dvd examples
 

hello to all...

i am a current graduate student in the area of media arts and studies with one semester to go - i am planning on doing weddings in order to pay back my mountain of loans and finance my independent films...i've been reading alot on this forum about getting started - (it's been incredibly helpful! thank you to everyone!) i currently own a vx2100 and edit on final cut pro 4, in the fall i plan on purchasing additional equipment - wireless mic, lighting, etc (yes, another loan!) and can borrow from my school as needed...

i plan on doing a few weddings for very cheap in order to put together a demo - i've done one wedding, but it was a favor for a friend and i handed over all the raw footage for her to edit (d'oh)...otherwise all my stuff is either concert footage or experimental (not films to be shown to perspective clients) my problem is this - i need to see some examples - everything i've found online consists of only clips, plus i live in the country and only have dial-up (ugh!) so the clips i can download (i'm having trouble with windows media player) takes FOREVER...i really want to see some dvds in full so i can have an idea of what's out there right now and to figure out what direction to take mine in...i know some places give clients examples, but i don't thing they'll take too kindly to a competitor...does anyone have any ideas? or know where a decent clip is in quicktime?perhaps someone would like to share their work? :)

thanks for reading through all this...any other advice would appreciated!
nikkii

Nikkii, I don't think you'll find many professionals that will willingly send out their work to other videographers for study. My suggestion would be to invest in some Wedding Videography training videos. Most of which actually consist of real wedding footage anyway.

http://www.tulsaweddingvideos.com/videographers.shtml

http://www.weddingfilms.com/eventvideographer/

...are good starts.

My response is not related to weddings or video... but to the thought of getting a loan.

DO NOT go into debt! If you already have a camera and some equipment you can use, knock out some weddings for cheap (cheap enough to where you can still eat) and SAVE like you have NEVER SAVED BEFORE. And once you have the $ to purchase what you need, DO IT.

If there's one thing you don't want to do its dread the first of every month. Monthly payments and accruing interest are BAD and can both easily wipe out what money you might be making.

That's my two cents... and the wife tells me it's not even worth half that.

Very true!
I started out using a Panasonic MiniDV Palmcm (or HAndycam, I don't remember), I did some football games with that a Wal-*** tripod and Arcsoft's Showbiz. Everyone was impressed by it , so word of me slowly grew, I made my prices cheap enough, knowing I would get more business (more money) in the end. Eventually I grew into doing wedding videos (I also did short films before weddings), But none the less pay in cash if possible (I have) also some retailers, when you ask them for their CASH price they will usually drop the price a little, it nothing else rent equip., just make sure you get reimbursed for it in the price of you wedding,
Most people did the their first wedding for free. I didn't, I knew I had the experience to do it and did, It didn't turn out bad at all and everyone liked it.
Thing it being on a budget I KNOW. My first wedding I didn't have a job, except for my production business growing. I was a freshman/sophomore in college. You get the picture.

What I used:
GL2
Tripod
Steady Stick (for Pictures & Ceremony)
Ran an unbalanced mike cable from the mixer into my camera. (DO NOT TRY, It didn't work)
4- 80 min MiniDV tapes
100-watt on camera light which hooks to separate battery pack (it was a bit to bright unless you used it to bounce light off the wall.
I think that's it, you can read about my experience here:
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthrea...6&page=1&pp=15

I think I may have gotten a bit off topic, but that's what I did
~Matt