Oh. Fire. Fire, fire, fire.
You know what, we’re going to move that. Blow that out. Take it outdoors. There we go.
I just saved this wedding. The whole building could have burned down. Am I a hero? Maybe.
Welcome To The Beef Capital Of The World
Welcome to Hereford, Texas. I always try to take you to the most exotic parts of the country, and here we are at the Hilltop Events Center. Honestly it looks pretty flat here. I don’t know that it’s necessarily on a hilltop. But technicalities aside, I am very, very excited to be filming the second half of Paul and Monica’s wedding.
Yesterday we were in Palo Duro Canyon and it looked absolutely incredible. Today, rustic barn. I feel like half the weddings I shoot are in barns, and here’s another one. This is Texas. What do you expect.
Other exciting news: I have the Sony a7 IV with me. Unreleased, being announced very soon, and I am so excited. The audio with it is going to be insane.
We already filmed the couple getting ready yesterday for their first ceremony, so we don’t need to do prep coverage today. It’s a weird day. We’re going straight to the ceremony and the reception. No prep at all. Straight to it. Rachel is already running around getting amazing angles, and I need to go inside and figure out how we’re plugging in for the ceremony.
I stepped in some bubble gum. Look at that. Fresh gum too, which is the worst. Honestly though, if I had to choose between bubble gum and cow poop, I might take the bubble gum. And if you’re not aware, this is the beef capital of America, so the amount of flies out here is very impressive. Very impressive. Also the smell. Rachel said do not talk about the smell. I brought up the smell. I’m sorry. Cut that.
Establishing Shots
I’m going to do a little push in along here, because this is easy with the candles lit. Push and tilt down. Nothing crazy. Just a little bit of detail. Very nice.
Detail shots done, which means the candle blowing process can now begin.
Reception Audio Setup
It’s the world’s smallest soundboard and I love it. So little. But hey, it’s all you need.
Very simple soundboard setup. I just need a quarter inch output, so I’m going to plug into the headphone out and mic check to make sure it’s going to sound good for the toasts.
Let’s try. Oops. I hate when it pops. I always get in trouble, and I’m always sorry. Okay, the stereo out is barely picking up anything, so let me try the phones out instead. Check, check, check. Testing one two. Testing one two.
Love it. Getting it super clear. And then, is there a plug down here I can hijack? Oh my goodness, there’s one left. Thank God.
Now I need to take this audio setup back outside, because we’ll have it at the ceremony and then bring it right back in for the reception. One quick plug and we’re good to record.
It is a wired mic, so we can’t go super far, but that also means no interference. It’s a win win. Their speaker is right here, the couple will be standing right over there, and the background is really what matters, especially on a head and shoulders shot. Thankfully we have all these nice twinkle lights, so I’m hoping Rachel can put the 135mm on at f/1.8 and get really nice bokeh behind them while they’re speaking.
Lighting Setup
Now to offset some of this incredibly warm indoor lighting. I’ve got the little Aputure 60x, my favorite light ever.
Thinking about dancing: their lights are over here blasting out this way, so I don’t want to compete with that and I don’t want my light on that side. I want my light on the opposite side of the dance floor, so I’ve got clean light coming in from one direction. If their lights are making everybody look green, I can still make everybody look like a good color.
It’s so warm in here that I want my light bluer, both to offset it and to give some color contrast. We can go brighter if we need to, but we’re going to keep it down low. Right about there. That should work really well.
MORE Establishing Shots
For establishing shots, especially at venues like this, I always look for a corner of the building so I get some of that three dimensional feel. In this case we have nice flowers in front, so this is one of the best angles of the venue in my opinion.
They opted to put a large security sign right next to the venue sign, but we’ll work with it. Weddings are all about working around things.
It is very bright. I’m looking directly into the sun to get this shot. My face is absorbing all of the sun’s rays, just to get a corn field shot. But you’ve got to love a good corn field. I’d say I’m the Christopher Nolan of wedding filmmakers, but I’m more like the Zach Galifianakis of wedding filmmakers, so we’ll take it.
Some venues, you just work with what you have. There are some cars in the way, but we’re documenting a day, and that nice man just closed a door for me so it looks a little better.
Wide shots taken care of, Rachel got a lot of tight shots of the flowers and florals, and they look really good, so I’m feeling pretty good about our establishing coverage. Also, the cakes have just arrived. This is very important.
Ceremony Setup
Setting up the ceremony tripods. My camera thinks the chandelier over there is a face. And I have never seen bridesmaids in pajamas before a rehearsal. Okay. Really casual wedding.
Here’s something fun. Paul, the groom, is also a filmmaker, and he asked me to film his wedding in 8K if I could. So he rented an a1. Heads up: this link goes to the newer Sony a1 II. We’re going to see this ceremony in 8K. Why not. Memory card space is going to be a problem, and it’s about an hour and a half of recording, so we’ll see.
