First wedding to shoot...

C

chocobobot

Member
Hello all. I plan on shooting a wedding sometime this summer for a friend of mine. Being that she already invested a large amount into the photography company taking her photo's, she didn't want to spend a huge amount on a videographer. This is where I come in.

Sometime this weekend, I am looking to sit down with her discuss the basics of me shooting this wedding. From lighting, to camera angles, to 24p/a, 30p, 60i, etc. Basically all I know at this point is she wants approx 1 to 2hrs worth of footage. Unedited/Uncropped and nothing fancy. Only the footage on the DV tape.

Of course she is willing to pay for me taking the time to do this for her so I would like to get anyones opinions on how much you would charge for something like this (An estimate)? A friend of mine who is a photographer recommended I go no lower then a starting price of $300. Being that this is my first real wedding to shoot, I don't want to feel guilty for charging a large sum for footage that in all honesty would not be perfect and to their expectation. Although we all know the quality of the DVX's footage is amazing :). Again, she expects nothing fancy.

Appreciate everyones feedback.
 
I shot a wedding a few years ago and charged $400 or $500 don't really remember,But I shot and edited everything on an Avid News cutter. SO it was pretty fancy.

I've been asked about shooting a Wedding in August and I told them It would probably be around $300-$400.
Since I know them I'm going to cut them a deal and get it as close to $300. Of course it's really going to depend on how many hours to shoot and what all the details are.
 
When your shooting, try to grab everything you can, and have a lot of DV tapes. Sometimes you might think it's useless but then you end up using the footage later on.

If she is expecting nothing fancy, you can always go a little further than that and make it look good. That wouldn't hurt if have the spare time, and it will look good for your next project.

When it comes to the point where you have to film the vows, try to make sure to get good audio.

What you can do for an estamate is to check out local videographers and see what they charge. But it probably wouldn't be anywhere near it, it's just to give you an idea.
 
Yes $300 is a good place to start. just tell her what you are going to do and explain it to her in detail.
because it seems like she doesn't understand how videographers work.
you can't just shoot 1 or 2 hours of footage straigt throught and get good results.
it just doesn't work that way.

No offence to her but I'm guessing she's one of those people who think "movie's are shot in one day" type or girl.
So when she says "Not fancy" ask her in detail what that means.
she might be reffering to a documentary style (which is a lot of work, so she needs to understand)
 
I generally shoot around 4 to 6 hours of tape for a full days shoot.
My prices are way higher than 300 though. I'm usually getting $1200 a gig and thats for a fully edited 1 to 2 hour finished piece.
 
keep in mind that while it's totally fine to work for low fee or even free when you're shooting your first wedding. Once you're able to put together a competent product, you really need to bump your price up to industry levels.. No need to slowly ramp up the price. If this $300 turns out really good and on par with the $2000-3000 weddings, then charge $2000-3000 for your next gig. If you keep to the $300 or $500 range, your network of referrals will all want a wedding for that price, it's a vicious cycle that you'll never get out of.
 
One tactic that has worked for me is to follow the photographers (obviously not the entire time). they will know exactly what they need to get, and this lends itself for some great beauty shots. I'd stick with 30i, because i'd bet the groom will be editing this later on... and theres no telling what software he'll be using. Or you may be able to get some more dough to edit !
Somewhere on this forum is a good list of wedding shots, well worth a search.
Good luck!
 
I have been a working pro for 12 years. A couple years ago I started picking up extra money on weekends doing weddings. My recommendation, depending on how good of a friend she is, is shooting for free. This comes for my experience with friend weddings. If you do it as a gift for the wedding it can help in the end. If you charge and they do not like it they may feel you owe them something or have general bad feelings. For my close friends I always say no first. If that does not work I do it for free or for expenses. Then I write it off as a gift. I used to have a friend rate of $1000 compared to the normal base rate of $2500. I found that, as the previous posted noted, every one that gets my info from the Bride and Groom wants the friend rate. The downside to my suggestion is you get no money, the upside is you give an expensive gift to the happy couple.

I know this is a late post but figured it might help others in the future.
 
kgimedia said:
I have been a working pro for 12 years. A couple years ago I started picking up extra money on weekends doing weddings. My recommendation, depending on how good of a friend she is, is shooting for free. This comes for my experience with friend weddings. If you do it as a gift for the wedding it can help in the end. If you charge and they do not like it they may feel you owe them something or have general bad feelings. For my close friends I always say no first. If that does not work I do it for free or for expenses. Then I write it off as a gift. I used to have a friend rate of $1000 compared to the normal base rate of $2500. I found that, as the previous posted noted, every one that gets my info from the Bride and Groom wants the friend rate. The downside to my suggestion is you get no money, the upside is you give an expensive gift to the happy couple.

I know this is a late post but figured it might help others in the future.
Click to expand...

I disagree... only shoot free if you are starting out. Otherwise, always charge what you are worth. There is no reason why a close friend should expect to get your services for free or for significantly low cost. If you do things like DJing, where the hours commitment and the physical labor involved is light, then I can how one would provide DJ services free to a close friend, photography and videography is ALOT of back breaking work, a good friend should be able to appreciate that.

I would agree with the idea that if you're starting out, you might as well do it for free rather than charge $300, little difference in money but a huge difference in how you come off thru word of mouth. The next person she refers you to can't realistically expect you to do it for free again, but they can expect you to shoot it for $300 again since that's what they think you are worth.
 
It still irks me that people will spend a lot on photography and then treat video as an afterthought. Maybe someday the two will be on equal footing.
$300.00 doesn't sound too bad for only taping with no editing or other post involved.
I'm shooting my cousin's wedding next month as a gift. This is the only situation where I will work for free. I figure I would have gotten him a really nice gift anyway and he doesn't take for granted what I am offering him.
Other than this, though, I always charge what I think I'm worth. If a potential client says "no" than I guess they are going elsewhere. Not to mention, if you under-charge people will treat you like a bottom-feeder. This should be unacceptable to anyone in our field.
 
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Just a quick word to the guys in Australia: My daughter was nominated as a student ambassador and Australia is on her list of destinations. She's pretty worked up about that. Of course, her little sister knows Australia as the place where Nemo ended up in the dentist office so she's excited as well.
 
I've just done my first 3 weddings. Shooting all day from the bride & grooms preparation till the evening entertainment, about 8-9 hrs of tape in total. I do a 3-cam shoot with the groom on a wireless lapel mic so the sound is clear. I have charged £700 per wedding. On each one i've spent £200 out on hiring another DVX100, another cameraman, tapes etc so really i've only made £500 a piece. It takes me a good month to get a really nice slick edit and classy dvd made up for the client. I've come to realise that i'm under charging by quite a lot as the hrs that goes in doesn't get covered by what i'm being paid. I feel like my package is easily worth double that. I realise that a lot of wedding videographers will do a crappy 1 cam shoot, with bad sound and rough editing with basic titles and slap it straight onto a poorly encoded dvd and charge as much but i dont wanna do that. I'm trying to build a good reputation so then i can start charging more once i have a wedding vid website and showreel.

Sorry to hijack your thread with my sob story but i just wanted to share my predicament with other new wedding videographers out there.
 
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