Venue – Kew Gardens

Photographer – Mark Bothwell

Why do you want to capture your wedding on video?
(a) Memorialising the day – We want to capture our wedding on video so we can look back at the video and remember the wedding day for years to come. When we have them, we also hope and intend to force our kids and grandkids to watch the video. We want to carefully capture the wedding ceremony including the vows and speeches. Capturing our family members and wedding party will be most important for these parts of the day.

There are a few particular things that we can discuss and detail separately that would be important to capture (e.g., Claud’s mom brushing her hair on the day as she gets ready – a Hong Kong Chinese tradition that is quite important to them).

(b) Catching the bits we miss – We know that we won’t be able to see a lot of how the day unfolds. So we’d hope to capture (i) each other getting ready with our respective families and wedding parties and (ii) how the guests interact with each other and enjoy our wedding day as well. Especially during the drinks reception and dinner, we’d like to capture the guests generally.

(c) Background for our Hong Kong wedding in November – We will have a separate Chinese ceremony and reception later in the year in Hong Kong in November. We plan to show the footage from our London wedding on the day as part of our celebration and to show those people unable to make it on the day. (We should separately discuss to consider which video you will produce will be best suited for this – footage that can be played in the background without having to listen to speeches may be better).

Why did you pick us?
We picked you because we liked what we’ve seen from your portfolio. In particular:

(a) your videos are not too cheesy! For example, we liked the natural / reportage approach. Some portfolios had staged sections which we didn’t like so much.

(b) quality production – that said, some videographers had shakey filming where people had tried to be too natural or casual and resulted in diminished quality. We didn’t see that in your portfolio.

(c) your portfolio managed to capture some very natural shots of the couples and their families – we hope you’ll capture those of us too!

(d) we heard you are not intrusive or disruptive – we have been to weddings before where videographers have disrupted the day (by asking for forced/posed segments or blocking people’s views during key moments of the day), but know that’s not your style 

You guys? …What do you do?..How do you spend your days?..What’s important in life? etc etc
Dan is a corporate lawyer and Claudia is a financial consultant. When we’re not working, we spend our days travelling around the world and enjoying our time together. Family and friends are important to us! 

The proposal? …Tell me everything (all the gushy details)
We got engaged during a weekend getaway at the Cotswolds – after a 12 course meal Dan surprised Claudia with a proposal in a beautiful set up in the gardens of the hotel!  He picked the spot because it was quiet, private and secluded – the proposal was personal. We didn’t tell people until the next day (when we called everyone…). 

Kew Gardens in London? … Why this place above anywhere else?
We love the light that the Nash Conservatory and the Orangery will bring to the ceremony and the reception, and the airy-ness and tranquility of the gardens.

We have a lot of guests coming in from overseas, and Kew is an iconic venue and very “London”.

We’d like to capture the surroundings and will have a clean, classic style to the wedding (with lots of flowers – we’ll let the flowers and the botanic garden setting do the work).

If possible, it would be nice to capture some of the general area in some of the set-up shots relating to the wedding (e.g., in the Nash and in the gardens or stereotypical London or British scenes generally – maybe we can discuss). 

What experience do you want to give to your guests?
We want everyone to have a great time and enjoy the company. More than 50% of the guests will have traveled from afar (New York, Hong Kong, San Francisco, etc) so it would be lovely to have everyone enjoying a beautiful summer evening in one of the most beautiful gardens in London!

Dan’s family are mainly in London and Essex, with a few people coming in from Ireland.

Claud’s family are mainly in Hong Kong, with a few coming from North America.

We have friends coming in from Europe, NY and SF from when we studied and worked there before moving back to London in August 2016.