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.

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!

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.