Lessons

Lesson Info

Shoot: The Ceremony

So we're gonna head over to our ceremony and robin, I will talk to a little bit about what we're doing for the ceremony to make it the priest yes, we're gonna do some audio now we're gonna do some miking up and obviously this wouldn't be done in front of all the guests, but we are doing this for illustration purposes. All right, so we have our officiant here. Thank you very much. We're going to be making him up. Our groom is going to stay here. So you guys you know, we would normally do this out here, but I'm gonna show you guys how we do this. So while robin getting his microphone stuff it just want to tell you our thought process is too what we communicated and how we're going to stand here because I am the photographer. I do need to get that shot of the bride walking down the aisle, so I need to be here and I've chosen the side so that I can both turn to get the groom's reaction and get the bride walking down the aisle on the flip side robin's going to be in the back same side of th...

e aisle so that we don't get in each other's shots, right? So why am I going to be in the back of the isle? Well, I mean for fusion piece I'm looking more for that money shot of the ceremony and what's more important to me is the groom and his face as the bride's coming down the aisle just in this case, plus wearing tight corners and have two of us up here, it would be really kind of time and this happens it's this tight normally, sometimes in reception can their money really can be. So I'm going to I mean, I would like to be on the backs on back in the back. I'm sorry on the same side is vanessa this way, she's not shooting directly into may, so we'll set that up in a second, mike, our vips here and then while he's doing that, I'm just gonna get my soldier and I'm going to use one of our guests here with my life you to get the exposure since she's here on dh that'll be right about pre exposing instead of pre focusing here, so that would be right about where I take the picture of the bride and my white bounces at forty three hundred, my shutter speed at one twenty five and my appetite at two point eight war talking. When the bride is walking down the aisle, I will change into my al servo mode teo get the focus to continue while she's walking down the aisle is just something I like to do if I have enough light and the you know I can trust the camera two focus there to this so rob you're using the exact same microphone has kim task can de ouro seven mark too and what I'm doing here I mean normally I would have him tuck this in his shirt and bring it up here just for the sake of time and what we're doing here I'm just going to put it on him it's ok and it's gonna have you talk about in your pocket so you just slip it right in there and be great and for the groom what I did was I might him up on the outside of his lapel and I took the mic into his pocket into his jacket pocket I normally put two microphones on the groom but I only brought two with me on the plane so we're just gonna put one on him for now and what I normally like to do is put one at this height and then one a little bit lower usually down here why do I do that? Well sometimes brides or different heights on a lot of times when they're facing each other if you I see a lot of guys putting the mic way up here and that might sound really good for the groom but if a bride is shorter, she's talking directly into his chest and you're missing the sounds not going into the mic, so I just I used these mikes, they're really high quality and they're pretty sensitive, so I like to just kind of leave him in this position right here, and then I would probably put another one down on this side over here, that's good, you get buttoned up and you're all set to go, we would do that in private, by the way, we wouldn't do that right out here and keep saying that. So at this point, I'm just going to go set up my camera in the back on this would be going on right before the ceremony were to start. So all right, so what rob is planning to do is going to be on that side, focusing on the groom's reaction as she walks down the aisle. Would you have a beautiful flower girl that is going to be coming down the aisle? A cz? Well, so if that's happening it's almost like great practice on the bride's maids walked down the aisle for your shooter's shooting video behind you, teo, get used to it practice a few times if they're honest, lighter or even if they're just on a mono pod, what it's gonna look like when the bride walks down so it's nice to get a little bit of a practice run so what'll happen is the bride's gonna walk down the aisle and they're going to turn here? We're not going to say stop this we're going to let this play out so that's why I'm explaining it to you now so the bride's going to walk down the aisle? They're going to turn to face each other here and the priest is going to start his homily, which we've written from so he's just going to read that the microphone is going to be picking him up andi even though we did not duel mike the officiant or the groom, we've actually kind of duel mike because they're both wearing mike's and if one usually do do like the brother I know I know, but right now since we didn't know you kind of have a dual make set up because they are close enough where the mike would pick up the other person a little bit as well so they're going to come up here homilies can happen and then they're going to say their vows and remember we talked about this earlier with the vows how you can have one angle get your safe shot I should say get your safe shot in the aisle first you would do that during the homily so the video is gonna get the safe shot during the homily then rob and I are both going to come to one side take the pictures of the vows getting the groom's face and then walk around to the other side take pictures and videos of vows getting the bride's face all while cropping in trying to get nice and tight to see that into the conversation take it also is worth noting at this point that we've communicated okay vanessa and I know where each other is going to be at all times this way we don't end up in each other's shots so my plan for the ceremony is and I kind of thought this out on how I want to shoot it I know they're going to be saying vows to each other and I want to get those vows so I'm going after I get my shot of the bride coming up the aisle in the back I'm gonna let them