_srm Ashton Lamont Photography, Copyright

then the couple got away in the bridal car:

Ref 179-8590-03_srm Ashton Lamont Photography, Copyright

I had recently switched from Canon 1 series bodies - which are totally weatherproof - to 5DII bodies - which are only weather resistant. Carried on using my L-series lenses which of course are also weatherproof.

Both 5DII bodies totally failed shortly after. Fortunately there was a long gap before the wedding breakfast in which there was nothing to shoot. I was able to open up and dry out the 5DII bodies in a warm cupboard and they started working again.

Heavy rain is often accompanied by strong gusts of wind of course and brollies will be worse than useless. I do always have a supply of ivory coloured brollies ready in my car though for use by the wedding party - venue brollies can be ugly and covered in advertising. UK members I got six from here in 2007:

Large Golf Wedding Umbrella (NOT PERSONALISED) - Pure Treats Store

Brollies can look OK in the shoots when used sympathetically@

Ref sides35-36-hmh Ashton Lamont Photography, Copyright

Now for myself I use a large waterproof jacket complete with tuckaway hood. I can sort of wrap the jacket partly around the main cam to give it some protection between shots. I also have waterproof over trousers on hand :- )

Good luck with any insurance claim if you do suffer rain damage. And good luck trying to arrange replacement equipment in time for the next days shoot. You can only do what you can do, don't take silly risks.

Adrian, if its raining for your shoot try having an assistant hold an open brolly over the couple until the last moment then whip it away, you shoot, then they whip it back again. Works great. Raindrops in shot usually look naff especially if illuminated by flash so take insurance shots by including some without as well as some with flash. It may be a major Photoshop job to remove loads of foreground raindrops from in front of the subjects faces etc.


Pete

[Rob Cantwell]

i have used Canon 1 series cameras in torrential rain - never once failed, i wouldn't risk it with my 5D MkIII ;-)

I have a slicker for the PMW 200 if things really turn nasty, it makes shooting a challenge tho!

last week the photoshoot was rained out so the photographer had to just take the shots in the hotel, i covered some of that but i wouldn't really add anything extra if the photoshoot doesnt go ahead.

I think your onto something there Chris - a little umbrella for a camera!! good idea.

Oh! and btw we have 365 different kinds of rain here in Ireland :-)

[Mike Beckett]

You lot don't know rain until you've stood in the Irish countryside for hours in January in driving rain so cold it makes your fingers blue.

Jessies, the lot of yiz!

[Jeremy Lee]

Originally Posted by Noa Put

Did you use umbrella's above your camera's?

All we had were store carry-out bags. It was very last minute and very "okay what can we put over the camera to keep it dry. In retrospect I would have asked a wedding guest to keep our cameras covered with an umbrella because the wedding guest were very friendly people and I am sure someone would have help. Because of the rain and the rush to get down to the beach there was almost zero time to set up and white-balance so our cameras were way off. Great learning lesson for next time!

[Leon Bailey]

We've actually had a wedding that rained right before the ceremony began. It was a beach wedding. I covered the cameras with plastic, but lucky it didn't rain hard and stopped right in time.

[Chris Harding]

We had drizzle late yesterday afternoon during both my stedicam shoot and my photshoot (we did both photography and video on this one) and the bridesmaids went running for umbrellas. Both shoots went ahead under umbrellas and they actually added a huge amount of prop value to the stills. The stills shoot was really fun and the bridal party enjoyed it too!! It was nice for a change to have a bridal party to take the weather in their stride and have fun!

Chris