r/weddingvideography

I honestly don't even know where to start...

I've been working entirely in HDR for a while now. I use JXL files on my 16-inch MacBook Pro (M2). Everything works extremely well so far. I have no issues sending the files to other people, editing them, converting HDR to SDR works without any problems in apps like WhatsApp, and playback also works well on my Mac, iPhone, etc.

Thanks to Apple's EDR technology, editing HDR photos in Lightroom also works flawlessly. I don't have any issues with washed-out colors or contrast when HDR is enabled. On top of that, both my MacBook and my iPhone more or less match each other 1:1, which is extremely important for reproducibility since most of my clients also use iPhones.

Now comes my problem.

I would like to use an external display so that I don't always have to work on the relatively small 16-inch MacBook screen.

Currently, I have a QD-OLED monitor that covers more than 99% of the P3 color space, supports DisplayHDR 400 True Black with 1,000 nits, and was factory-calibrated to a Delta E of less than 2.

The monitor does not natively support EDR (or better said Apple dosent nativly enabled EDR with this monitor), which is the first drawback, because as a result all SDR content looks completely washed out when HDR is enabled. I also suspect that the monitor's 1,000-nit limit is restricting how I can edit the HDR files.

My current workflow looks like this:

• Connect the monitor to the MacBook via USB-C
• Enable HDR on the MacBook for the external monitor
• Match the two displays as closely as possible
• Close the MacBook and edit exclusively on the external monitor

This leaves me with the EDR issue, but even more importantly, the HDR highlights are not reproduced equivalently on the external monitor.

If I edit an image on the MacBook until I am happy with it and then look at the same image on the external monitor, the difference is significant enough that I would want to edit the image again on the external monitor so that it looks best there.

And that's really frustrating, because it means I don't feel comfortable moving away from editing exclusively on the MacBook.

My current plan is the following:

First, I want to see whether tools such as BetterDisplay can make a difference with my current monitor, especially by enabling EDR. From what I understand, this should generally be possible.

After that, I would try to match both displays, the MacBook and my OLED monitor, as closely as possible using all available settings, and then see whether that is sufficient to solve the problem.

I don't expect this to fully solve the issue, though, because I suspect the monitor's 1,000-nit limit is ultimately the bottleneck.

Plan B would therefore be to buy a 5th-generation Tandem OLED. These supposedly offer around HDR 500 True Black / up to 1,300 nits peak brightness.

I would then either go for something like the MSI PRO MAX 341QPXW14G, which has not been released in Germany yet but offers various profiles and software-based implementations specifically for Mac. The monitor was essentially designed with Mac users in mind.

If this monitor doesn't become available within a reasonable timeframe for whatever reason, I would go with another Tandem OLED and hope that I can use something like BetterDisplay to enable EDR, then manually match the colors, contrast, etc. as closely as possible.

Another thought I had was buying Apple's Studio Display. However, it doesn't offer true HDR, so I can't really imagine that it would be suitable for proper HDR editing. The Pro Display XDR is simply too expensive for me.

So, how do you guys edit photos in HDR?

Am I missing something obvious here? Is there a flaw in my reasoning or something I'm overlooking?

Hi wedding videographers of reddit,

I am an amateur photographer with some limited videography experience. My cousin asked me to film some parts of his wedding this coming weekend (as a low-stress bonus - they already have a photographer and content creators, but they want a simple full video of three particular events). I’m hoping you all can give me some tips.

I need footage of 1) the ceremony/vows, 2) their entry to the reception/first dance, and 3) a surprise flash mob dance later in the night. His fiancée is a professional dancer so the dances will be pretty involved, and good video of them is crucial. Everything will be outdoors on the beach - ceremony starts at 3pm (there's no shade) and reception ends at 11pm.

I have two cameras and a bunch of lenses:

• An Olympus OM-D E-M1 II (micro four thirds, portable with good image stabilization), with a 35mm prime (f/1.8), an 18-36mm wide angle (f/4-5.6), an 80-300mm zoom (f/2.8), and a gorgeous 85mm portrait (f/1.6, the Panasonic Leica Nocticron).
• A Nikon d3500, with a Sigma art 18-35mm f/1.8 lens + the 18-55mm kit lens (f/3.5-5.6).

 

I also have a simple boom mic and a musician friend is helping to record the audio from the speakers for the ceremony. I’m getting ND filters because of the sun, and I have fast SD cards and extra batteries.

My general plan is to set up the Nikon with the sigma art on a tripod as the wide catch-all shot + shooting handheld with the Olympus for tighter reaction shots/good bokeh. 

My questions:

1. Which lenses should I use for each of the three events (ceremony, first dance, surprise dance), assuming the Nikon is on a tripod?
2. What settings do you recommend, and what technical issues am I not thinking about? I'm really worried about focus hunting.
3. Any general tips on successful wedding videography? Biggest pitfalls? How to navigate among guests without getting in the photographer or content creators' way?

Thank you so much! Worst case I give my cousin the tripod videos and call it a day, anything else is bonus. It would just be so nice to give them something more involved as a wedding present.

I guess there’s something out there for everyone.

I run a photo shop and we also shoot weddings, around 8 - 16 avg. a month right now.

I’ve been thinking about adding something new where we put QR codes on the tables and guests can just scan them and upload whatever photos/videos they take during the wedding.

The idea is that it’s not only for the couple. Everyone can get access after, so you might find some random video of yourself dancing or a photo someone took from another table that normally would just stay on their phone forever.

I’m trying to figure out the technical side before actually building it. Photos seem pretty easy, but video looks like it can become a mess pretty fast because we have no control over what phones people use. Could be iPhone HDR, HEVC, H264, 4K, different frame rates etc. And with 8 - 16 weddings a month it could easily turn into thousands of videos.

Has anyone here built something that deals with this kind of video volume? How are you handling transcoding? Just running FFmpeg workers yourself or using some API/service?

Also curious what actually becomes the biggest pain when it scales is it cost, speed, storage, weird formats, HDR, or something else?

I shoot weddings and events on Super 8mm and 360, and I love what 360 captures. I bring my 360 camera mostly as a backup capture for audio and camera failures, but it really is awesome in its own way. Looking around the whole room during the vows or the first dance is something nothing else gives you.

But I hate hate HATE editing it. Pulling a good edit out of 360 takes me 10x longer than my Super 8 footage. With film, I choose the frame when I shoot. With 360, I’m reshooting everything in post, deciding where to look in every moment and it's crippling me.

I’m curious how others deal with this:
• Do you offer 360 in your packages, as an add-on, or not? If not, is the editing time part of the reason?
• What parts of the day do you use it for?
• How long does a 360 edit take you compared to your regular footage?
• Do you reframe it into a flat edit, deliver it raw so the couple can look around, or both?
• Have you found anything that makes the process faster? Tools, workflows, or shooting fewer moments in 360?

I’d love to keep using it, but I’m trying to figure out if there’s a sane way to do that or if we’re all suffering.