I was thinking about this the other day- I think one of the things that makes me good is the fact that I am realistic with people. When I speak to someone about their wedding I don’t just tell them how great and perfect everything always is. “I know that place- BEAUTIFUL!!!!!!” You know how people just say whatever it takes to get you to work with them? It drives me crazy. People sometimes just ask for just a copy of raw footage and I tell them “no, there is no chance you will be happy with it, so why would you want it?”.

I say it all the time because it’s true- it’s not what someone likes, it’s what works best. I love Guns N’ Roses, they are my favorite band ever and I waited 17 years for Chinese Democracy to be released, but my first dance song was not “Sweet Child O’ Mine”. (Did you know that if they all stayed together they would be going into the Rock N’ Roll Hall Of Fame in 2 years? Actually, they never really broke up, everyone just left one at a time, only leaving Axl by himself. But that’s a story for another time…)

Just today’s random thought of the day.

Anyway, time for the next project. This is Kim and Herb’s wedding. I really enjoyed doing this wedding because it was such a laid back day and you can really tell that both bride and groom were genuinely happy to be getting married. They were so easy to work with. And the photographer was great too.

This clip is from Kim getting ready at the hotel. It was an afternoon wedding, so shooting at the hotel started at 7 AM. I actually got a lot of nice stuff in the room. When I went back and started to edit it I was really happy with all the footage here. I got so much good stuff that the bridal preps will wind up being longer than usual. There were not a lot of people in the room, which helped a lot. Normally there are so many people around when the bride gets ready that as soon as you set up a shot someone walks in front of it, so as a result everything here came out really well.

I am taking it really slow here. Like I said, it was a laid back day so I want the video to reflect that. If you go back and look at the bridal prep clip from Allison’s wedding a couple of months ago, this is the total opposite style because I don’t just cut and paste every wedding. Heavy documentary feel. The footage is really good, so I am just going to let the images speak for themselves rather than do anything fancy here.

No music either. The same way I am over feeling as though I need to fade between shots and add transitions between everything, I am over feeling as though I need to have music under things. I have come to appreciate and understand the power of silence. Just hearing a few camera clicks says a lot. Not that there is no need to ever use music, but the same way effects are used to cover people’s mistakes, music is used the same way too. Just over it.

I really like it when her mother says how beautiful she thinks Kim looks. Very nice quite moment.

I met with the bride and groom prior to the wedding, during which I got the feeling that putting on the dress for the first time was a big moment for her, so I really made it a point to show off the dress when I shot, then edited the hotel preps. I really don’t always make a big deal about the dress because I take a more low key approach to things and try to nail down the little things as the day goes along, but since I knew what’s what she wanted that’s what I made it a point to do here.