Shoot-It-Yourself Wedding Video Guide

“If there is ever one picture your ancestors have of you, that’s the one in your wedding dress,” – this is how a dress designer speaks of her product in this National Public Radio story.

“The birde’s dress signals how wealthy she is,” – continues the narration. “But it can also signal how seriously she is taking this marriage.”

OK now. What is the point of putting on a “signal” dress if the ancestors have no chance to see the photo if it’s not been taken or filmed? Does not hiring a videographer signal a seriousness of intentions for both bride and groom, and also the one of their families?

 Last weekend the DJ working at the reception with me shared his observation, and here it is: if 5-7 years ago 4 out 5 wedding parties hired a videographer, today’s ratio is 1 out of 5. What is it: crisis, bad marketing, generational change, combination of factors?

Here is in my opinion typical aftermath conclusion, borrowed from the Brides.com forum:

“I spent $10,000 on flowers and event design – all my own money because my mother thought I was insane (I probably was insane). Looking back at it later, I am acutely aware that my wedding would have been just as beautiful, just as memorable, just as fun for my family and friends if I’d spent $1,000 on the flowers. I’m ok with having spent it because I didn’t go into debt to pay for it and learned a valuable lesson about needing to say “do I really need that??”, but if I had it to do over again I’d have cut it back and put that money to better use. This is why I said to really think about whether you NEED a videographer – that’s $1500 you could save just to have another layer of permanent memories on top of the photos, which you’ve already paid for (and will probably look at a billion times more often). “

And there is also very interesting response to that entry:

“When I heard the videographer was going to be $1900 extra I said HECK NO. I hate my voice on video and I hate seeing myself on video too. I wasn’t going to pay thousands knowing I’d never watch it.”

I’ve heard similar words said right into my face. It seems to be just fact of life – people hate seeing themselves on the photo, never mind the video. Is there more self conscious brides nowadays then 10 years ago?

What do you think?

/A\ Morning Ottawa has performed another live on-air wedding – this time for Heather and Robert, who had never managed to get married for last 13 years.

The building was turned upside down to accommodate for all the sponsors, contests and of course for the bride and the groom and their two daughters.

Building on success of the live on-air wedding broadcasted in May 2009, A-Morning TV Show pulled another one, just as successful. The small army of local wedding vendors eager to showcase their talents, has helped to present beautifully every element of the show.

Family and guests are looking down on the ceremony from the second floor of the Media Mall on 87 George St. in Ottawa, Canada.

I asked the show producer Ziyada Callender to assess the success. Ziyada kindly responded, and here is the interview:

Q:  What was the success on a scale form 1 to 10?

Z: On a scale of 1 to 10, I would rate the wedding show a 9… since
there’s always room for improvement! There was so much to do in such a
short space of time, I’m more than happy with the outcome of the show.

Ingrid and Gino are leaving the Ceremony at the A-Morning Ottawa.

Q: The most important motive of every wedding is keeping the bride happy.
Do you think we made Ingrid feel good?

Z: Keeping Ingrid happy for this wedding was even more important than the
first wedding we did, because our focus was on couples who had a
disastrous first wedding. Ingrid’s first wedding was a complete
catastrophic destination wedding so it was extremely important that she
was pleased with everything. Thankfully, she was!

Q: Have you heard back from the viewers? Any exciting emails you could
quote for me?

A: We had a quite a few emails from viewers saying how happy they were with
the wedding show (the dress was beautiful, they got so many prizes,
etc.) but the best one for me — the one that I kept — was from the
bride and groom themselves:

Thank you for giving us such a great ‘re-do’. It was an experience that we will never forget. Please pass on our thanks to the staff and hosts of the show. Everyone was so nice and worked hard to make the day so great for us and our guests. We may not have come across as sentimental on the show but this ‘re-do’ experience not only gave us a new wedding day experience that was far better than our own it also helped to remind Gino and I that we have a great life together with our children.

Wedding gown show makes good television.

Q: Local wedding vendors charge big money for their services. You have not
charge the couple a penny. Are you going to spoil local brides?

Z: We love our community and showcasing local businesses. If there’s a
venue for us to support both, we’re definitely going to do it!

Q: How do you think it affects local vendors in terms of setting up certain
standards. Who is catching up?

Z: I think shows like this gives vendors involved a chance to showcase
their supply to such a mass audience and ultimately, generates more
business. Because of what we’re doing, I feel local vendors are raising
both their quality and quantity to meet the demands once being on our
show.

I will let you know if there is another live on-air morning show in the future. Thanks!

– says TV producer Joanne Woo.

Joanne produces daily breakfast television show in Ottawa, National Capital of Canada. The city with its suburbs totaling up to around one million inhabitants wakes up to the only local morning show named simply – A-Morning. /A\ (sic!) is the brand of the station, hence the show title.

On the photo: the weather and the best man Bill Welychka looks up as the A-Morning host Kurt Stoodley performs the ceremony.

 While the station struggles through the hurdles caused by the federal regulations and current status of economy, the staff decided to take on the wedding theme and run four hour show culminating in the live on-air wedding ceremony.

JOANNE WOO: “It’s something we’ve never done… I love the challenge of new things. So we thought what the heck, let’s take a chance.”

The show propped up by the local sponsors went well as a high class wedding with the white limousine, make up artists, decorators, clothing retailers and jewelers, all focused on promoting their businesses at the same time making good television. Response was strong and positive -from the married couple, their families, sponsors and viewers as well. The station in fact has received several requests for the copies of the show.

JOANNE WOO: “It’s a big morale boost to know that our little station can put together a big production with so few resources.” The show was put on shortly after the major cuts in the industry in a whole and about 50% staff lay off at the station.

On the photo: news anchor Sandra Blaikie blows bubbles on the newly married couple Stephan and Christina leaving the TV station.

Apparently the station is keen on capitalizing on success and eager to run the sequel, and possibly to make the wedding show a regular one.

Is it going to affect local wedding video production businesses? It will definitely raise the bar in production quality challenging local videographers to catch up. Is it going to compete with the businesses? Probably not. Few occasional weddings a year won’t bite out of a big pie. On a contrary, production team wants to see wedding videographers on the show, says Joanne.

That’s all. Let me know what you think in the Comments box. I would like to hear from the videographers, marrying couples and local TV stations, what do you think of a live on-air wedding on your local morning TV show?

More photos of the live on-air wedding of Stephan and Christina.