First RED Wedding Booked!

[Don Miller]

Perhaps Scarlet has improved thermal performance compared to Epic. That would reduce surprises, and everything else is predictable.
It's surprising how well wedding shooters have done with the limitations of DSLR. No reason to think that won't happen with Scarlet.

[Louis Maddalena]

Exactly why I figured I'd give it a shot. The only reason why I don't think every DSLR shooter shooting weddings won't move over to it at some point is because its probably cost prohibitive for most people when you get down to media, storage, and editing. I bought it more so for corporate jobs and commercial stuff but figured if I had it it would be a waste not to shoot a wedding with it.

Anybody else doing so as well? What are your plans?

[Jose Ortiz]

I think this is another perfect example how we as wedding filmmakers have the tendency to work for free.
When DSLR came on the wedding industry was the chance to all of us double the price of packages and take advantage of the image quality. It did not happen.
Why? this situation is part of that answer...
In my workshops I always bring the example: "Imagine if you had a lens broken or lost in a wedding that you were just charging just 2k" and please don not get me wrong.... When you start in the industry you need charge cheap to start.. we all did it at some point.. but the idea is to make money and using a RED in a wedding would not make a different on quality for the eyes of the 90% of Brides.
I personally believe using this expensive tool in wedding will increase the chance to loose money.

Good luck and I can not wait to see the footage!! But please even for highlights charge them more if you are using a "better" equipment.

[Warren Kawamoto]

Jose brought up an excellent and very important point. If a bride today is out shopping for a videographer and discovers that Louis charged only $2200 for a Red Epic, Red Scarlet, DSLRs, plus a 3 to 5 man crew for the entire day and night, she has justification to argue with other videographers who are NOT using Red that their price should be a LOT lower than $2200.

After you consider the equipment cost, manpower, and all the hours involved with shooting and editing, there is no way you could even come close to breaking even if you charge only $2200. Think about it. Louis, rather than making gains for the industry, you are actually hurting everyone in it.

[Jason Finnigan]

Seams wedding video budgets are coming close to that of small indie films haha.. Would love to see it though.

[John Knight]

Originally Posted by Warren Kawamoto

After you consider the equipment cost, manpower, and all the hours involved with shooting and editing, there is no way you could even come close to breaking even if you charge only $2200. Think about it. Louis, rather than making gains for the industry, you are actually hurting everyone in it.

Agreed. Reinforcing perceptions that our time is worth nothing.

[Louis Maddalena]

Originally Posted by Warren Kawamoto

Jose brought up an excellent and very important point. If a bride today is out shopping for a videographer and discovers that Louis charged only $2200 for a Red Epic, Red Scarlet, DSLRs, plus a 3 to 5 man crew for the entire day and night, she has justification to argue with other videographers who are NOT using Red that their price should be a LOT lower than $2200.

After you consider the equipment cost, manpower, and all the hours involved with shooting and editing, there is no way you could even come close to breaking even if you charge only $2200. Think about it. Louis, rather than making gains for the industry, you are actually hurting everyone in it.

The way I do it is this. I'm not charging for the camera because they're not getting that camera quality, later down the line I will charge but this is a one time only thing to make sure the camera won't' die in the middle of something important. My second shooter gets $750 a day. My DIT will pull in $250 leaving $1200 remaining in the budget. That gets me working for a little bit more than $100 an hour but then I have to factor in over head. My office is above my Dad's doctors office in a building he owns.. I'm a little bit spoiled in the fact that I don't pay rent because I'm still newish to the industry and I spend all my profits on new gear. I do pay for advertising but even after all my overhead is paid for, the total amount of profit I'm making is still a lot , I know its low, but for the first time where I know I'm going to be experiencing camera problems I think its a justified price point. Future RED weddings are not going to be $2200, but I think $2200 for a 4 minute video is a good deal for both them and me because I get to test this camera, and they get a high quality finished project. Especially when my competition in my area is charging 3500 for a 40-60 minute video.