Here's a look at Andrew and Sabrina's wedding day. We filmed with Canon XHA1's and an HV30, and also used a Steadicam Merlin. Enjoy!

Highlights for Andrew & Sabrina on Vimeo (http://www.vimeo.com/3890943)

Travis - nice work. I liked the time shifting, kept my interest because it was not so predictable. Toward the end of the piece, the pacing was starting to get a little slow for me and then you kicked in the fast cuts which I thought worked out great. What a beautiful backdrop from the dancefloor. I also loved how you captured the filtered sunlight. Overall - great job!

Art

Thanks, Art. I was so happy that their first dance coincided with sunset. Made for some great shots.

Travis
Well made clip, great colors, first shot is awesome!
Keep good work coming..

Wow! Very nicely done. Really like the way you timed cuts to music. Your artistry is amazing. Really brought out the emotion. Thanks for sharing.
Randy

Okay, seriously? More than 100 views and only 3 people have left a comment?

Okay, seriously? More than 100 views and only 3 people have left a comment?

Almost same story on my video that I posted

But I guess I am guilty of not leaving comments.

Great video and some awesome merlin shots

btw what weights do you use on your hv30. I always have hard time balancing my hv20 on my merlin. it flips sideways gently...like see saw

Thank you, Jawad. Regarding the Merlin, I only shoot with my XHA1 on the Merlin. It's much more stable because of the extra weight. I used to shoot with GL2's, which are half the weight of the A1, and the Merlin was more difficult to control.

So now the whole setup has gone from 5 pounds to 10 pounds, which is better for control but much harder on me physically over the course of a day. d;-)

Great stuff bro! Was this the wedding with the particular kiss shot we talked about? The quick cuts towards the end were great.

Indeed it was, Randy. Thus the reason I had to use the kiss shot from the balcony that was 100 yards from the alter. Thanks for watching and commenting.

R. Stewart, thanks to you also for the comments. Much appreciated!

Here's a look at Andrew and Sabrina's wedding day. We filmed with Canon XHA1's and an HV30, and also used a Steadicam Merlin. Enjoy!

Highlights for Andrew & Sabrina on Vimeo (http://www.vimeo.com/3890943)

Great shots. I was paying attention to the yellow color tone your choose (since I'm trying to figure out if / when I should try a post-based color grading) and it looked great.

I really liked the shot of the bridal party in a circle where you fly around them because you got some real fun footage of them goofing off. Lots of other money shots, especially the kiss at the end, and some of those dancing shots. Did the CotR church give you any more guff this time?

How did the cams behave in the low light? I am unfortunately stuck in SD for the remainder of this year (or longer) so I won't be moving up any time soon.... but I'm always curious about the HDV vs XDCAM debate to see which format "wins" for weddings.

Jason, glad you liked the coloring. The bridal part shot was originally intended to be used in real-time with the actual audio, but then I got the idea to speed it up and it seemed to work better. Gotta love it when things just work right.

Regarding the CotR .. I really dislike filming there. It's a beautiful church, but the locations they allow you to film from are so limited. You almost need 5 or 6 cameras to do a really good job there. I shot another wedding there the next weekend and supposedly the bride got permission for me to be on the floor on my knees up front next to the aisle .. couldn't move at all obviously, so I was on my knees on that hard floor for 30 minutes straight. Anyways, afterwards they wanted to blacklist me again for being there. Apparently the bride didn't get permission from them afterall. From now on I just film from the other locations and save myself the trouble. d;-)

Oh, low-light on the A1's seems okay to me. The GL2's might have been a bit better, but it's hard to tell without a side-by-side test. One things for sure, there doesn't seem to be any good reason to upgrade to HD in our area. I poll every couple I meet with, and so far roughly 9 out of 10 don't even own an HDTV and aren't the slightest bit interested in HD. Of those few that are mildly interested, they aren't interested in paying extra for it.

Great work travis. I am quickly becoming a fan of yours. A fine selection of shots. I notice some shallow DoF ones, did you use an adapter to get those???

