Shown here is the first dance of Rick and Jolene Sietman at their reception held at the Waldenwoods Resort in Heartland, Michigan.
Posts Tagged ‘Michigan Wedding Videographers’
First Dance at Wedding Reception
Sunday, March 13th, 2011Look at Your Bride for the Vows
Tuesday, February 23rd, 2010When it is time to say your vows, look directly into the eyes of your beloved and DO NOT turn to look at the minister. It is only natural for you to look at someone who is speaking to you. Consider the case of a handshake. It is almost impossible for you to not extend your right hand when someone else offers to you his hand in a greeting. It is like a slap in the face for you to not return your hand in like manner.
Now, consider what we have at the altar. The two of you are standing at the altar looking at each other with the minister only an arm length away. The minister then speaks directly to one of you saying something on the order of, “Do you, Your Name, take Your Beloved’s Name to be your lawfully wedded…” Unless you have thought it through before hand it will be almost impossible for you to avoid turning your head away from your beloved to look at the minister who is speaking to you. There will be to you an illusion that you are offending the minister.
Taking this to the next level, when you turn to look at the minister your beloved will almost certainly turn to look at him as well. You end up with head bobbing that will look horrible in your video.
Well… rest assured, the minister will understand if both of you completely ignore him and merely repeat his words while never turning your eyes from your beloved.
Capturing the Marriage Proposal for Generations
Tuesday, August 4th, 2009A marriage proposal is a once-in-a-lifetime event that a couple will want to remember for a lifetime. Even more, a couple will want to share the event with others not only in the days and months before the wedding but even years down the road.
Imagine recreating scenes from that proposal and telling the details of it to show on cinema! The proposal would be immortalized for generations even yet unborn.
Presented here is the story of a marriage proposal made by Merrick Miranda to Katie Darnell. As you watch the story notice first the tender moments presented before the discussion where Katie and Merrick spend time together enjoying nature and each other’s presence at a scenic park with mood enhancing timeless music. Here the viewer becomes acquainted with Katie and Merrick so that when viewing their story a heart-felt joy will be experienced.
By way of interest, please notice what some may take to be a paid advertisement for a seafood restaurant. While it may have the appearance of a paid advertisement, the purpose is in memory preservation for the couple. Ten or more years down the road seeing these things will bring back cherished memories. We are doing more than telling a story. We are capturing memories for generations.
Katie and Merrick’s Wedding Highlights Video
Friday, July 31st, 2009Every wedding we capture memories in motion at is unique and even moving. It never grows commonplace. Please take 4 minutes and view highlights of Katie and Merrick Miranda’s wedding from May 16th. This has moved some to tears!
Please feel free to leave your comments after viewing.
House Audio vs Cinematic Audio
Wednesday, July 29th, 2009There are important distinctions that exist between house audio or public address and cinematic.
House audio must be optimized for understandability in a room that has dynamic auditory characteristics. Sometimes people are coughing, children may be excited, someone may be sitting next to sound absorbing curtains while another may be sitting against a bare wall reflecting sounds, and the list goes on. To optimize understandability a public address system will therefore have a narrow band of frequencies it will put on the loudspeakers usually centered around 3,000Hz, optimum for the human voice. Cinematic audio, or audio for television, serves an audience of just a few people in a relatively small room. Under these conditions the audio is much easier to understand. This leaves room for a much wider band of frequencies enabling a more natural and rich sound.
Capturing audio from a variety of church sound systems we have noticed the practical effect of all this. The sound we typically capture from a house sound board sounds fine in a video until you compare it with audio we captured at the same event with our own microphone systems.
Please view below a sample video illustrating the differences between a typical house audio system and audio for cinema. In the video you will see a pastor delivering a wedding message to a couple during their wedding ceremony. The pastor is double miked wearing both a house microphone and one of our wireless microphones.
The video is in HD high definition so if your bandwidth is too slow click on the HD icon to switch to standard definition. Please bear in mind that this is raw video and not necessarily representative of the quality we release.
