Destination Weddings - What are they like to film?

Filming a Destination Wedding

Although hugely rewarding and enjoyable, Weddings abroad bring a whole new set of challenges to a videographer. When I started out it was an aspirational goal of mine to film a destination wedding, I thought it would be really glamorous and that I’d feel like I had finally “arrived” in the industry, but, like most things in life this wasn’t the case. They are stressful from a logistics point of view just getting your equipment to the destination in one piece, what can go in the hold? what needs to be carried on as hand luggage? Making sure equipment is split so if one case goes missing you can still film the wedding. All these things need to be given serious thought and consideration. When you are there you work harder and longer in conditions that can be oppressive due to the intense heat but after saying all that I absolutely love them. I always arrive at least one day before the wedding, I like to scout the venues and just run through things in my mind, look for possible problems I may face and work out contingency plans should these things happen. Most ceremonies abroad take place from 4pm onwards so as to avoid the hottest part of the day. This means a late start and a late finish, a ceremony at 6pm for example will usually mean speeches around 11pm and then dancing until the small hours, many a time I have had a flight booked for the following morning and just traveled straight to the airport from the wedding reception and slept slept on the plane. The light abroad is just beautiful, especially as the sun begins to set but that window is so small in most countries, in 10 minutes you can go from golden colours to pitch black so its important to get things set up and be ready for any shots that may be planned. Artificial light is something I don’t really use when shooting domestic weddings because most wedding receptions are indoors so you have some ambient light to work with for the speeches. Abroad however the vast majority take place outside and if there is no AV company dealing with lighting you can be faced with almost total darkness for the speeches so I always have some small panel lights on hand that give me just enough definition in the speakers face to work with without affecting the overall ambiance.

I wouldnt like to film a destination wedding every week but the 3 or 4 I do each year are just perfect for me, I love to travel and experience new cultures and meet interesting people and when I nail a wedding overseas and my clients love their film its the best feeling ever. Ive always had the belief that to improve you must put yourself in situations that test you and believe me there is no better test than a destination wedding :-). So if you are considering a destination wedding please get in touch.