The question is whether we shoot the 200 megabit 8K or the 400 megabit 8K. 400. Yeah, why not. Drunk with power.
The sound system out here for the ceremony is terrible. It’s a very cheap system, so I’ve convinced the DJ to move his whole setup outside for better ceremony audio. You’re saving this ceremony, my friend. You’re a hero. I had never heard of that brand of audio equipment before, and there’s a reason for that. It doesn’t work very well. Not sponsored, clearly.
Paul also wants his Zoom F6 with his wireless system recording as a backup. It’s his wedding, he’s a filmmaker, he can do whatever he wants. So we’re putting a wireless transmitter on him and one on the officiant, both running into the F6 for 32-bit float audio, which should sound very good. And then I’m also going to mic Paul with a Tascam recorder, and the officiant gets one as well, plus backup mics just in case. Lots and lots of microphones. Everybody gets a mic.
In a strange turn of events, they just pushed the ceremony back 15 minutes and I’m already set up. So I’m sitting down. Resting. Before a ceremony. It feels weird. It feels very weird. But very good. I’m not complaining, I’ll take it.
Speaking of which, How To Film A Wedding with the Sony a7 IV | Behind The Scenes of Paul & Monica’s Elopement (Part 1) is worth a look too.
Ceremony (in 8K)
And it’s rolling, recording in 8K, and I’m starting this camera five minutes early. I don’t know how much space that’s going to take up. Probably wasting a lot of space, just recording in 8K.
My shadow is on this building and it’s very hard to work around, so I think I’ll stay here on the side.
Okay. Grab the audio from the groom, then grab the officiant and get his audio, and then we are cruising right into the reception very quickly now. I’ve got to make sure my audio is plugged in for that.
Into The Reception
They’re doing a prayer first, so I need good light and good audio on that, and I’m setting up here.
Then the entrance, then the first dance.
Then the toasts, which is where that 135mm and those twinkle lights finally pay off. Let me get this light set up over here first.
And then the bouquet and garter, and the dance floor.
GO WATCH PART 1 IF YOU MISSED IT!
The past 48 hours have been nuts. Thank you so much for coming along on this BTS with the a7 IV. It’s been a lot of fun, I love this camera, and I’m very excited that it’s coming out. I think a lot of wedding filmmakers are going to be very, very happy with it. Yes, there’s a crop, but offsetting that with the 16-35mm can help, especially at f/2.8.
Otherwise it’s about time for me to go find a hotel somewhere, and then I have an eight hour drive home tomorrow. In Texas. Eight hours, still in Texas. That’s big. Texas is a big thing.
This is the second part of a two part series about Paul and Monica’s wedding, which I filmed with the Sony a7 IV. If you haven’t seen part one yet you really need to, because it’s a gorgeous elopement in the second largest canyon in the United States. And here’s Paul and Monica’s full wedding film if you haven’t watched that either.
Musicbed
This one is sponsored by Musicbed. If you film weddings like me, I’m sure you need to license music for your films, and Musicbed is one of my favorite places to do it. I’ve 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.
If you want examples, you’ve already heard some, because every single song in this behind the scenes video is licensed from Musicbed. With over 700 indie artists and composers offering record label quality music across a huge range of styles, you’re basically guaranteed to find something that matches the vibe you want. There’s Bright Pink, Natalie Madigan, who melds a classic and a new pop sound, and Drew Holcomb & the Neighbors, who provide the smoothest country vibes.
There’s so much good music, and it isn’t hard to find, because their search tool has a lot of advanced features and they update their curated playlists all the time, so it’s easy to find songs not everyone has used yet.
Oh, and they created a system called SyncID, which automatically removes YouTube copyright claims for any music you license through them on your subscription. All these songs playing in this video: no copyright claims. You and your couples won’t have to deal with music copyright issues on YouTube, and that’s amazing.
Sound cool? Use my link with the code MATTJOHNSONBTS and you’ll get 12 months for the price of 11 on an annual subscription. Thank you very much to Musicbed for sponsoring this.
I also want to give a big thank you to my friends at Archaius Creative for helping me edit this video. If they weren’t here to help, you would probably never see it, because these behind the scenes videos take so long to edit. If you need help editing wedding films, corporate videos, YouTube videos, literally anything, they’d love to help you too, and if you use that link and tell them I sent you, they’ll give you 10% off your first edit. So if you’re struggling with your backlog, or there’s a part of the process you hate, like color grading or sound mixing, no matter how big or small the project, they’d love to help.
The footage here is graded with my own color presets at whoismatt.com/luts, everything I filmed this with is on kit.co, and if you film weddings, I’ve got a free guide to booking more clients and a wedding film editing course. Come join us in the Learn Wedding Filmmaking Facebook group too.
Thanks so much for reading, and have a great day!