Midnight Magic Videography | Knoxville TN wedding videography at its very best

This is going to be a short entry, I have a wedding tomorrow morning and thank goodness it is indoors.  I love outdoor weddings, but this summer has been just amazingly hot.  Just to give you an idea, we normally have only 11 days of temperatures  90 or above. So far, including today, we have had 57 days above 90.  I looked at the long range forecast and there is no sign of that ending anytime soon.

I wanted to post a trailer for Allison & Ben’s wedding back in June.  They had the ceremony at the Amphitheater  at Worlds Fair Park.  It was a beautiful venue and a very special wedding ceremony.  There were a few bumps in the road that day, but nothing could stop this very special couple from sharing their vows with their family and friends.

Tomorrow is shaping up to be a long day and I’m looking forward to it.

I just got this today from Whitney.  I did Whitney & Jon’s wedding back in April at Hunter Valley Farms.  It was so nice of Whitney to write the following testimonial for me:

“Don Samples and Midnight Magic Video are top-notch! Let me just say that Don made my wedding the most incredible time of my life. He was there for every special moment and did not leave out a single detail. Wedding planning can be extremely stressful and time-consuming! However, I knew that my wedding videographer would be something I had absolutely no worries about and knew would be in great hands. I looked forward to every meeting we had with Don and our wedding video turned out absolutely wonderful! I believe your wedding videographer should be something you take great care in choosing. Your wedding video is what will capture all of the special memories and will be watched for years to come! It should definitely be put in capable and experienced hands. I could not be happier that we found Don Samples and Midnight Magic to help us always remember our wedding day!”

I cannot say enough great things about Whitney and Jon, they were a videographers dream to work with.  They were open to every idea and so willing to try just about anything I wanted to do.  I wish them the best of luck in their future together.

Here is a short clip from the 2010 Knoxville Bridal Bliss Wedding Show held at the Knoxville Convention Center.  We had a great day meeting with some really great brides.

I want to invite you to the Mia Photography’s first annual “With This Ring Bridal Day” for a one of a kind bridal show.  Most bridal shows you attend are very large with so many vendors, most brides tend to get overloaded with information or lost in the shuffle.  These bridal shows are also loud and crowded which gives you little to no time with the vendors.

“With This Ring Bridal Day” will be completely different. First off there will only be a few vendors present.  Mia Photography has picked the very best to be part of this show.  I have worked with most of these vendors before and can tell you, they are the best of the best in Knoxville.

The show will not be in a huge convention center with a fashion show going on in the background. The show will be in the Mia Photography’s studios on Peters Road near the Panera Bread.   This is going to be a very intimate setting where you can actually spend some one on one time with each vendor.

I am happy to announce that I will be a part of this show and would love to meet as many of the area brides as possible.  If you go to the web site and register now you will get a free wedding planner with over $1000 in discounts and giveaways from the participating professionals and an entry for a free engagement session and custom guestbook from Mia Photography.  Space is limited so please register soon.  The show will be on Sunday February 21st from 1 – 5pm.

I will be having a giveaway at the show that day.  If you register with me at the show, you have a chance to win the CD “7 Steps to a Stress-Free Wedding”.

This CD is produced by one of the leading wedding insider, Rick Brewer.  Rick Brewer is no stranger to the Wedding Industry. Rick has been in the wedding industry since 1992 and has accomplished the following:

Growing up in the 70′s, you typically had three ways to communicate with someone.  You could travel to their house, if they lived close enough.  You could make a long distance phone call (remember, unlimited long distance calling didn’t exist until a couple years ago) or you could write a letter, mail it and wait a week or two to get a response. The cheapest was to use the mail, but it also took the longest.

Today, we live in a society where we have cell phones and landline phones with free long distance, email, instant messaging, Twitter, Facebook and video chats.  You can now get in touch with anyone in a moments notice.  We live in a media savvy culture where we get news in a 24 hour cycle with video being shot by everyone who has a cell phone.  We no longer want to hear about the news or events, we want to see it.

This goes along with an article I saw the other day from The Knot that listed the top 10 trends in weddings this year. One of those trends is something brand new for brides and just getting noticed.

Video-Save-The-Date

When you really think about it, it goes along with what we all want in today’s culture – something visual.

The Video-Save-The-Date really opens the door to brides for them to be as creative as they want.  This gives them the ability to do something that many of their friends didn’t have the option to do.

You want your wedding to stand out, to be different, to be one that your guests will remember for years.  Then start that as early as possible with a Video-Save-The-Date DVD that you can send to your friends and family and post online.

So, what does this look like?  It can look any way you want it to look.  It can have a simple, classic look, like this

Or you can get a little creative and do something like this:

But, if you really want to get their attention, you can go all out and do something like this:

Can you just imagine your guest getting one of these in the mail?  Or having a great website with this video being the feature to kick off your wedding planning.  How excited would everyone be for your wedding?

We can do Video-Save-The-Date DVDs and Videos for any bride.  Not only can we do the video part but we can also put it all together for you with full color photo labels on the disk.  We would place it in a wonderful jewel case ready for you to mail out.  Just think how excited you would be to get a DVD in the mail and see this from one of your closest friends.

Contact us today for a free consultation for your Video-Save-The-Date.

