Keeping your wedding videographer informed of your arrangements for the wedding day is super important so we can always be prepared for each event before they happen. Here’s 5 vital pieces of information you should consider sharing with your chosen filmmaker.
1. Date, Time and Venue
Okay, this may sound like a no brainer, however its vital to provide these details to your videographer as soon as possible. There is no better time to provide this information than at the enquiry stage.
Firstly, by providing as much information as possible in your enquiry tells us you are genuinely interested in booking a videographer and aren't just feeling out for prices. By including the date and venue, it allows us to think about any logistical arrangements that may be required on our part…perhaps we may be booked for the day previous or the day after your wedding date and would have to consider the best means to reach your chosen venue.
Finally, in the rare occasion the worst happens - we unexpectedly fall ill or suffer an injury that prevents us from making it on your wedding day, we can relay those details to contacts who could stand in at the last minute if required.
2. Running Order
Providing us with the running order of your wedding day gives us the vital timings and events taking place throughout the day. It can then allow us to plan our day from a filming perspective and ensure we can be ready and stay ahead of each event.
3. Order of Service
Your order of service for your ceremony is also really handy to provide to your videographer. We can then see how your service is going to run and lets us know about any songs or readings taking place.
Again, being prepared for these details is very important, we can then plan how best to film each part of your service; perhaps we have a second camera operator who can capture your guest reactions or be quick to film an alternative angle.
4. The who, the what and the where
Probably one of the most significant details for us, since we are filming people the whole day is knowing the who, the what and the where. If for example, you are planning on having any readings during your ceremony, it’s vital for us to be informed of who is doing the readings, and where they will be read from. This way we can make sure those people are mic’d up prior to the ceremony or we at least know where to place a microphone or audio recorder in the room.
In a church scenario, we may have to ask the officiant or whoever is leading the service as they may decide where readings are read from. It actually isn't a bad idea to invite us to the ceremony rehearsal so we can clearly see who will be where when the big day arrives.
The same goes for speeches, please don’t let us assume every person giving a speech will be seated at the top table. In fact, we have almost been caught out by this! Let us know who out of your guests will be giving a speech and where they will be seated. Again, this is so we can set up suitable audio requirements and also allows us to set up camera angles which capture this properly.
5. Dances/Evening reception arrangements
The evening reception is our last leg of the wedding day so we want to end it on a high! For this point in the day we need to know your arrangements for your evening entertainment and when things kick off. This helps us set up our camera and audio requirements (notice a theme here?) perhaps we can arrange for a clean feed of audio from their sound set up.
My experience of filming weddings as seen a broad variation of dance arrangements. Both of our film packages cover up until the end of the third dance at evening reception. Sometimes if the dancefloor is still pretty active we’ll stay whilst a couple more songs play through for some more arty and creative shots that we can use in the final films.
For those traditionalists amongst you, please inform us of when you plan to have any traditional dances. If possible, ask your band or DJ to arrange one dance within the first few so we can at least cover one in your final delivery - it really makes for some great footage as well as brilliant images from your photographer!
That pretty much wraps it up! We always ask for as much of this information as possible prior to your wedding however it is really easy for us to miss some minor details, so help us out by providing us with as much information as possible. Those details make our job so much easier on the day and can then reflect on a relaxed filmmaker giving you the highest quality wedding film possible.
Dan