by Elena Coyne Boston InFocus Video and Photo
When you pick apples – whether you are picking just one apple or one thousand – you did the apple picking. But with editing someone else does the “picking”. So what you are getting could be a “grab bag”, even though it sounds good and you are getting your wedding video edited.
To explain the costs of different wedding packages I put editing in three categories: basic, documentary, and cinematic – even though there are other terms that could be used.
Here is an example of a cinematic wedding:
Anyone can do basic editing, even a student intern in a company. It can be considered editing the full video, but it may just consist of cleaning; cutting out all unfocused or shaky shots or bad shots (like a guest sneezing, etc). Sometimes I can edit using the music in the background, but it will not be edited to the beat of the song or tell the story. This is not the creative editing you are hiring a professional videographer to do. This also referred to as Traditional or Long Form editing. Traditional editing tends to look more like a family video that is shot with just one camera and doesn’t have anything that needs to be synchronized. Everything is edited in a linear progression and usually in its entirety. These videos tend to be 2 to 3 hours in length.
Documentary editing is also known as Journalistic style. We shoot all documentaries with at least two cameras so you will have more then one angle. For example when we have the bride walking down the aisle and one camera is on her – the second camera is on the groom or parents… Those moments can not be captured with one camera. During editing those cameras are synchronized and segments are edited as they occur to preserve continuity. Things are where they belong for example if I shot the church sign at the end of the wedding – I will put it at the beginning to show where we are. This style of editing will produce a polished documentation of the day as it unfolds while telling a story. I usually use light background music picked by the bride and groom, match it somewhat to the beat of the song, add transitions where appropriate, adjust color balance, level all sound. We cut out all repeated moments like the same guest dancing for a while, similar angles or shots that were used already to make it little more compressed. These videos tend to be 1 to 2 hours in length.
The term Cinematic is defined as making a movie or film. It is captured and edited for the dramatic effect and mood. It is usually presented with a particular style and “wow” effect that may not be present in a documentary version of the event. We edit 3, 6 and 10 minute highlight videos with music of your choice that may be uploaded online. The shorter highlight version is popular for showing friends, while family members might watch the full-length wedding video on DVD or Blue Ray. This also referred to as a Short Form Wedding video. This is the most artistic and creative editing style. We usually offer both Long video and Short highlights in our wedding packages because it gives you the best of both worlds – full lightly edited video and short cinematic highlights to share with friends – and have them be totally amazed after you already cried over it each time you watched it.
So if you are looking for the best – you can have your wedding day shot with 3-4 cameras and edited cinematically. If you have less in your budget the documentary package is the best one. And if you are trying to save the basic will preserve all the key moments but it will not be edited artistically (except for the short highlights video that could be added).