Hiding Mistakes You Made at Your Wedding
Friday, July 17th, 2009It is extremely rare that a wedding or event can transpire from beginning to end without somebody making a mistake somewhere. What is worse is when something unfortunate happens during a significant event that you had wanted to cherish for a lifetime. Your videographer can only capture what transpires and cannot turn the clock back to have your wedding party perform their part again without the mistake. After all, your videographer is only human. …or is he? Maybe he has abilities far beyond those of mortal man, is able to jump across tall buildings with a single bound, faster than a speeding bullet, etc.
Technology allows us to do amazing things in the edit room that just might persuade you that your videographer has abilities far beyond those of mortal man. In the example to follow we captured the lighting of a unity candle by mothers of the bride and groom. The mothers made a mistake. They were not supposed to actually light the unity candle. Their task was to light two individual candles which the bride and groom would later use during the wedding ceremony to light the unity candle. For the plain and simple video of the ceremony we will just show what happened at the wedding. However, when we develop the music highlights video, artistically composed from events of the entire day, we want to avoid triggering unfavorable memories and center on developing those which warm the heart and will continue to warm the heart ten or more years down the road.
So, what are we supposed to do? We could simply leave out the mothers lighting the candles which would be ashamed as this is symbolic of families joining. What we did was not change the story but simply remove a part of the image which would draw attention and the viewer’s eyes to a mistake. Viewers will still know what happened but at least the showing of the candle lighting in the music highlights video will not be highlighting a mistake.
Please watch the twenty-seven second video below where you will see the actual footage of the candle lighting and then you will see how a portion of that same footage was used in the music highlights video.
What to Ask: What About Photographers?
Tuesday, July 7th, 2009One of the skill sets videographers acquire is an ability to capture memories in motion at weddings and events such that the photographer does not get in the way. When you interview potential videographers you might consider asking them how they deal with photographers with respect to keeping their presence in your video at a low profile.
The optimum you are looking for is a set of vendors for your wedding or event that will work together for your benefit. The people you hire need to have a sense of urgency that they must communicate between themselves insulating you from various anomalies of the day. Your vendors need to have a concept that helping other vendors to succeed is part of their job.
The answer you are looking for from videographers you interview can take a lot of shapes. However, the answer that works is the one that does not center narrowly on videography but rather on a much larger perspective. Your videographer must express as part of his or her answer that part of a videographer’s job is accommodating the photographer’s needs. You also want to hear what the videographer does to insure that the photographer reciprocates. Listen for specific words addressing what steps are taken to that end.
When there is bi-lateral communication between the photographer and videographer you become the winner.
Family Band for Weddings & Events
Saturday, July 4th, 2009Capturing memories in motion by videogrpahy at weddings, we see a variety of vendors serving a variety of functions. We take special notice when we see a vendor who goes out of his or her way to serve the client. Such was the case at a May wedding we did this year where Trilogy Band provided dancing music and entertainment at the reception.
We prepared a complementary promotional video (adapted from our client’s HD composition) for the band which you can view below. Often times portions of a client’s video can be easily adapted to serve as a promo as was the case here.
Gain Knowledge–Interview Several Videographers
Saturday, June 13th, 2009You have decided that you would like to have a video of your wedding, reunion, anniversary, or other event. The next step is to select a videographer. Please consider a few ground rules that will ensure you make an educated and wise choice while staying within your budget.
The first rule may seem at odds with one of your goals–staying within your budget. When interviewing videographers don’t be overly concerned with pricing and how much they charge. Be up front with videographers you interview and tell them roughly what you would like to spend but that at the same time you would like to know what is available. Tell them, “We are trying to get an education.” Any good videographer or artisan knows that if he does a good enough job in his presentation that the couple may be so deeply moved that they will seek out “papa” to help. If your potential videographer takes issue with that then you have addressed the next consideration found below.
One of the primary considerations you must address at all costs in securing a vendor for your wedding or event is only securing the help of individuals whom you can work with confidently and without hesitation. You want a friendly relationship to develop between you. You want someone who only says “yes” even when he says no. You want someone who leaves the distinct impression that he or she is dropping everything when you call.
