3 Apps to Say “I do” to
It goes without saying that Wedding planning would be nothing without the proper resources. With technology experiencing exponential growth seemingly each day, it’s not hard to see we have so many resources right at our fingertips…literally! Each day thousands of apps are downloaded on the app store. The market’s flooded with wedding apps!
Of course, there’s Pinterest and Instagram; the tried and true source for inspiration and aspiration, and sometimes perspiration. These apps are great for open-ended searching, when you’re not really sure what you’re looking for but when you find it “you just know”. Instagram can be great for searching wedding hashtags, looking at vendors work, and much more. These simple, but irreplaceable apps are a perfect start for a bride-to-be, but it doesn’t stop there. Here are a few other options that you hay have overlooked, but are worth checking out!
Mint:
When you can keep track of your money, planning is simpler! (And not to mention, a little less stressful.) Mint is an app provided by Intuit – you know, the tax guys. I think they know a thing or two about keeping track of your cash! Mint allows you to keep your financial life together, so you don’t have a fractured wedding budget. You can categorize your spending to document what you’ve been putting money toward. Check it out!
Mint’s pie chart budget organization tool.
WeddingHappy:
Let WeddingHappy be your digital wedding planner of sorts. The app keeps you on task; giving you an active countdown till your Big Day. It will give you step-by-step suggestions for your “To-Do-Before-I-Do” list. Over 16,000,000 wedding tasks have been completed using WeddingHappy! What’s more, they even have a feature that allows you to track your budget here, inside the app as well! With thousands of glowing reviews, this free app is certainly one you should look into.
Trello:
Out of left field comes a workspace app that many of you in the tech world may recognize; Trello. Trello is your go-to virtual sticky board; letting you stick “Post-its” on your own designated, digital board. Create cards to build out your To-Do list! You can attach files, add “team members” (Bridesmaids or your hubby-to-be), add due dates and set reminders as they approach. This is super helpful to use throughout the planning process as it allows you to create individual checklists inside each card – so you can be sure to stay focused on each task individually.
As I write this, I too am planning my wedding! Let’s get a look inside one of my Trello cards. Here’s what we’ve got for our Ceremony so far. You see, we’re still in the middle of dialing in our date and venue, so most of you will be a bit further along than us! - Max M.
Inside this card I have our checklist that we need to complete in order to have the ceremony all set and taken care of. I’ve also added my fiancée to the card as well so that she can contribute and be notified when there is any action on the card. I can also attach images to reference some of our favorite venues and assign a due date to get an accurate countdown before my card is due.
We know there are tons of apps out there to help you plan your wedding; some specifically design for your Big Day, and some were designed for other reasons but can still be great wedding planning tools! We hope some of these ideas help stay organized as you march down the aisle toward your wedding day!
If you have any questions for us, please submit a form on our contact page! Got an app that you use and want to share? Leave it below in the comments! Hope you’re all doing well and staying safe. <3
Ashley + Steve | 9.27.19 | Mount Hope Farm
Capturing the love between Ashley + Steve on their wedding day couldn’t have been more fun! On the morning of September 27th, 2019 these two love birds prepared for their big day at the picturesque Wyndham Newport Hotel; an idyllic setting situated at the base of the Newport Bridge on Narragansett Bay.
After a quick commute off Aquidneck island over the Mount Hope Bridge, rumbling above the boats dotting the sun-soaked bay below, Ashley + Steve arrived at their beautiful venue; Mount Hope Farm. This gorgeous 127-acre farm in Bristol boasts uncontested views of Rhode Island in early Fall.
After their first look, we had some time to shoot the bridal party photos before the ceremony.
Ashley + Steve’s ceremony took place in the lush, sunlit lawn of the Governor Branford House on the Mount Hope Farms grounds. The couple said their “I do’s” smiling in the sunshine with their friends and family.
What’s a wedding without a proper reception?! The party got started in The Barn, a charming 160-year-old building nestled among the fields and trees of Mount Hope Farm. Warm colors peppered the rustic tables garnished with a summer harvest of local greens. Surround by their loved ones, Ashley + Steve dined and danced into the night.
With weather as warm as their smiles, we enjoyed every moment of capturing this special couple’s big day! Congratulations Ashley + Steve!
To inquire about your wedding, whether it’s for photo or video, fill out this contact form here and feel free to look around our site to see more. Thanks for taking the time to read this!
Vendors:
Hair/MU: Glam By Cori
Photo: Mike Neilan Media
Video: Fast Track Media
Venue: Mount Hope Farm
Catering: Russel Morin
Cake: Bella Confections
Jackie & Mike | Small Ceremony In Boston
A little over a month ago I got a Facebook message from someone I met back in high school. She was getting married; having a small ceremony for their close family in Boston and she was looking for a photographer. It was not your typical 8 hour wedding day, but I was available and I happily agreed to do it. It took place at the Old City Hall in Boston, which is now Ruth Chris’ Steak House. The outside is awesome and makes for a great spot for photos.
We took some right out front of the steps as you see above, and we took some in this smaller area off to the side as well. It was pretty cold out as it was February 23rd, but Jackie and Mike were troopers.
Jackie & Mike braved the cold for almost an hour, props to them honestly.
Funny story about this photo right above here; I didn’t think I was going to like it when I took it. The light coming from outside was obviously daylight and the light inside was very yellow, but I ended up really liking it in black and white. Anyway, once we did the family photos and their portraits outside, we went inside for a few more family photos and for the ceremony.
That’s all! Hope you enjoyed this set and this article, let me know what you thought.
