Pre-Wedding Bride/Groom Interview Shoot
 

Tomorrow I will be shooting a Bride/Groom interview video that I will be showing at the wedding reception. I want to have enough good questions to ask them to provide more than plenty good video and good soundbites to edit with. However, I am no good at interviewing and writing interview questions. All I can think of are the basic ones like "Describe how you first met" and "Describe your first date", etc. Can anyone help me out with some good, interesting interview questions?

Also, since it will be blistering hot tomorrow, we will be shooting indoors. Could anyone share any tips on setting up a good backdrop, and maybe good lighting tips too? I really don't want to screw this up.

I will be using 2 GL2s, one in fixed position, and I will be using the other one to get closeups of whichever person is talking to use as cutaways. I have two wired lav mics, and I will have one on both the bride and groom, and each mic will run to a seperate camera. I'm sure only one mic would suffice, but I want to use two just in case.

Any other tips/pointers to make this go as smoothly as possible would be greatly appreciated!

Chris,

I've found that doing to seperate interviews AND a combined interview works best. Ask the same questions of both in the individuals and use them to cut between to tell the story.

Off the top of my head

How we met
When we knew we were in love
Favorite (and least favorite) attributes
How he proposed
What our future holds
What my parents/friends thought of him/her

Rob, thanks for the ideas.
I'm trying to have as many questions as possible just to ensure I have plenty of good content to edit with.

I like the idea of doing seperate interviews as well as together, but in my opinion, there's one minor problem. Both the bride and groom will be here tomorrow and I know they only want to spend one day shooting. If I were to do seperate interviews, It would probably be best if the other was not around. Im not sure if it would be rude to ask them to leave the room or not... anyway I'll see what I can figure out.

Any other interview questions would be welcome :)

I just shot my first real "wedding interview" today myself, and I must say, it was very fun. I drafted about 20 questions, 10 pertaining to the both of them, and 10 about the individual, interviewed the bride and groom seperately hoping to get different answers from the both of them, and it was awesome.

I just had one camera (DVX100) set it up low at one of the beaches here (yes i'm in hawaii) and sat about 3 feet to the left of the camera and just had a simple conversation with them.

I simply reminded them that upon me asking a question to repeat it... i.e. (where did you meet? bride: Well me and Tony met at ...)
That way it's easy to merge the two if needed.

Now what I'm going to do is create a script of questions and pay one of the local power vocalist to ask the questions and do naration. Should be fun, but again, this is my first real video and I'm going all out... (steady cam, jib, 3-4 cameras)

Dang and I thought all my equiptment for my first video was far out.

If i will be using 1 camera only for the interview, will it be better to mount it on a tripod or a moving camera man? and any suggestion on lighting position and what lighting will i use...ARRI are really good but cannot afford yet. any substitute for lighting and postition suggestion...halogen are really hot considering that i will do the interview indoor.

Chris
IMHO I would use 1 cam on a tripod ( 2 will be distracting to the bride and groom ). Definitely interview separately and intercut between the two ( the answers will be a suprise to each when they see the final edit). I try to use natural soft window light as much as possible and position the subject as far from the background as possible. If you must light use a very soft light source on the subject with window light as fill. The less equipment you use the better the interview with less ditractions. Get your subject comfortable and relaxed and just have a conversation will rolling the camera. Try to vary the shot between questions for variety ( close up to medium close up).
Cheers, Aldo