Seems like every company or business has a mission statement.  I have even known a few families that have mission statements.  I never really understood the whole need for a company to tell you what it is they do and how they want to do it.  I mean, if you are using that business, don’t you already know what it is they do?

I think companies should move away from mission statements and move back to customer service.  It amazes me how customer service has seem to have been tossed to the side in the name of profit.  Companies have put the priority on the dollar and not on the person spending that dollar.  And the saddest part is that this loss of customer service is not limited to private businesses; it has spread to our government as well.  Federal, State or local, it just seem like the people who are taking your tax dollars just don’t care or seem annoyed that you are asking them to do their job.

I will give you a case in point; today my wife and I had to run some errands downtown.  We had to go down to the city/county building to renew my business license and a few other things.  We had to walk the entire length of the building, twice, to find out that we were in the wrong building.  We had to go next door to the OLD courthouse.  Once we got inside there, it was another search and find journey to find the right office.  When we finally found where we wanted to go, the people working in the office acted as if we were disturbing them.  I mean, how dare we come into THEIR office and have the gall to ask them to help us do something they are PAID to do.  PAID with my tax dollars I might add.  One girl in the office was talking on her cell phone making plans for the night with her boyfriend, one guy was at the desk opposite of her slowly pecking away at a keyboard. I think he was trying to kill time or maybe he just didn’t care.  But, the thing that really set me off about all this is the sign at the back of the room “We are happy to serve you.”   WHAT!!  There wasn’t a happy person in the room.  Customer service gone out the window.

All this got me thinking about what I do; I provide a service and am proud of the work I do.  I take pride in my work and want nothing more than for the bride and her family to be happy with the product I give them.  I know that money is tight today, so when someone books me to shoot their wedding, I know that they are spending some hard earned money.  With that being said, I want to share with you my “Mission Statement”:

“You, the customer, are the most important thing to me.  You are not dependent on me, I am dependent on you.  You are not an outsider to my business — you are part of it.  I am not doing you a favor by providing you a service, you are doing me a favor by allowing me the opportunity to serve you.  My work is not finished until you are 100% happy with the work I have done.”

Customer come first with me.  That is my mission statement, are you listening GM?

I know that this is going to sound strange, but I am so glad it is Monday.  Most people hate Monday’s, Garfield comes to mind.  The reason I am happy it is Monday is the fact that I survived this past weekend.  I called it my “Triple Wedding Weekend”.  I had two weddings and a dance recital this past weekend and to say I am beat is an understatement.

First up was Shelley & Josh’s wedding at Ridge Valley Farms.  Ridge Valley Farms is the site of the first wedding I did professionally OH SO MANY YEARS AGO.  I hold a special place for Ridge Valley Farms.  It is a beautiful location, you are in a valley between some very mystic mountains.  The only draw back is the fact that every wedding I have shot there was cloudy and gray.  Friday was no different, it looked like it was going to rain all day, but not a drop fell.

Shelley was such a beautiful bride and you could tell that she was marrying the man of her dreams.  As they left for the night, they couldn’t stop looking at each other and just smiling.  I would say the only thing that went wrong was the sand ceremony.  If you have not see this, let me explain; instead of the unity candle, the couple uses sand.  The bride has one color and the groom another.  At the bottom of  a glass vase is a layer of sand that represents God as the base of their relationship.  They pour the sand into the vase which represents the blending of their lives together.  It is a very sweet ceremony to watch, but for Shelley and Josh, it was a bit different.  Someone forgot the sand and didn’t remember it till just before the ceremony.  So, they did a water ceremony instead.  Same as the sand, but with different color water.  I will give the pastor a big shout out as he changed the wording of the sand ceremony to fit the pouring of the water.  He is a pro.

Saturday was a dance recital with Imagine Dance Studios at Campbell County High School.  This was their first recital and you could tell these girls put their heart and soul into the program.  Our biggest challenge was the lack of air conditioning but, like the pros we are, we just pushed through.  My assistant, Alexis, had the worse end of the day having to be up in the old projection room where I am sure it was very uncomfortable, but she never complained once.  Now you know one of the reasons I hired her.  She does great work and has never complained about anything I ask her to do.

Sunday was Taylor and Jon’s wedding at Dara’s Gardens.  I can say without a doubt that Dara’s Gardens is my favorite place to shoot a wedding.  The grounds are so well kept and everything there is just so beautiful.  Taylor could not have picked a better day to get married.  A clear blue sky without a cloud in sight.  It was a bit on the warm side, but that didn’t stop her from having the wedding of her dreams.  Taylor had such a infectious smile the entire day.  As I watched her go through her day, I could not help but smile and laugh along with her.  She was just having so much fun the entire day.  Jon had one of the best ideas for his groomsmen,  they all wore black Chuck Taylor All-Star tennis shoes.  I got a great shot of the guys walking down the stairs in their shoes, I can’t wait to work on that shot.

I have to give a huge THANK YOU to Brenda, Lisa and everyone at One Enchanted Evening.  They did the both weddings this past weekend and they did a great job with both of them.  Brenda had every detail in hand and both days went off without a hitch.

But also, a really big THANK YOU  to my wife Leeann.  She took care of everything this past weekend, our daughter, the house and even helping me with my tapes and equipment.  She is a saint and I know I am just so lucky and blessed to have her in my life.

Keep an eye on this blog in the up coming days as I will be putting up some trailers from this weekend.