If you or someone you know is searching for a wedding photographer or videographer, have them reach out, I’d be happy to talk.
Email mywedding@mikeneilan.com to inquire and check out other videos on the site!
Thank you.
Wedding Videos: What Happens After The Wedding
A wedding video can be 3 minutes, 5 minutes, 8 minutes, 10, 20, 60, 120. You might get 1 videographer, you might get 2. Some companies even offer 3 videographers. You might need 6 hours of coverage, you might want 8, maybe 10? Some couples even just want 4 hours. You get the point; a wedding video can really vary depending where you go.
One thing you might not completely think of is just how much time is spent after the wedding to make your video. Whether it’s a short 5 minute video or a long 60 minute video, there’s a lot of work that happens behind the scenes to make your video come out the way it is. Here are a few samples.
I’ll spoil this article and tell you how many hours it takes now. Nah, maybe not. Keep reading.
So after the wedding is over, the first thing I do when I get home is take the memory cards and back up all the footage to a hard drive at my desk. All the videos, the audio, everything. Depending on how long the wedding day was and how much we shot, this takes about an hour. That night I might even back it up to a 2nd hard drive so I have it in two places. If I do that, it’s another half hour. Other times I’ll back it up again the next day instead of that night. Point is, I want to make sure all the media is safe and on my hard drives so I can clear my memory cards and have it stored properly. Now it’s ready to edit.
The next thing I do is sort through all the video. Every clip we shot gets looked at, every single one. We are usually at a wedding about 8-9 hours. Now, we aren’t recording every second of the day but we are shooting a lot, and we have multiple cameras, so there is a lot to go through. I go through all of it and pull out the best pieces of every clip. Some clips have nothing I see that I want to use, some have 3 or 4 good parts, it all varies. This process takes about 10-12 hours. Now I have gone through all the clips, found the best pieces and I know what I like. The next part is putting the ceremony and reception together.
We usually shoot the ceremony with 3 cameras, sometimes 4. We also have audio from wireless mics. This needs to get synchronized so we can easily switch between camera angles when we want, and see the ceremony all put together with each camera angle. Depending on how long the ceremony was and how many cameras we used, this takes an hour or two. Then there’s the reception. Now we don’t record the entire reception but we have the introductions, the formal dances, and the toasts that need to be synced up. Similar process to the ceremony so this takes another hour or two to organize that and get it put together. Now we’re at about 12-16 hours.
Now the footage is sorted through, ceremony and reception are organized. Time to find music! No joke, sometimes this takes me 30 seconds, sometimes it takes me 2 hours. I might find the song that sounds right the second I start looking, and I’ve also had times where I played through songs for almost 2 hours and didn’t find the right one. It’s one of the most important pieces.
Next up, edit the video! Now it’s time to take that music, and put some video over it. What I’ll do is listen through the vows and the toasts for the best pieces and I pull those aside so I know what I want to use. That takes about and hour or two. Then I start putting clips over the music, and I mostly go in order of the day. I’ll put in some clips of the bride getting ready, her bridesmaids, getting hair done, makeup, etc. Then I go through and put in pieces of the toasts and vows that match and make the most sense to me. I might show the actual footage from the ceremony or the reception of them speaking or I may keep it on them getting ready. Then I do the same thing for the groom. The way I edited my videos is basically two halves; I show the bride and groom getting ready, go into their first look if they have one, then to their ceremony, and that’s the first half. If you’ve never seen my videos, it might seem like the video is over at the end of the ceremony. But it’s just a short 2 second pause and then I go into the 2nd half of the video.
The 2nd half of the video is the reception; so I show some footage of decorations, the cake, the venue, then the introductions of the wedding party, and then the bride and groom getting introduced. Then some clips of them dancing, then their parent dances, the cake cutting, and then the video is finished off with a 2-3 minute montage of people dancing and having a blast at the reception. This whole part takes about 10 hours. Now the video is edited from start to finish.
Last but not least, similar to the icing on a cake, I do the color correction. Throughout the day of the wedding we are changing settings from indoor to outdoor, changing lighting settings, etc. So the footage might look off in color, or be dark in some areas, too light in other shots, things like that. Color correction is where that all gets fixed. We brighten up things that are too dark, tone down areas that are too bright, and fix colors that are just not set right. For a 5-10 minute highlight video, this takes about 1.5 hours. For a 20-40 minute video it takes close to 2-3 hours. Now the video is done! About 25-28 hours later, the video is ready to send to the couple.
(If I’m doing a longer video in addition to the highlight, it’s another 6-8 hours of editing. This is the time of adding more ceremony footage, removing certain parts and adding more in other areas, adding more to the reception.)
It’s quite the process. When I first started doing wedding videos, it actually took me 35-40 hours to edit the video. That’s a whole work week for most people, pretty crazy. But after many times of doing it, figuring out better ways to do things, getting more efficient, I got to where I am now.
I hope you enjoyed this article. This is a craft we as wedding videographers take our time to perfect and we really put our heart into it. At least speaking for myself, it’s something we do because we love it. Getting the reaction emails of “OMG this is amazing I cried! Thank you so much!” or “Thank you so much Mike, we are truly grateful we had you capture our day this is more than we could ask for” is something that really means a lot to me. It makes it all worth it and it truly brings me joy. I actually did a screen recording and voice over of me editing a wedding video once, if you would like to see it, go here. If you have any questions for me or if you are looking for a wedding videographer, reach out to me at mike@mikeneilan.com and check out my work on my wedding video section.
Thank you for reading.