get settled I'm goingto come around this side I'm going to grab my mon a pod and I'm going to be here looking at the bride okay? I'm just doing this for a few seconds just to kind of get settled and then what I'm gonna do is moved to the isle to get my safe shot this is my safe shot right here I just want to get the officiant and the bride ing room standing together okay so I just have them as that beautiful nice overall shot so while the priest is giving his homily, I can be here with that then when the groom starts to give his vows, I'm going to move over to this side and I'm going to shoot over the bride's shoulder to the groom's face and I'm going to make sure that I'm getting him saying that saying vows and then once it's the bride's turn I'm gonna come back over here and that's my plan for the ceremony and again, we're just shooting for short clips for fusion. If I was doing a film, we'd have cameras locked down faraway zoomed in and we would just stay in one place, but we're just you know, it's one camera we're just trying to get a couple different angles for the ceremony. All right? So once we start this ceremony, there is no stopping because there's no stopping there's no stopping you is everybody have their vows is the art room have his vows is our bride have her back? Okay, you can hand them to her one when she's up there. Actually, I need to change the battery in my camera. This is something that you know is normally like before her video is sex up your battery a lot, so be sure that you have enough battery power at all times yeah, usually right in between all the major events we're very careful to make sure that we have enough card space and battery so we don't run into situations where in the middle of the ceremony we have a problem running out of either. So again, what else am I doing inside my camera? Making sure my audio is good for the reference point for sinking up later on, so I'm just going into my menu, and soon as it comes up on the screen you'll be able to see I'm going into my live you and checking my sound recording tab and just by the sound of my voice that looks okay, maybe it's a little bit hot, I'll dial it down just a touch and that looks pretty good. So at this point I'm ready and I'd be waiting for the ceremony to start. So whenever you guys already have at it, get married way to celebrate the joining of dawn and fema in the bond and a covenant of marriage. Marriage is a blessed union between a man and a woman joining him two hearts, two souls marriage is built upon without love american with and problem, but with love as a foundation dawn, we'll be able to face anything thiss world and throw their way always is today, now that dawn and demon now yeah, with with with time I greatly extend your part today you're pregnant there's nothing in this world that whatever way you you're my best friend my only my one true love I promise to always be there for you in good times and bad I can't believe this day is finally here I'm so happy to be marrying the man that I've always dreamed about since I was a little girl I was imagining you although I hadn't met you yet you're my rock my shoulder my only true love separate we're not perfect we're perfect together that's all that will ever matter give you my heart my soul my life saver gone and dean I now invite you to join your hands and declare the words you've written for each other in the presence of your family, friends and the entire creative line come in okay that's sort of what they just did hey sort of said the vows already that's okay that's fine. You can kiss the bride and at this point they'd walk out back to back up the aisle and that would be the end of the ceremony. So flaws okay, that was challenging my wire. It was like trying trying to move around all the different spots the wire was really giving me problems normally we wouldn't have that I'd be able to just pick up and move and get to where I got to get to stay with me my wire came out yeah that's that's really something that we would never have that definitely poses a challenge but yeah so I couldn't really get the angle that I wanted to on the bride from the other side like couldn't just couldn't reach with wire so but you get the general idea you know that's that's sort of how I mean that was a quick ceremony and normally they're like, you know, the fastest ceremonies we've seen it like ten minutes, which is pretty quick but most ceremonies on site like this or like a half hour and gives you a lot more time to work so might be nice why don't we have you guys come on back up here and just get the shot so that they can see the type of foreground thatyou yes yeah that'd be great I need what I need is this wire to come a little bit? Yeah don't do that I didn't what I didn't was trying not to do was walk in front during the ceremony that's a big no no so I just didn't want you guys come on back so you guys just stand on your spot there and this would have been the framing that I've probably would have gone for for the ceremony right there so you guys can hold hands right there and what do your settings there? I have to stop the camera to find out let's see I'm at eight hundred on the so just because it was a little darker and they're kind of back lit, so I needed the extra eye, so to kind of to maintain my shutter speed, and I like to shoot my ceremonies a little higher on the shutter just because I want nice, crisp movement when they're when they're saying their vows and I want to look sharp, so I'm not one hundred three two at eight hundred and that's what the shot would have looked like right there, so I'm just going to roll my camera games, I want to get her reaction and I think that looks really good and I was able to get the other side, so I was able to get the exact opposite of that, so fifty millimeter lens is really nice to be up close. Sometimes we use a one thirty five actually, john, if you could just grab my one thirty five, I can kind of illustrate that, just sort of what that looks like a lot of times we wouldn't want to be this close, you want to kind of be back here, maur this way, we're out of the way, so you need to stop and notice that I'm nearing what rob does this is really important because I wanted to get this side of the groom's face. I would see robin my shots and he would be in mind so we need to mirror each other exactly what we're doing on the other side and this is a nice trap for me anyway because I have the same