Come along with me behind the scenes as I film Monica and David’s wedding in California. This is part two, the day before the wedding, where we shot the couple’s portraits in the mountains at sunrise and then filmed the rehearsal dinner and karaoke. Here is part one and part three, and you can watch the finished wedding film here.
This one is sponsored by my friends at Musicbed, and I will tell you more about them at the end.
Sunrise Mountaintop Portraits
Good morning. It is 5:25 in the morning and we are up and ready to go, waiting on the couple. They should be here any minute now, and then we are all going to pile into the rental car and drive up a mountain. Should be pretty cool. Very excited about this. The sun is already coming up.
There are a lot of little paths and trails up here, so we will start right here and have you kind of lead him along here, and you can go a pretty good distance. Then come over here and stay in this open spot and cuddle up together.
What is cool is that below this area there is another rocky outcrop I am going to have them sit on in a minute, and it looks amazing. You are doing great. Keep cuddling. Trying not to fall while filming this is not the easiest thing.
Time for a little Super 8 too.
Now I have got to get the drone up. Give me three minutes to get that thing in the air. Nothing crazy. This is about as flat as we are going to get for a takeoff. Six satellites. Give me more, I need more than that. There we go. We are on a mountain, it should be able to get satellites pretty easily, I would think.
Go lower so they can also see us. Come over here close to the tree, real sneaky. I have got the tight shot, and I want to get a wide shot of them too, where they are hard to see, just people as a little dot in the frame. That can look really cool.
On to location number two. This first spot was where I was definitely going to spend the most time, just because it is one of the prettiest. Now we are going to head down to a field where the sun should look really, really good. After that we go to the forest, then the water, and then we are done. Already done with one stop, and it is only, what time is it, 6:45.
Mountain Meadow Portraits
Come over to this spot and keep standing right there. Wrap your arms around here, back to him, and back it up. There we go, real cuddly. Now rub his arm a little, we like motion. And now can you do a slow spin around?
I am trying to be a little more playful and fun with some of this, whereas up on the mountain it was super dramatic. We need somersaults. This is great.
What were we listening to yesterday? I need something. We do not have the song out here, so I will just sing it. To the window, to the wall. I am impressed. Y’all are out here in nature embracing your inner dance.
Redwood Forest Portraits
This looks fantastic. This is what I was hoping for whenever we scouted it. There is probably some invasive moss that is killing the trees, and it is beautiful. I love it. The sun is coming through over here.
So come right into this light beam here. David on this side, Monica, come forward a little bit more so you are in the sun too. Perfect. Now pull her into you, hand on her waist. There we go.
Then I just want one shot of you two walking into the forest, side by side. And on the way back to the car, keep walking together along the path while we film it. David, other side of her, sorry, because you are so much taller.
Couple Interview
We are almost done with the portrait session, just a little bit more. We are going to interview them right over here, sit them on this log, and Rachel has her questions prepared. We do not have service so she cannot pull them up, but they are in her brain. Her big, sexy brain, which is half the reason I married her. The other half was her cooking ability.
If you get nervous and you mess up, just start again. We are good, we are not in a rush.
Lakeside Portraits
Can you both sit on this rock? David sits, and you can sit between his legs up there, and we are looking out at the water. Relaxed sitting angle. Cinematic. It feels cinematic. This is the part where Matt tries not to fall into the water. No guarantees.
And we are about done. Wake up at five, done by 8:30. A little three hour shoot plus driving, and you can see the sun is getting so high now. I am glad we got up when we did.
Rehearsal Dinner
Hello and welcome to the rehearsal dinner site. Look, I got dressed up, finally out of a blue shirt after three days of different blue shirts. To be clear, they were different blue shirts. You will notice one has a pocket and the others do not.
Here is the Italian themed rehearsal dinner setup. Love it. Thankfully the sun is going to go down a lot, it is going to get darker, these lights are going to come on, and we will cool off a lot too. Very happy about that.
The main thing I am really concerned about for this event is the toasts. Specifically, I want to make sure we are recording good audio and getting video of them. I have already talked to the wedding coordinator, Paulette, who is wonderful, and according to her the toasts are going to happen over here.
In keeping with the Italian theme there will also be an accordionist. They are going to be performing right over here, and they will have a speaker system that will double as the speaker system for the toasts. I know that speaker is a Bose L1, which I absolutely love. Heads up: this link goes to the newer Bose L1 Pro16. I have one I use for rehearsal dinners as well, and it is super easy to plug into with some RCA cables. You will see me do it in a little bit, and then we will get some great audio.
Now, if the accordion is here, I have got to think about where to put my light, because I need to be lighting whoever is giving the toasts. Looking at the angles and the way things are set up, I have a few options, but I do not want to be in the way, and I want my light far enough out that it does not get knocked over.
