Trash the Dress Brainstorming
 

Thinking about ideas for an upcoming shoot. I've seen some great ones, such as:

splashing in the surf
splashing in a fountain
riding a Harley
riding a moped
standing on a pool table
sitting on a hay stack
kissing on a work bench

Some ideas in my head:
food fight with groom
paint ball course w/ bride elbowing in the dirt with an AK47 replica!
carnival rides
climbing a tree
rainstorm - of course we don't have these in Phoenix, though I've heard of them
silly string fight with a bunch of kids or the groom

Other ideas? I think we can make Trash-the-Dress huge if more of us do them. It's one more step to make videography a necessity for brides. They're also a great portfolio-builder for photographers. Pics of couples kissing doesn't catch people like some good old-fashion splashin. I think brides want to see themselves having fun on their day (while being a princess of course).

BTW, I talked to a cleaner and asked what you can do to a dress and still be able to preserve it. In short - not much. Just water can ruin many dresses.

I've got to say that after doing a trash the dress shoot ( www.silver-media.net/trashthedress ) I'm not sure if it translates as well to video as it does to stills. Why do I say this? I played it at a bridal show to gague people's reactions and all I got were furrowed brows and confused mothers. I didn't have a single positive comment from anyone in the 10 minutes I ran it. Show a bride a photo in the same settings and they'd love it. I have no explanation.
Will I do another one? Sure. They're fun, and different, but I'm not so sure they'll go mainstream as a paid video thing.

Anyone out there doing a lot of these as paid jobs? I'd love for someone to say yes, cause they're fun and can be pretty.

BTW, I give a big thumbs up for the carnival idea. I can see all that nostalgic, rusty, colorful apparatus around sunset being beautiful... you might have given me my next one. Do you think they would let you shoot in one of those roadside deathtrap carnivals? I sure hope so.

If I'm filming at a carnival I'll have my feet on the ground. I would sooner skydive!

We just did a cross Canada promotion for Canon in which we showed some of our work. The clip that , by far, got the most attention from everyone at Canon, the pros, and other non-industry people was our trash the dress video. While we also do photo, so we had stills in the clip, it surely was a video.

These are in pretty big demand for us and couples are more than willing to pay. Some are even flying or driving down to have it shot (both photo and video). I don't think having both mediums offers a huge edge, but I think these translate into video very wells o much so that we only offer them together.

The bigger question is, what sort of market enjoys these shoots? In other words, what types of couples and dresses are brides willing to do this shoot with.

Here is the clip we showed at the Canon promo that got a lot of attention:
http://stillmotionblog.com/?p=128

Patrick

Patrick made the point I was going to make. I honestly think it depends on your market. In Canada it really seems like wedding videography is something that the B&G are looking for. In my market, it's pretty much the opposite.

Case in point. Love story videos seem to be very popular in many places. This past year I didn't sell a single one. At one point I even had a special where the first 3 couples to book one got it at half price. Still no takers.

So I have a feeling if I did a trash-the-dress video here I would get a lot of puzzled looks as well. It's too bad, really.

Most of the love story videos I've seen are, frankly, boring. The best one I ever saw was written as a comedy, but comedy is hard to pull off.

Trash the Dress is edgy, which I like, but it's a fine line between edgy and sac-religious. I like that it gives the bride a contrast: we see her perfection but then we see her freedom when she's willing to risk her perfect dress.

Here are more ideas off the top of my head:
Walking under a waterfall
Riding a mechanical bull
Trampoline
Sliding down a steep grassy hill on a piece of cardboard
White water rafting
Diving head-first into a big wedding cake
Parasailing
Rock climbing
Demolition-bride swinging a sledge hammer to break windows, drywall, etc.
Snowboarding
Silly string fight
Fingerpainting with 10 kids, or have kids mess up the bride with their paints
Skateboarding
Waterskiing
Car wash with lots of suds
Playing with fireworks (sparklers, fountains, etc)

Basically, anything with ACTION that makes the bride laugh and smile

As usual, I have questions for Patrick Moreau:

In this Trash The Dress video, how did you get the shot that starts around 1:16? Did you have a crane? It looked like a lot of movement in a cramped space.

Also, when was this shot in relation the the actual wedding?




In general, I don't see much of a market for this type of thing here in Central New York. You never know. I think it depends on the couple. Looks like fun.

My two favorites:
Silly string fight
Fingerpainting with 10 kids, or have kids mess up the bride with their paints
-This one would be colorful. With a white background you could do some high-key shots, etc. It could start out with well-intentioned painting on a canvas and become a full paint fight. How fun.

As for the other ideas: sounds like you have tough brides!

Dana, if you need ideas that are a little more tame, how about these:
1. Sitting at a potter's wheel with colored clay
2. Blowing glass (go to your community college or art class)
3. Food. In a professional kitchen, with big mixing bowls full of flour and eggs, chopping colorful veggies, making pasta by hand, feeding each other spaghetti with hands, eating huge watermelon wedges, cutting and squeezing lemons for lemonade, making salsa from scratch
4. Animals. Wrestling with your dog, or chasing him around in circles, put a pile of birdseed on the ground then running through the birds when they gather.

What is Arizona famous for? I've never been there, but I'm thinking
5. Hot air balloon
6. walking through a garden of cactus or joshua trees
7. hiking through a red rock canyon or through Monument Valley
8. Playing with animal skulls and bones in a desert
9. Playing with harmless snakes

i did a ttd this summer with photogs and it was really fun. the one i did was some what simple compared to what chris and darrell did for event dv.

here it is http://take1productions.blogspot.com...different.html