Veteran Los Angeles Wedding Videographer Recounts Wedding Day Nightmares.
Months before her wedding, when bride, Lisa, decided that she didn’t want an established, professional videographer to record the event, her mother, Alexandra, had a feeling that she was making a mistake and begged her daughter to hire one. Cut to the wedding day…At the wedding reception, mom, sick with a cold and three days into her antibiotics and cough medicine, disappeared without telling anyone and missed the bouquet and garter tosses as well as the cake cutting. She was understandably distraught over having missed so much of her daughter’s reception, that is, right up until the minute she was able to watch everything on the wedding video made by the professional videographer her daughter thought she didn’t need. Fortunately for mom, her daughter had taken her advice before the wedding.
The subject of wedding videography came up during my physical therapy session this week and my therapist told me that at her own wedding a cousin with little or no videography experience volunteered to record the event for her. At the precise moment the bride’s two cute little nieces were walking down the aisle, the amateur videographer was mesmerized by the guitar player’s fingers strumming the guitar, and that was the shot he recorded. I think you can guess the rest of the story. Too bad. He lost one of the most video-worthy moments of the day!
I think the saddest story I’ve heard in 35 years as a full time wedding videographer is from another bride and groom who decided not to have anyone record their wedding. (A money issue, most likely). A short time after the wedding the bride’s brother was killed in an car accident. There was no video of him at the wedding for the bride to remember him by. Her loss (and regrets) were profound. Too late. There are no re-do’s, and unless you’re able to see into the future, you just won’t know what’s going to happen. A wise decision needs to be made from the start. The hard, cold fact is that you can’t go back in time to do it again once the wedding is over.
Amateur mistake causes irreplaceable memorial footage to be lost: A friend of mine told me that he had recently attended the memorial service of a close relative which was video taped as a favor by another family member who had come from out of town for the service. The amateur videographer diligently recorded all the testimonials and the prayers, as well as the guests reunited to witness the final farewell. The video, intended to be a lifelong rememberance, was accidently left in the relative’s rental car along with the camera and never recovered. End of story…and of the video.
To avoid being added to my list of wedding nightmares, here are a couple of insightful suggestions from my website article, “Finding The Right Videographer…Busting The Myths:”
“What you deny yourself today you won’t have when you want it tomorrow.” The people who don’t have a video made of a once-in-a-lifetime event, are the same ones who most regret not having the foresight to make one. You only have one opportunity to record your wedding day. Don’t be “Penny Wise and Pound Foolish”. Remember: “No Re-Do’s”
A Thought to Ponder: Get out of the moment and think ahead. There are few things more enjoyable than to look back 10 or 20 years to see how everyone looked back then. Remember, your video is not only for you and it’s not only for now. Consider it your magical connection to the past…forever.”
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