Wedding Video: Covering the Peninsula
Simply Interactive had the Peninsula bracketed over the weekd of July 16, with different teams shooting weddings and receptions ranging from San Jose northward through Santa Clara, Cupertino, Palo Alto, and San Francisco. That might sound like a lot of territory; but actually it was unusual for us to have so many events happening within an hour's drive of our Redwood City offices. Typically we're spread out a lot farther, with at least one event in the North Bay or East Bay, or farther south in Santa Cruz, San Juan Bautista, or Monterey. (And we ve gone as far afield as Sacramento, Yosemite, Palm Springs, and Santa Monica, in recent seasons.)
I had the pleasure of covering the wedding of Dow-Jane Chi and Cheng-Wei Pei, who were married Saturday afternoon at St. Joseph of Cupertino Church . The couple got ready for the ceremony at the Sheraton Palo Alto Hotel , a stone's throw across El Camino Real from Stanford University. The Sheraton's small courtyard gardens and fountains made nice settings for Simply Interactive videographer Justin Lambakis to get attractive shots of Cheg-Wei and his groomsmen.
Dow-Jane's and Cheng-Wei's wedding marked my second opportunity to use the Manfrotto "Fig Rig" camcorder support. The device, which looks like a steering wheel with an off-center crossbar, is named for the filmmaker who designed it: Mike Figgis, perhaps best known as the Oscar-nominated director of the 1995 film "Leaving Las Vegas," for which Nicholas Cage took home the Best Actor award. Figgis has used it on a number of his own feature films and documentaries.
During Dow-Jane's and Cheng-Wei's reception at Ming's Restaurant in Palo Alto, I loved the way the Fig Rig allowed me to smoothly follow their movements among their guests, to do a "fly-around" of their wedding cake, and to continuously and seamlessly shift perspectives as I covered their first dance.
I think I can safely predict that clients will be seeing a lot of Fig Rig-enabled shots appearing in future Simply Interactive projects. It adds another level of finesse to techniques we re already using.
Wedding guests seem fascinated by it, too. I've probably had more interested inquiries from guests -- "Say, what's that wheel thing do?" -- at my last two weddings than I've had during the last two years. As a rule, we try to stay in the background; but when I do get questions from guests, I'm always happy to answer them.
The music for Dow-Jane's and Cheng-Wei's reception was provided by Al Flanagan and Sam Peacock, of "DJ for Select Occasions." They did a good job of providing a mix tailored to the different tastes of the reception crowd -- some of whom were Dow-Jane's and Cheng-Pei's friends from work and from college, and some of whom were relatives who flew over from Taiwan for the occasion.
Ming's was bustling on Saturday night -- there was another wedding reception in a banquet room on the other side of the building -- but the service didn't miss a beat. And the food was superb. It was a great place for a celebration.
