Vendor Spotlight- Bill Grant with Cinema Couture Films

by | Apr 1, 2016 | Vendor Spotlight

When you’re planning a wedding, unless you have lots of friends that just got married, it can be really overwhelming to know which wedding vendors in your area are the best.  So, I decided to create this new blog series to spotlight some of the amazing pros that I have worked with over the 13 years that I’ve photographed weddings in Columbia!  These are people that I have personal experience with that share a few qualities- they’re professional, reliable, talented, creative and have a great attitude that makes them a joy to work with!  One of the first vendors I’d like to highlights is Cinema Couture Wedding Films so I asked the owner Bill Grant to tell me more about wedding videography.

Bill Grant videographer for Cinema Couture Films

Bill Grant- Cinema Couture

Bill and I have worked together on more weddings that I can count over the past decade.  Photo and video work hand in hand to each capture the wedding day in their own unique way.  One thing I love about Bill is that he does an amazing job at making people feel comfortable and really bringing out their true personality. He works incredibly hard on the wedding day to capture all the moments and the end result is breathtaking!   His wedding films are top notch.  To start our spotlight, I ask Bill to answer a few questions in his own words to help brides learn more about his wedding films!

FIVE THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT PICKING A VIDEOGRAPHER

What are 5 important things that a bride should consider when hiring a wedding videographer?
1. Experience. How many weddings have they done and how many like yours (church, beach, garden, etc)
2. Style. Try to understand exactly what you’ll be getting with your video. Ask about what they cover and what they include.
3. Special Requests. Make sure you let them know any special requests you have before the wedding. Afterwards there’s just no going back.
4. Know your options. There’s is no “normal” way of doing things so find out what the options are. Videographers can offer anything from bare bones to everything and they may not list everything on their website or pricelist.
5. Ask for recent samples, not just what’s on the website. Ask them if they have something similar to yours. Websites and facebook are usually reserved for only the best work. It’s good to see some consistency.
Wedding Video with a couple at 701 Whaley
If someone is on the fence about hiring a videographer, what would you say is the greatest value that you provide to brides?
I think the most important thing we do is freeze time. We do it in a way the preserves motion and sound. The wedding day will go by so fast that you just won’t remember everything. I recognize, having been married now for almost 18 years, that the time passes so quick and all you really remember are the big things. Having all of those little things as well is so important.
What do you consider your personal specialty or style?
Our specialty is story. What does that mean? That means through the process we find out what makes the couple unique and we showcase their personality. We want our films to be exciting and emotional to watch. The most important thing is we want every film to be different. If you can just remove one couple and insert another, it’s just not good enough.
What sets your services apart from your competitors?
I’m not sure about our competitors, but a critical quality of what we do is how much we really care about doing this right. We will go absolutely overboard to make sure that we capture things the right way. We overcome obstacles at just about every wedding that bride and groom will never know about. I’m sure most of my competitors do the same. But I think it’s so important that we personally care about every final film. Our standards are extremely high, we want it to be perfect for them every time.
What’s one of the best/funnest projects you worked on recently?
We’ve done some cool stuff this year. It’s so fun to travel to different areas of the south like Charleston and Savannah to capture weddings. Everything is just a little different out of town. We are working on a project right now for Spirit Communications to be installed in the new baseball stadium in Columbia. There’s never a dull moment.
What helps you when you’re planning an event with your bride?  Timeline?  Family relationships?  Themes, etc.?
There are a couple of things I try to get across to my brides before the wedding. The first thing is that we need storytellers at their wedding. Whether that is the pastor, whether they’re having speeches, or reading letters to each other, we want to know their story. Sometimes that’s easier than others. It’s good to know who’s gonna tell that story. We also want them to understand that we will adapt to whatever situation comes up if plans change, we just need to know. And lastly, we need to eat! Sometimes we’re at a wedding for 10 hours without a break and we need fuel. 🙂
Anything else you can think of that a new bride should know?
I think it’s so important not to plan every second of the day. Leave a little breathing room so that you can enjoy it. It’s gonna go fast anyway so take a minute to look around.
What is your price range?
Local films (Columbia SC area) start at $3100. That is our most common thing, but there are a lot of other options.

Finally, I wanted to share with you some of Cinema Couture’s work.  We have posted a photo highlight of Regina & Roger’s Charleston wedding on the blog and here’s Bill’s wedding highlight film for the same wedding!

 

Regina & Roger Highlight Film from Cinema Couture on Vimeo.

To view more of Cinema Couture’s wedding films, visit their website – www.cinemacouture.com or facebook page – www.facebook.com/CinemaCouture.

Coming soon to the blog…how wedding photography and videography work together on your wedding day!