Wedding Highlights
 

Hey guys,

Shot a wedding 2 weeks ago and finished up the highlights this week... just wanted to get some professionals opinions on it.

Here are some things I know and won't do again:
- The audio sucks big time
- There are some shots that are shaky for no reason
- The framing between the groom and the bride do not completely match

I hope you guys like it!

Re: Wedding Highlights
 

Louis,
I think they bride will be happy with what you created, good job. I'm not a professional, but I'll brain dump what I've learned over the last year.

Regarding the sound. Check to make sure that the lav mic is an "Omnidirectional lav". It looks like you set it up correctly, its just picking up too much background reverb. Maybe list the lav your using and if you did any post to the audio so that the more experienced guys can give some suggestions. I would use constant power to transition the music into the speeches (think video transition, but with the audio). It will make it less abrupt. Also look at vocal enhancer and eq parametric to get the voice to stand out.

Regarding the shaky footage. Look into post process stabilization software like prodad (or warp stabilizer which takes longer). It can eliminate that kind of stuff completely, you just need to learn how to use it. I drop my stuff down to 720 to recover footage when I have issues like that. Also, Newbluefx makes a plug in that can sometimes get rid of some of the flash from vdslr's.

Great job on white balance. Things like cineform really help out to deal with difficult tungsten lighting. I'd try to get your exposure more uniform, seemed like it went from dark to light a little in the first part. In outdoor shots, try to underexpose the footage to bring in the sky and then correct the exposure in post. You can also add a little contrast to make a glummy day look a little brighter. Watch your highlights, the 5d isn't the best at recording the highlights, so its better to expose for them to fix things in post. Some of the clips, the brides forehead was hot, and exposing for it might have brought it back.

Check your export preset, the transcode looks a little bitmapped full screen. I like H.264 with the vimeo HD preset. Also add unsharp and sharpen at 12 to really get the footage crisp. Might not show up on a plasma screen, but for the internet deliverable, it really helps.

Great eye and composition, and great job!

Re: Wedding Highlights
 

Did your Lav mic go out? I really didn't notice the framing issue until I started looking for it. As far as shake goes, are you using a monopod and what type?

Re: Wedding Highlights
 

Put the lav mic on the groom, and then the dj proceeded to set up a wired mic in front of them and I thought it looked pretty ugly so I said, why don't I just throw my wireless through that board and then eliminate the ugly mic from the shot. Did a mic check and all was good, but then the dj adjusted the levels after I had set my recorder and everything from that point forward was overly modulated and couldn't be used, so to solve this problem in the future, I'm going to buy another wireless mic that the dj can use if their plan is to include a wired mic. And then use my current system to record the audio near my camera so I can monitor it.

The shots that were a little bit shaky were handheld, but I do use a monopod at some portions of the day, and a tripod as well.

Re: Wedding Highlights
 

Wow, completely didn't see this post lol.

Thanks for all the great advice.... I definitely understand what you mean to watch the exposures.. the main problem is that I shoot with a friend of mine, and we never expose the same location the same way... he tends to slightly under expose and I tend to slightly over expose.. we both know what we're doing, we are just going for different looks and for some reason thats the one thing we always just think the other person is doing the same and we forget to talk about it...

The problem with the audio is as I described it in my last post... no lav at all... got over modulated when the dj changed the levels and I didn't know he was doing it... so all that audio is from the 5D mic, and I tried my best to make it sound nice in sound track pro.

I'm going to check that software to try to remove the flashes! that sounds like it would really help :) I also have to go through the audio and try to see if I can remove the sound of the shutters of the cameras.

I shall try to use some of the other filters you mentioned and see which one works the best... Thanks so much for the critique.

Re: Wedding Highlights
 

"the main problem is that I shoot with a friend of mine, and we never expose the same location the same way... he tends to slightly under expose and I tend to slightly over expose.. we both know what we're doing, we are just going for different looks and for some reason thats the one thing we always just think the other person is doing the same and we forget to talk about it"...

My best suggestion for this is...If you guys are using the same camera (5d for example) and hopefully the same lens, agree on a color temp first 3200k, 5600k etc.. then agree on an ISO and an f stop. On a day where clouds are moving this could be tricky, but for indoors it takes away any color correcting and you can paste any attributes that you make on one cam to another without having to make any adjustments. Just my 2 cents.

Re: Wedding Highlights
 

This is a very good idea and we'll do that the next time... because the biggest pain in the butt on this particular edit was matching everything.

Re: Wedding Highlights
 

Nice work! Very beautiful scenery. Good editing work too.

What camera and lens you used? Does your lens have OIS? I think the shakes was caused by lens without OIS.