Cinematic Wedding Videography: What It Is & Why You Should Care

Wedding videography seems like a fairly straightforward proposition. You have someone show up on the day of the wedding with expensive equipment, document the entire thing and then go home with some beautifully framed shots to finally use Final Cut Pro to fashion the random bits of video into one seamless film that shows off the best bits of the wedding.

Except that just like when candid wedding photography usurped the traditional “look into the camera and say cheese” method of doing things, cinematic wedding photography is slowly taking over from the traditional and straightforward videography that has ruled the roost so far. And yes, fancy filters are still included.

What It Is

The hint is in the name: your wedding video will be turned into a mini-movie (or mega movie, if that’s what you feel like) with all of the themes and styles of shot framing, editing and cinematography that one would normally associate with Bollywood and Hollywood productions. The major difference, however, will lie in how your video is filmed, because no matter how good your edits are, you can only work with the footage at hand.

Vijay + Sanna Wedding Highlights from Venkata Rajesh on Vimeo.

How?

First of all, you need a professional. It goes without saying that not everyone will have the same eye for shots, and even if one has learned how to effectively use a tripod to get beautifully stable video, the cinematic approach involves just the right panning, zooming and wide angle techniques coupled with the right music or score to bring out the desired emotions. Then there’s the lighting, and some would argue that lighting is everything. Setting up just the right kind of soft lighting that perfectly complements you and the scene is the key.

[Read More: Engagement Photography Ideas ]

Speacialized equipment meets specialist technique and the resulting footage then makes it to the editing room (or computer) where mastery of not just the software suite, but also all of the cinematic techniques available to the editor are of tantamount importance.

Why?

Right, so it all seems quite compelling and it definitely is interesting, but why would you stray from the tried and tested approach and opt to make your wedding video into a movie? Well, there’s the fact that – truth be told – you’re never going to look at your wedding video in your life more than maybe once, and considering that you’re paying a small fortune for the privilege, you might as well get creative with it.

pradeep & jaya wedding highlights from saikirannetha photography on Vimeo.

The second and equally compelling reason is that when you sit down to show off your wedding video to friends and family, don’t be fooled by their smiles, it just doesn’t make for very interesting viewing. Don’t get us wrong, they’re thrilled for you and would love to revisit with you some of the happiest moments in your life, but the video itself is more of a piece of memorabilia to treasure for the sake of tradition and cherished memories, rather being intrinsically worth much in itself. To put it in a different way, it would be much more of a loss to not have a wedding video, than it is entertaining or amusing to actually watch the one you have.

Megha & Anant Wedding Highlights from Cinematic Weddings on Vimeo.

[Read More: Engagement Photos ]

My Wedding Movie

Now we’re not trying to tell anyone with a standard wedding video that it’s not worth anything, that would be akin to telling people with black and white pictures of their wedding that they’re not worth much because they’re not in color – but anyone who is strictly opting for black and white photos only in this day and age would be missing on the whole new world offered by color photography.

In the same way, cinematic wedding photography as a new and novel technique is worth exploring for anyone who is looking for a highly unique and professional movie-like video of a once in a lifetime event of immeasurable value.