One of the objectives in your search is to get an education. You want to find out what services are available and to see what sorts of styles exist for you to choose from. Having an education you will be more confident about a particular style or manner of video.
There are videographers who believe that the average bride-to-be will be sold on technology. If you find yourself listening to technical terminology that you don’t understand mark it down as a minus. What you are interested in are results and any vendor you select should understand that. Think about it: what would you rather hear about. Would you rather hear about capturing the beading of your wedding dress, the tear in your father’s eye, or would you rather hear about digital color sampling standards defined by the National Television Association?
Solomon wrote, in all his wisdom, saying, “There is safety in a multitude of counselors.” By visiting and talking with a number of videographers you will gain an improved understanding of the craft and can only improve on your ultimate selection.
Kimberly and Atticus’ Wedding Day
Monday, June 8th, 2009
On June 6 we had the distinct honor to capture the memories in motion of Kimberly and Atticus as they captured their dreams in matrimony at Zion Lutheran Church of Ann Arbor, Michigan.
Atticus Flores, U of M ‘02 graduate, of Canton, Michigan, proposed to Kimberly Ellsworth, also a U of M ‘02 graduate, during a romantic fall picnic in the Arboretum. Kimberly is a graphic designer at the U-M Law School. Atticus is an automotive product engineer at Plastech.
The staff and pastors of Zion were very helpful in helping us to capture wedding video memories that will serve this couple a lifetime. Of particular help was the church AV technician who went out of his way to assure that our site audio feed was superlative.
One technical issue we had to grapple with at Zion was the mixture in the sanctuary of outdoor daylight with indoor lighting. I am pleased to report that we had incredible success in overcoming this limitation. While photographers find this easy to deal with, videography imaging is challenged by it.
Digital imaging, whether still or video, must be balanced for the color or temperature of predominant light in a room. Once balanced, the light entering the imaging device cannot change its temperature without causing an objectionable change to the hue. While we can correct this in the edit room, results will be better if the original capture is balanced for color. For still imaging the photographer merely “swamps out” the ambient light with a flash. For video the problem surfaces when the camera frame moves from an area of one color to an area of another color. Such was the case at Zion Lutheran Church.
The sanctuary at Zion is architecturally divided between front and rear with a baptistery in the middle. Zion requirements for video and photography dictate that we cannot operate during the wedding ceremony any closer to the altar than the baptistery. The color of light for the rear half was predominantly daylight while the front was tungsten. This, therefore meant that to follow the processional of the bridal party down the isle a fundamental color shift occurred at about the middle. Our solution was to have one camera dedicated to following each celebrant down only half of the isle. The camera on the right covered the processional only until the middle and the camera on the left picked them up from the middle and followed them to the altar.
This, however, was not the end of the problem. The camera on the right, balanced for daylight, had to swing into a tungsten colored frame at the conclusion of the entry processional. Fortunately, our cameras are bi-modal for color. For the camera on the right we solved for two separate color balances before the ceremony. When it was then time for that camera to swing into a tungsten frame a simple switch was flipped for the alternate color balance.
At the reception, Kensington Court Hotel, we had an opportunity to view samples of the photographer’s work and decided it was excellent.
We were particularly impressed, however, with the live entertainment Kimberly and Atticus had selected for their reception. “Two for the Road,” Vincent Vitale and Brian Bogozzi, were very creative in providing live family oriented entertainment and dance music. These two knew how to engage an audience, keep them informed of events of the evening, and provide for a memorable reception. We highly recommend Two for the Road and have added them to our link resources web page.
In addition, Brian and Vincent went out of their way in helping us to capture stunning audio for the couple’s video. At reception or dinner events where toasts or other speaking activities take place, we attempt to secure an audio line from the DJ to feed an audio recording device. This frees us from having to individually mike speakers or handing them a second handheld microphone to awkwardly grapple with. The price we pay for this, however, is a dependency on the DJ to send us quality audio. While we always have redundant audio sources for these events, the primary audio source is preferred and “Two for the Road” gave us pristine audio for Kimberly and Atticus’ video.
A nice touch the couple provided for their wedding reception guests was a shutter photo booth where guests could have their photographs taken.