More Posts Coming Soon

Just wanted to post a quick apology for being so lax with my posting lately. Brent and I attended a wedding filmmaking workshop in Austin so we've been out of town and quite busy too! Will post more soon...

Our Wedding: Planning Begins!

Previously in this series- Our Wedding: The Proposal

Anyone who knows me at all knows that I LOVE weddings. In fact, that's half the reason I do what I do: I like to document things and I love weddings, and when you combine the two you get the career of my dreams. I even remember in eigth grade or so as a birthday gift my friend Erika gave me a subscription to Martha Stewart Weddings. Those quarterly issues only fueled the flames.

So you can imagine how excited I was when I got engaged nearly three years ago. Besides of course being able to marry Brent, it was also my ticket to PLAN MY WEDDING. In retrospect I see that for me, wedding planning was the ultimate creative outlet of my life. Pretty much the entire eigth months I felt like a kid in a candy store. My budget was modest by many standards, but at times that made it even funner because I had to use my imagination more. I will do several more posts on the planning process, but here's a little illustration to show you just how prepared I was once I had the ring on my finger:

This is several years' acquisition of Marthe Stewart Weddings that I had stashed away. These became one of my biggest sources of inspiration and by the time the wedding day had arrived, they were all torn up and well referenced. Thanks Martha!!

VideoMonday: Tilt-Shift

Okay, so I know it's not really Monday but allow me to post my usual installment of VideoMonday today instead.

Recently my photographer friend Allen let me play around a bit with his neat-o tilt-shift lens that he uses for special pictures during his portraits and weddings. Here's an example of its results, as taken by Allen:


As you can see, it blurs out portions of the picture, either the top and bottom or the sides. Pretty cool. Well a few days ago I came across a video that was shot with the tilt-shift and the effect is amazing. In addition to blurring portions, it also messes with the perspective, which in this case miniaturizes the images. It makes people look like ants! (If any of you photograpers would like to take a stab at explaining how this happens, please feel free to leave a comment.) So here is the video of a helicopter ocean rescue, created by Sydney based photographer Keith Loutit.


Bathtub IV from Keith Loutit on Vimeo.

It was hard to pick my favorite one of Keith's because he is doing a whole series. You can also check out Mardi Gras and Beached.

My Dream Venue, Part II

Yesterday I posted Part I of my list of ideal location features. Here's the second half:


The Groom's Room

I'm sorry guys, but no TV! They mess up my audio, and generally sports don't mesh too well with the romantic vibe.

Bold colors, and maybe even some cute "props" for the guys to mess with to get them to loosen up. They always seem to be a little stiff. Maybe it has something to do with a chick videotaping them getting ready, I dunno...


The Ceremony

Outside! Outdoor ceremonies are so pretty and much easier to shoot because I can freely move around. It's better for me, and also gives the client more of a variety of shots because I'm not constrained to a dark little corner in the balcony. Plus, they're just pretty.

But if it must be indoors, leave lots of space in the edges of the room for me to move around, and also have a large "altar" area so I can get shots of the bride and groom when they face the officiant. The edges of the space would be dark and unlit so I can lurk unseen in my black get-up.
No big flower arrangements or candelabras up front to block my shots.

A long aisle to draw out the bride's processional.

Not too spotlighted on the "altar" area. This causes everyone in the audience to be underexposed.

Crisp colors: reds, whites, blacks, etc. Lots of brown and beige looks a little funky to me personally.


The Reception Hall

Fabulously, ornately, tastefully designed and decorated!

Spotlights on every single centerpiece and of course the cake. Plenty of light everywhere, in fact.

No exit signs to show in the background of my shots.

The dance floor must be directionally lit with lots of colorful lights, and it must have room on all sides for me to move around.

A balcony for me to get the occasional high and wide establishing shot.

A ceiling like The Villa's: fiber optic stars!

(photo by Casey Benson)

Super attentive staff that that gives me a heads up whenever something's about to happen, and that fetches me food and cake during downtime. ;)

So that's it! I'm sure I could go on and on, but this is all the stuff I've thought of before. Can you think of anything I'm missing?

My Dream Venue: Part I

As an event videographer, I have learned how to adapt to shooting in all sorts of locations and constraints. It's all part of the job, and I don't think much of it. However, occasionally when something about a location is really bugging me, I tend to daydream about what the ideal wedding venue would be. I've made a list here of all the things a perfect place would have. If this place exists, please tell me where and I will move there right now.

The Exterior

Landscaped like The Butchart Gardens. This alone would be stunningly overwhelming and I might start crying and rolling around in beds of pansies or something. I love doing nature shots and it's one of my favorite parts of my job. (Sometimes I like to pretend I'm working for National Geographic.)

(source)

Located in a climate with constant bright blue skies and gorgeous puffy clouds (for my time-lapse shots).

No cars allowed to park in front.

Lavish, intricate architecture. Cathedral-esque, if you will.

The Bride's Room

Pretty large rectangle shape, with one short end of the room being made up entirely of windows.

Walls hung with black velvet. Sounds weird, but people pop and look really beautiful in front of a saturated black background. Maybe one wall would be a pretty sky blue (I like colors that contrast with skin).

