Making sure that we are investing in state of the art technology within our industry is essential in making sure we are delivering the best quality wedding video to our customers. Thus, all our cameras record in 1080p HD and our aerial videography even records in 4K! Now, there are going to be people out there that have no interest in these numbers and therefore will not even know what this strange number and letter combination even mean, and that is fine as we all have our own area of expertise and that is why I am here to explain (with 0% of jargon).
Most televisions that are sold today offer - as a minimum - High Definition (HD) capability of some sort. Even most TV’s bought in the last 4 to 6 years should have some sort of HD capability. What this means is that TV’s that are “HD Ready” offer superior picture compared to those TV’s that do not (careful! This doesn’t necessarily mean that the sound is also going to be superior, but I’ll touch on that in a later blog post… for now, let’s just focus on the quality of the picture). Think of those old TV’s which you would struggle not to find in any house during the 90’s or early 2000’s where the depth of the TV would usually be bigger than the actual screen size itself and you’d probably need at least two people to move it around the living room. Now, those TV’s produced standard picture or definition hence the term SD.
Roll forward 10 or so years and we have HD – High Definition! HD has given this industry the capability to produce videos that are the closest thing to actually being there, so from a wedding video perspective it has given Wedding Videographers (like us) the capability to produce Wedding Videos for our customers which are the closest thing to actually reliving the day all over again. From the sharpness of the video which really does bring out the detail in the Brides dress, the depth of colour in the flower arrangement to the laughter lines in the faces of the flower girls and page boys. The simple truth of it is you will not be able to identify such detail in a standard definition DVD.
There are many different categories of HD in today’s technological world but generally they all now start at 1080p and work their way up from there to currently 8K (sixteen times as many pixels / quality as 1080p) but do not panic if you’re thinking you are being left behind because 8K televisions are not really being seen as the must have television at the present time and 1080p or 4K (also known as Ultra HD) are perfectly capable of delivering outstanding picture quality. The truth is that very few videographers or even broadcasters currently record in 8K so you will not see a benefit of an 8K television for a few years to come yet.
Now, reeling this blog post back into the Wedding Video industry. Imagine capturing a Bride and Grooms most special day; the whole day, from the guests arriving, the most important ceremony, the must-have photo call, the hilarious speeches, the traditional cutting of the cake and the evening celebrations, all in glorious HD or 4K and having to downscale, which basically means downgrading the picture quality from HD to SD, from 1080p to around 480p – which is cutting the quality of the picture in half, which essentially produces a DVD as opposed to a HD Blu-Ray? From our perspective, it hurts. Not because it causes us any extra work or time but we know the difference between standard definition and the immense quality of High Definition. We offer 2 different options with our Wedding Packages, you can either receive 3 HD Blu-Ray discs and 1 SD DVD or flip it to receive 3 SD DVD’s and 1 HD Blu-Ray disc. It still surprises us today that many wedded couples still do not have a Blu-Ray player of some sort and therefore are forced to opt for the 3 SD DVD’s. Yet many, if not all of them have HD Ready TV’s but not the Blu-Ray player to bring out the best picture quality of their TV.
Up until recently we have only offered customers 10% off their Wedding Video when they sign up to our no-obligation email distribution list which makes sure we are the most competitive like for like videographer in Wales and further afield, which we pride ourselves on as we believe a Wedding Video is the best representation of your day and should be made affordable to everyone.
Given our experience and findings on this topic over the last few years (which I have summarised above), we have decided to change our current incentive to offer our future customers a choice. Either receive 10% off our “All-Day” Emerald Package or receive a free Blu-Ray player when we deliver your wedding video. This is a win-win situation for our customers and us. Future customers win because they receive a free Blu-Ray player and are therefore more likely to select 3 Blu-Ray discs and 1 SD DVD. We win because we get to produce their wedding video in the quality that it was captured in, quality High Definition.
Whether you decide to book with us or an alternative Wedding Videographer we cannot encourage you enough to make sure the Wedding Videographer you choose offers HD Blu-Ray discs, and if possible at no extra cost. The reason why we offer HD Blu-Ray discs at no extra cost is because we believe that HD Blu-Ray discs should become the standard in the Wedding Video industry, it’s because the mammoth sized TV’s from the 90’s are long and gone and the modern TV of today is built for such quality. That is why we have gone one step further and now offer a free Blu-Ray player for all future customers when they sign up to our email distribution list.
If you have any questions about any of the content in this post or would like me to clarify anything then please feel free to leave a comment below or contact me directly at lloyd@em-pro.uk but please be patient for a response. It has been an absolute pleasure collecting my thoughts on this topic and creating a tangible benefit for our future customers, I just hope it has been beneficial for you to read.
Lloyd Gingell
Emerald Media Productions