Our Wedding Movie: Take 2

Another Kitten Teaser Pic!

Photo by Joe Simon

So, where were we? I had decided I would go big or go home with the wedding movie. But as I continued to watch videos like these and tear up over strangers, I began to realized that having a wedding movie had become very important to me. After some research and number-crunching, I determined that Stillmotion was out of my budget, but I was thrilled to learn that, with a little budget revamping, we could fit the very talented Joe Simon into the Kitten budget! With Joe I found exactly what I was looking for--a wedding cinematographer with a fresh, artistic style who makes wedding films that I could actually afford! If he sounds familiar, it's because he filmed Mrs. Bird of Paradise's wedding back in 2006! Joe travels all over the country and abroad to document weddings, and he was excited about the prospect of coming to the Cayman Islands for our wedding.

Hiring a wedding cinematographer was a big expense, and in some ways I don't want to think of it as part of our wedding budget. The movie is more of an investment for us and our family for later in life--a family heirloom that generations will be able to enjoy! Once I realized that having Joe film the wedding was at the top of my priorities, we worked backwards, factoring in his fee and working from there to come up with the rest of our wedding budget. We we found ways to save in order to compensate for the cost (buying a gently-used wedding dress, having modest centerpieces, limiting our bar selections), and I think it will be WELL worth it! In fact, I would have rather had a small, no frills cocktail reception than forgo my wedding movie! I think a big part of my insistence on having this movie is that although we had about 75 guests at our destination wedding, many of our friends and family weren't able to make it. I can't wait to share the story of our wedding with those who weren't able to attend!

So what if you absolutely cannot fit a wedding filmmaker into your budget? Well, we've heard from Mrs. Avocado that you should be careful who you delegate filming responsibilities to. If you can have several people filming (or a few tripods set up in addition to your volunteer(s) with handhelds) you will have more footage to choose from while editing, and there will be less of a chance of missing key moments.

You can also give your DIY wedding video a vintage twist. I don't know about you, but I love the look of Super 8 films. Caroline, a commenter on A Cup of Jo posted about her low-budget videography strategy: have three friends use Super 8 cameras during the wedding! I think it turned out really cute!

There are three things you should know about Super 8 before you jump headfirst in to this kind of project. One, Super 8 doesn't record sound so you have to take that into account. Two, you have to change film rolls every 10 minutes or so, and the film isn't cheap to purchase and process. And three, the camera is noisy (it sounds like an old fashioned movie projector to me) so it could be distracting to have three of them going during a quieter moment like the ceremony. But it produces such lovely film with a nostalgic flair, so maybe a mix of traditional film and Super 8 would be best way to go (that is the option we chose with Joe Simon).

Are you having someone film your wedding? Are you going the DIY route or hiring a pro? For those of you DIYing your wedding film, what's your strategy?