Teaser - My very own wedding!
 

Hey guys,

After wrapping up editing of my '07 weddings, I finally got a chance to work on my wedding. I've put together a small teaser. Feel free to give your feedback.

I was fortunate enough have my wedding covered by Patrick Moreau and Michael Y Wong, two of the best in the business. With them behind the camera, I didn't have a thing to worry about as they've done an outstanding job. I would like to take this opportunity to thank them as well.

I will post highlights and other clips as they become complete. Thanks for your time.

http://vimeo.com/905314

unfortunately at work at the mo so watching with the sound off but this is VERY interesting!! so let me get this right, PM and MW filmed it, and you're editing it?
it's great to see another take on colour grading and shot selection.

p.s. gliding through dry ice - nice!

p.p.s. congrats on the wedding :)

Hey Ram congrats!

I'm trying to understand, did they shoot it and now you are editing it?

Suggestions on the editing.. I felt a disconnect in the beginning with all the steadicam shots.. it just seemed like a bunch of well done flying shots thrown together onto the timeline. The two back to back shots of the house seemed weird and repetitive to me, but they might have deeper meaning to you. Also some of the steadicam shots were flying too fast(reception tables) IMO and didn't go with the flow of the video/music.

The flying shot thru the fog during the dance is amazing though!

I agree about the disconnect in the beginning. Everything after :36 was great though. Love the color and effects! Good choice of music.

thanks for sharing!

-JS

I thought it was sometimes difficult to lav the groom or bride,,,,in this clip the bride had a BIG mike shoved in her face !! Ha ha.

Nice video though,nice gliding shots.


Paul.

Lucky!!!

That's cool that you got some of the best to shoot your wedding. Very cool.

I have to agree with the other posters, though. Until the music starts, I wasn't really feeling the video. I think if you shortened that opener to maybe 10 seconds it would work, but currently it's just too long. Once the music starts, everything is golden, though. Very nice work in the editing!

Hey Ram,

I like how you put this together. It is quite odd seeing our footage in anothers hands and seeing what they do with it. I think overall it was very solid in terms of the editing but it looked like those guys didn't give you much to work with in terms of the footage.

For the opening I would try and shorten it a hair and also work with the noise a bit to remove some of it. If you then added a slower instrumental piece and perhaps took out a few setting shots in favor of some nice emotional tight shots throughout the day you would really take the whole piece up a notch.

Patrick

Exactly my thought. Although the glidecam shots were great, somehow they didn't fit in with the music trown together in that way.
I only like glidecam shots if they are executed slower, but that's just my personal preference. I did like the "fog" shot, that one was really cool.

Nice video, I liked the groom walking down the steps shot. Very creative.

Like everyone has already mentioned, loved the part with the music. I did think the beginning was a bit long (narrative part) and it would be excellent trimmed down also.

Hi Ramesh,

I thought as a trailer, it was great.

As what everyone said, a nice slow & emotional music piece would have added to the first half of the trailer, and perhaps the intro of your locations could have been made stronger by also including, you and Dolly and perhaps a wide shot of the audience inside the church.

With that said I can see why you were saving those shots & sequences until the music started; since those intros were what you were hoping to build up to via the first half of the trailer.

I thought the colour work was strong, and the lens baby effect was something that I haven't seen before. Really like how the shot of you walkign down the stairs turned out, definately worth the 10 takes if I recall correctly.

I'll be dropping you a line later today since we just got back from NAB in vegas.

Looking forward to seeing more.

Michael

Hey guys... thanks for all your comments.

For those of you who are not clear, yes, Pat and Mike shot the wedding for me and I'm editing it.

Everyone seems to agree about the 1st half (narrative) part being too long. I will look into altering it. But Mike, you took the word out of my mouth. I intentionally chose those shots (empty shots of the venues) and didn't overlay a music to give it a 'raw' feeling. I thought this would add more value to the 2nd half when music starts with shots of people. May be it didn't fully come-out as I expected as many of you are feeling a little disconnected at the beginning.

Mike, yeah shot of me walking down the stairs came out really well. I remember the multiple retakes we had to do to get it right. There is more to it. You will see it the preparation clip which I will post soon.

Pat, good catch on the noise. I thought it would go unnoticed. I will try to remove it.

Two of my personal favorite shots in this clips are the shot through the fog and the silhouette shot at the end. Patrick at his best.

Btw, I'm putting together the Park shoot clip and I really like the way its coming out. I will post it shortly. Be prepared to witness some wacky groomsmen, "microwave dance" by the bride, and infamous "moonwalk on the grass" by the groom (meeeee) ;-)

Once again, thanks for all your comments.

Congrats! The silhouette shot was very nice..!! was it done in the day?

Just wanted to add a quick suggestion.

That raw feeling in the beginning might be able to be achieved by a voice only song. One song I would suggest is Shania Twain's From this Moment on. It has a long intro and would fit perfectly for what you're trying to achieve and by looking at the shots in the video, seems it would still fit the style of editing and shooting well.

I know re-editing a video is a big pain, but I just wanted to throw that out there. I know that song would be able to match your first vision and still have the dramatic start you're looking for in the second portion. Of course you could either dub the priest's voice in and soften shania's talking or not have the priest in there at all.

Hi Ram,

Should you decide to add in Shania Twain for the opening please remove our name from the post, I would feel bad seeing our shots abused like that :)

It is your call though, no pressure lol

What's wrong with Shania Twain? From what everyone has been saying, your shots in the intro are currently not mixing well with the priest or rather is it the priest isn't mixing well with your shots? My suggestion was to get a track that would HELP appreciate your shots better, not "devalue them" by putting them with an artist you dislike :).

I might need to add something like that to my contracts...

Just took a look at your site, no wonder the comment ;). I didn't know who I was talking to.

Not to detract from Ram's video, I'll send you an email on this issue.

Thanks

Pat,

Don't panic! I'm not gonna use Shania Twain; Instead, I'm planning on using "I will always love you" by Whitney Houston ;-)


Randy,

Thanks for your suggestion. But I don't think letting Shania and the Priest fight for the attention of the viewer for the first part isn't a good idea. It will be distracting for the viewer when different tracks of voices are played at the same time (even if one is set at a lower level). Plus, I want to personalize my wedding video as much as possible, that's one of the reasons I've used priest's voice in the beginning. And finally, the song you mentioned is overly used at weddings and wedding videos. It's a great song don't get me wrong, but it is not to my taste.

I can understand why Pat got freaked out when you mentioned Shania's name. If you check some of his videos, you will know his song selection ability is unmatched. That's one of the reasons why he is part of the Top 25 dream team.

Ram -

Fully understand :). I don't have access to the musical score Pat and most of you have so I usually have to make due with great (but VERY overused) songs. I could only suggest with what I know and up to this point, my wedding editing has been limited to songs that are well known.

Personalizing videos is something I'm striving for at this time and which is the reason why I am here learning. I can only hope to reach Pat's level and achieve that top 25 in my lifetime.

Given the situation, I'll admit using Shania's song would be a giant step backward. However, the style in which the song begins and starts is what I was ultimately eluding to.

Thanks and congrats on your wedding!

I agree, I give good videographers credit for their music selection as much as the images they shot.. many times even more for the music selection..

I think Patrick was kidding around, but I could be wrong.