A fabulous place to hang the dress, with a pretty hook, in front of maybe stained glass or a tapestry or something.

Not too many mirrors, as this makes it hard to stay out of your own and the photog's shots. But it would have one huge gilded mirror for that classic "bride-checking-herself-out" shot. Or more commonly, the "flower-girl-checking-herself-out" shot.

Plenty of nice furniture upon which to set accessories for close-ups. A red velvet fainting couch would be cool too.

This post ended up being longer than I anticipated, so I'll post the second half tomorrow!

Nic and Cam: The Reception Venue

I remember vendor reviews being pretty helpful for me when I was planning my own wedding, so I thought I'd post a some reviews of a few of the vendors from my sister's recent wedding. First up, we have the Magnolia Hotel, which is where all the out-of-town guests stayed and also where the reception took place.

First, the positives. This hotel is in the heart of downtown so you are very centrally located. The decor is nice, and they have happy hour with free drinks in the evening and then later free milk-and-cookies before bedtime. Brent and I slept extremely well there, which is saying a lot for me since I'm a light sleeper. As far as the wedding goes, we were all very pleased with how things looked. The ballroom was perfect for Nicole's modern-style wedding. They let us pull furniture from the third-floor lobby area into the ballroom for some swanky seating. Plus, that lobby area was perfect for the cocktail hour.

All right, now on to the negatives, which I'm sad to say are numerous. In fact, to make it easier for me, I'm going to just list them out bullet-style:

- People at the front desk aren't entirely on top of things. You would tell them to convey info to a vendor, and they wouldn't, they got names wrong for reservations, etc.

- They used the sheet cake in the back to cut tiny pieces of cake for the guests, but left most of the main cake untouched.

- The food wasn't as tasty and pretty as the sample menu Nicole tasted months before.

- They booked a wedding one floor below Nicole's for the same time, something they originally said they wouldn't do (because the floors are somewhat open to each other by a large staircase.)

- The coordinator left before the reception was over, which is something she said she wouldn't do. This led to: a wedding crasher, unattended wedding gifts (money!), unattended guest book which was then signed as a joke by one the young volleyball girls staying at the hotel, and also an attempt by one of those girls to steal Nicole's bouquet after the getaway. Not cool.

- And perhaps the most frustrating problem was that the wedding coordinator changed probably four times over the course of Nicole's engagement, so info kept changing and knowledge was at a minimum.

That's all I can think of at the moment, though I'm sure there's more. For any of you brides considering a modern downtown Houston wedding reception, I hope this is helpful!

The Wedded Bliss Features

Brent and I picked up the latest issue of The Wedded Bliss, East Texas' wedding announcement magazine, and saw a little picture of ourselves! It was taken at the Tyler's Best bridal show back in January. We're in the top left of the page (click to enlarge):

Also in this issue is Gene and Michelle's pretty announcement:

Plus, there's an announcement celebrating Mary and Bobby's 35th wedding anniversary. These two are the parents of one of my brides Lacy and one of my grooms Sam. Congrats you two!

Ashley & Justin

This day was a long time coming: Justin and Ashley dated each other on and off for 18 years! Wow! I did a photo montage for them and got to witness their progression through the years as high school prom dates to bride and groom. The festivities took place in Gladewater: the ceremony was at church in which Ashley's great grandparents had been involved (her picture hung on the wall where Ashley got ready), and the reception occurred on her grandparents' land. All of these factors combined to make an event that was infused with a sense of history, family, and heritage.

Not only was it meaningful, it was also beautiful! Ashley's pale pink dress was custom designed, and was embellished with crystal accents and feathers on the bodice. The custom bridesmaid dresses were really unique and looked great in the church. The tent for the reception was awash in pink lighting, and was accented with huge rose-covered balls and black chandeliers. They had a lounge/bar area plus a photo booth complete with wacky accessories that provided a great diversion. Not that diversion was needed, because the Spazmatics, a faux-nerdy 80's cover band, rocked the crowd. A getaway under the cover of Flutterfetti completed the night. You can watch it all here in their highlights:


Ashley & Justin from Vanessa McKellar Productions.com on Vimeo.


Church: First United Methodist Church, Gladewater
Photographer: Sam Smead, Longview
Coordinator: Mindy Rives, DFW Events, Dallas
Band: The Spazmatics, Texas

VMP Wins the EventFilmmaker.com Engagement Session Contest

I am SO thrilled to announce that our recent production "Nicole and Cameron: A Love Story" won first place in Event Filmmaker's engagment session contest. Event Filmmaker (previously known as WedFACT, The Wedding Filmmakers Alliance of Creative Talent) serves to "encourage, educate and empower film and video artists from around the world to achieve the highest levels of success in the artistic, creative and business aspects of the wedding and event videography industry". It's an association of the most talented videographers in the world, and that's why this is such an honor: We won through peer votes!


I gotta hand it to my sister and her now-husband for being such uninhibited and expressive individuals in front of my camera. The taping and editing of the piece flowed perfectly because I had such amazing subjects! (Although I may be a little biased.)

You can read the announcement here.