If somebody is standing here, I could put the light over here, shining it in from the side, and that can work well. I could go up on the side of the hill, but that is the buffet section, so I would be in the way. The last option is to go completely to the other side of the reception area, turn the intensity up and blast it over here, which should look good. One of those. We will figure it out. And then for audio we will just be running a Zoom H4n into the speaker. Pretty simple setup, nothing too crazy. Three toasts tonight. Heads up: the Zoom H4n has been discontinued, so this link goes to its replacement, the Zoom H4essential.
Most importantly though, what we really need to talk about is the cannoli bar.
Rehearsal Establishing Shots
Here is the ceremony site, lacking chairs right now. There are supposed to be about 200 people at this wedding, but remember, this is just the rehearsal. The rehearsal is going to happen right over here, and it is a great opportunity to see how people are going to be standing, where they will be positioned, where we can set up our tripods, all of that. Rachel is going to hang out over here watching how it is all set up.
I, on the other hand, need to film establishing shots of the rehearsal dinner setup. I could do that now, but this light is so harsh on faces, so we are going to wait for the sun to come down a little. It should look really good.
Little simple light setup here. The Aputure 60x on battery, and this little spot right over here is out of the way where nobody is going to be walking. That light will be for the camera, and I have another light to use on the couple while the toasts are happening.
I have also got the audio gear I need to plug into the sound system, which they just brought over. So I have an audio recorder I am going to plug into the back here, and that will not mess with anything, it just lets me record the toasts. Then I have a little microphone I am going to put on the mic stand, and it will not interfere with anything either.
If you want to go deeper, I’ve also got BEAR Crashes Wedding! – Wedding Filmmaking Behind The Scenes – Monica & David’s Wedding Part 3 and Wedding Filmmaking Behind The Scenes | A WILD California Wedding – Scouting & Rafting – Part 1.
Very simple setup. RCA record outputs on the back of the L1, very easy to plug into, running out to the Zoom H4n. And then we will also put a backup recorder on the handheld mic. Super simple, super easy, going to work great.
The annoying part with corded mics is that you have to unplug them to get the mic sleeve on. But it works. Pull it up real tight and snug, plug it back in, and now we have the mic sleeve on it, and I can slide the recorder down into the sleeve. A nice little backup.
One last mic test with my headphones plugged into the Zoom H4n to make sure the audio is coming through. That’s it. Really easy.
Some of these tables are already in shadow, so I am going to shoot those a little brighter. This is where they currently have everything set up for whoever is giving the toasts, and I am thinking I will try to move them out as much as I can, because it will be easier for me to light them if they are further out. If I can move this mic further out to here, then I can put my light out further than I thought, still out of the way of people, and the light will be able to hit the side of the face. Otherwise I would have to go way back in here and shine it this way, which might work, but I do not love it.
There is also a trash can right there, and I do not love it. I am going to make an executive decision to move this trash can. Do not tell anybody. Our little secret.
I forgot to put on sunscreen and I am regretting it right now. Feeling pretty good about this though. Got the signs, got the details as much as I can right now, and I am going to go film a bit of the accordionist. I know I will have time later and there will be more people around, but there are no guarantees. You get the shot when you have time to get the shot.
Rehearsal Guest Shots And Speeches
Audio recorders on, everything set up. Three toasts, and the mother in law of the groom went first.
Dancing, Karaoke And The Fire Pit
Rehearsal dinner, done. Now all we have left is karaoke, marshmallows and the fire pit. There is already so much booty grinding happening. It is a beautiful thing.
Thanks To Musicbed
Before you go, I want to take a second to tell you about the amazing sponsor of this video, Musicbed. If you film weddings like me, which I assume you do considering this is a video about filming weddings, I am sure you need to license music for your films, and one of my favorite places to license music is Musicbed. I have been using them basically since I started filming weddings, and in my opinion they have some of the best music, from real bands with real emotion.
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Sound cool? Use this link to sign up and use the coupon code WHOISMATT23, and you will get your first month of an annual wedding subscription free. That is 12 months for the price of 11 to license unlimited music. Thank you very much to Musicbed for sponsoring this video.
I also want to give a big thank you to my friends at Archaius Creative for helping me edit this behind the scenes. If they were not here to help me, you would probably never see this video, because these behind the scenes videos take so long to edit. If you need help editing your wedding films, corporate videos, YouTube videos, literally anything, they would love to help you out too. Use my link and tell them I sent you and they will give you 10 percent off your first edit. So if you are struggling with your backlog, or there is a part of the editing process you really hate, like color grading or sound mixing, no matter how big or small your project is, Archaius Creative would love to help you out.
All of the footage here was colored with my presets. If you want to go deeper, I have filmmaking courses here, and here is my full list of filmmaking gear.