Written with love, by Justin Metcalfe
"Hey! We just saw your wedding videos and we love them! We are getting married in 2 months and don't have much budget left, but we love your videos so much and want to see if you could shoot ours!"
You wouldn't believe how many times I receive this email from brides hoping to hire me to shoot their wedding video. Internally, I have to remind myself that the bride isn't trying to offend me, and that the reality is most brides do not think about having someone film their wedding day until the end of their planning. Now obviously, as a professional wedding videographer, I am confused by this mentality (because videos are awesome), but I can at least sympathize with why a video isn't at the top of the priority list for a bride. But I am here to tell you why your wedding video shouldn't be the last thing you think about while planning. How do I plan on convincing you? Well, by addressing some of the reasons you will give me for not thinking about your wedding video until the last minute.
1: Wedding video's are too expensive! Yes...but, you aren't thinking about this the right way. This is really a matter of value, not initial cost. Sure, what you are paying up front for is relatively expensive, but the lasting value of having your wedding day on video is priceless. What I don't understand is why a bride would spend more money on flowers (something that will die and you will forget about almost immediately) than something that you will have for literally the rest of your life.
2: Most wedding videos I have seen suck. Yep. You are right. Sort of. Somehow I have managed to make it this far into this blog post without promoting my company, Your Wedding Video Sucks (www.yourweddingvideosucks.com) When I started this company in 2008 it was because I was just about as fed up with lame ol' wedding videos as you are. They were long, boring, and did about as much to capture the beauty and magic of the day as your crazy uncle Sam with his point-and-shoot camera. But here is the thing: the industry is changing! Videographers are starting to make wedding video's into incredible works of art.
3: I am fine with just having great pictures. What I am about to say is not a knock on wedding photographer or pictures. They are awesome and valuable but they cannot capture the feeling and emotion of your wedding in the way that a video can. Don't believe me? Watch this two-minute video I recently put together for a couple:
Now again, this is no knock on photographers, but I guarantee you they could not capture that feeling of a New Years wedding in quite the same way as the video did.
I always tell my brides that they don't want me to document their wedding day. Again, your crazy uncle Sam can set up a camera in the back during the ceremony if that is what you want. What you really want is someone to capture the way you felt, the emotions, and magic of the day. When you watch your wedding video you want to feel transported back to that day and the love you felt for your spouse.
So there you have it. Sure, a wedding video is a substantial expense, but the value of having something that captured the emotion and feeling of the day for the rest of your life (and something your friends won't mind watching) makes it absolutely worth it. So don't wait until the last minute to start thinking about a wedding video!
