David & Kate

On October 25 I attended the wedding of David and Kate in Napier.

Filming began at 10.30am with the hair, nails and makeup preparations. After an hour or so I left the girls to find the boys to film their preps as well. Napier being a small town afforded short traveling distances and allowed me to film both preps for the price of one.

The boys seemed quite relaxed and took in a game of snooker at the Hawkes Bay club before the ceremony. Once they left fo head down to the beach for the ceremony I went to the County Hotel to film the girls coming down the staircase.

Dad seemed quite nervous and emotional while waiting for Kate to arrive but once she got there a proud and smiling dad led her off to the vintage car for a short ride to the waterfront fountain for the ceremony.

I scooted down to set up and captured the boys greeting guests and then lining up. The car arrived and circled the fountain a couple of times while the guests were seated. then, the processional.

Now one thing about having your ceremony in a public space is that you can't control what onlookers will do. So was the case with the lady who stood at the foot of the stairs looking towards the ceremony. This was the same stairs where the processional would be passing through. As the bridesmaid arrived and walked past the old lady, the groom motioned to the old lady to move over. The bridesmaid saw the hand gesture and she, thinking it was for her, proceeded to make a wide berth of the lady and ended up walking around the groomsmen instead of straight towards them...This and the boys on their bikes in the background during the ceremony were the only distractions for a short time.

Timing played a bg part for the ceremony. As soon as the official part was over, it started to rain! Getting my gear out of the weather was my main concern, but having a backup handycam for just this occasion was ideal. The main camera was safely out of the rain and filming continued.

The pace of this day was nice and sedate for me, there was no rushing around, besides to avoid the rain, and filming ended only 30 minutes overtime in the evening due to a rather long speech. All in all this Napier wedding was very nice. The weather fined up in the end and the city itself provided several opportunities for some great shots. Napier is on the East cost of the North Island of New Zealand, 4 hours drive from Wanganui.