foreground that he does so if you look at the monitor now I'm standing double the distance away and I have a very similar shot it's actually really really pretty shot so that's what I normally tried to do for ceremonies and sometimes they'll even use a tripod of this distance just to maintain a little bit more steadiness but that looks really nice I really like that a lot and then you want to flip to the other side yeah if I can think this time we can walk in front and right here impose a little bit of a challenge because we got this little bit of greenery in the way but that's actually pretty good looking looking looking at each other right there guys that's nice role that so you can have that for the fusions like joe it's a little bit warm I'm gonna just nice like their reactions and I was able to get a safe shot from the aisles that looks really good and I would be pretty happy with the shots same thing I'm coming from the other side in the same same type of angle so in a nutshell that's how we would do our ceremony that was really rushed on that was kind of crazy, but that's that's the general sense of how we do it and we were just always conscious of each other and there's actually a point where vanessa realized that she was in my line of fire, so she immediately noticed and she ducked down, so just keeping an eye on each other and knowing what's going on is half the battle and I will keep you guys out of each other shots, but yeah, those I mean for a fusion slide show what I was able to describe in that short amount of time, the slider from the back, the safe shot from the aisle one and two reactions from these sides and and I have the audio of the vows, so we put this together in a slide show is going to look really, really nice and that's what we're gonna do tomorrow, going to put it all together for you so that's pretty good any questions from the gallery here about what we did or just concerns like maybe you saw some problems that you thought would be other than the wires that doesn't count gabriel you like, I know you have the records recording the whole thing the whole time, and when you switching between shocks from like you don't, you don't necessarily have to get the whole her holes vallis uh always say right right, you kind of just switch back and forth and then just kind of have to sound playing over whatever you're yeah right? Because we're showing all different shots during that time he might take her thirty wooded part again about forty five seconds to recite her vows from start to finish and we might only use that maybe twenty five seconds of them you know, maybe the sweetest part right? And we shall be role will show different shots over that, so I'm not too concerned about having her locked down now if I was shooting a film when I do my wedding cinematography and I have a crew for people you know it's one person there, one person back there, one person back way in the back of the aisle and then an audio technician is making sure that all the audio is perfect that's a whole different thing because when I put it together in a twenty five minute film, I had need the entire ceremony I know most of what's what's happening then for fusion, all you gotta remember is all you're doing is looking for a good visual at that point and that just needs to be two to three seconds like there was some great spots where she would just come like, look down, look up, smile at her groom and that is all you need you need that once you got that move on to something else you can make it nice and quick you're not filming for coverage right? Do we have another question good you guys had said before take your shots first and then do video if you are going solo and it's just you, which you know is not recommended for wedding but just when we find ourselves in that situation would you recommend doing in la as she's seen her bows take the shots, then get a clip of the video before you switch to the other side or do photos photos comeback to video go back to honestly I wouldn't even worry about it if it was this solo, I wouldn't worry about trying to get them talking with their mouths with their mouths moving I would just get your photographs from yeah like what you said from this angle, I got my groom couple photographs which over get five seconds of video flipped to the other side couple photographs of the bryce perspective and then same thing couple five seconds video do one from the aisle that's your that's, your whole ceremony and what you've got what you're looking for on those five second video clips is and smiling and emoting if you if they're not and they're sitting there stone faced which happens turned to the crowd get one shot here and turned find look somebody looking somebody in the crowd that might be giving off some emotion on and I would just do it like that, but any time you're doing that for a wedding photos need to take priority because you were hired as a photographer, not as a videographer another another suggestion if you are attempting to do this by yourself don't even necessarily worry about that part of all keep a tripod or your glide cam in the back and then when you know the first kiss is going to come to your basic shots of the first kiss dart to the back of the aisle and get that shot of them walking out yeah that's what that's something I do also with films will have something in stationary in the back and we'll do slides that that's great cool so let's give our bride and groom a nice big round of applause they were awesome let's give our our fishy and we want to thank him as well for doing an amazing job flower girl back there also great and everybody you helped us out today we really appreciate you guys come down so at this point what was there something else we need to cover about? I have the feeling they're probably a million questions at this point questions yes, I think so maybe way do you have a million questions vanessa and rob but we are running out of time, you know we are going to hold on to those questions. We've got him weakened, perhaps get back to them tomorrow. Perfect. So pass it over to you. Yeah, thank you, vanessa. This has been an incredible day of just watching your process and just seeing how the photo and the video goes together, and how to use this to shoot a wedding and to shoot all kinds of photography has just been it's. Just been incredible. So big global round of applause for vanessa and rob again today. Thank you so much.