Hi Travis, I thought it was great. Some very nice moving shots and good mix of merlin shots. Only one minor observation at around 2:23...could be wrong will check! but a dissolve did not feel right!

Nice colour grading. I forgot to answer your question in your post earlier. I think it's magic bullet presets adding it's own diffusion! Will have to look into this further as I have found it sometimes blows the whites as well.

Cheers.

Great work travis. I am quickly becoming a fan of yours. A fine selection of shots. I notice some shallow DoF ones, did you use an adapter to get those???

Thanks, Danny. Appreciate it. I don't use a DoF adapter yet. Just maximizing what my camera can do for now.

Hi Travis, I thought it was great. Some very nice moving shots and good mix of merlin shots. Only one minor observation at around 2:23...could be wrong will check! but a dissolve did not feel right!

Nice colour grading. I forgot to answer your question in your post earlier. I think it's magic bullet presets adding it's own diffusion! Will have to look into this further as I have found it sometimes blows the whites as well.

Cheers.

John, thanks for watching. You are totally correct about the shot at 2:23. Basically at the end of the shot the couple is quickly moving to the right of the frame. I kind of felt like maybe it didn't look right, but eventually convinced myself it was okay. I'm glad you mentioned it because now I know my gut instinct was right!

Good luck with the MB stuff!

Hey Travis,

I had some trouble watching this one - for some reason I could only watch it in HD - damn it :)

Really liked your work. The dance with the sunset and lens flare is a knockout.

The colouring during the ceremony was nice also. It had kind of a soft, vintage look to it. Not sure if that's what you're going for but it worked for me.

Cheers,

Matt.

Sorry for the trouble, Matt. I'm not sure why Vimeo is doing that. It did it to me as well.

Anyways, thanks for watching and thanks for the comments!

wow - how am I ever gonna catch up to you guys?

and you actually have lots of footage with the merlin and A1 - I can only hold the thing up for 30 sec.

I think in retrospect the thing I notice most about clips like these is that I go in watching for ideas & technique and end up getting immersed in the day itself.

how do you match the HV30 and A1? - I seem to have lots of trouble.

watching for ideas & technique and end up getting immersed

And THAT is a sign of great videography :D

Paul, thanks for watching. Honestly, you have to pace yourself and in some ways don't worry too much about 'catching up' with anyone. When I first got into this I wanted to be the best right away (I have that tendency with anything I pick up). But it takes time and if you aren't careful you'll worry too much about what other people are doing and you won't develop a style of your own. So just hang in there and pace yourself. Don't douse the fire to get better, but be happy with the progress you've made. Anyways, pep talk over.

I agree that the Merlin is not friendly on the arm. I shoot with one all day (usually 10-12 hours), and my arm and back are killing me by the end of the day. I actually do special exercises just because of the Merlin. But that's one reason I want a Pilot, so I'm not disabled at the end of the day. I gotta say I think adrenaline kicks in during the day and over-powers most of the pain ... but it's all there the next day. d;-)

As for matching the A1 and the HV30, keep these things in mind. The HV30 generally has stronger color saturation and contrast, and is a bit sharper (to the point of being a bit harsh in comparison to the A1). So in post I usually back the saturation and contrast down some on the HV30 footage and up the saturation and contrast on the A1 footage. It ends up looking fairly close. This year I'm going to shoot with CINE turned off on the HV30, as that bumps the contrast and saturation in the image I think.

Hope that helps. Thanks for watching!

And THAT is a sign of great videography :D

I couldn't agree more. We have to be mindful of all the tricks and tools we have at our disposal. If they aren't adding to the viewer's experience of the story, then they are probably taking away from it and should be used differently.

An example would be Merlin footage versus handheld footage versus tripod footage. The Merlin footage is cool, but only in moderation. If you use too much of it, the effect is lost. Same goes for handheld and tripod footage. It's all a matter of learning a balance that works for your style of storytelling .. and the learning process never ends.