Every time I commission a full wedding edit package — you know the kind that include the wicked sweet montages I like to post for my demo materials — I make sure I stress importance on the idea that the couple who hired me picks a list of 10 songs for their video. I’d rather have too many than not enough. Usually there will be a couple of stragglers left behind. But every once in a while, there will come a couple who says, “We trust you. You go ahead and pick.” Believe it or not, this has happened many times, and it’s always worked out okay. However, it opens me up to vulnerability in a way: Taste in music is ultimately subjective. I believe that some music is just crap no matter which way you spin it — sorry, Beliebers — but for the other 99% of it, there’s a grey area that always makes me nervous when it comes to picking music for a couple’s wedding video.

 

Today, that grey area turned a shade darker. As a taste-tester for a video still in post-production, I sent out a dance montage I spent over six hours editing just a couple nights ago. I think it turned out amazingly well. The couple, however, didn’t like the song. So now I will have to recut this entire sequence. Six hours of work is down the toilet. But refer to the headline: There’s a reason I ask for ten songs from every couple and this is it. This is the kind of thing I want to avoid happening; the kind of situation that could have resulted in some unhappiness on both sides. If they had caught me after the video was finished, I would have refused to recut the sequence without extra pay because there is actually a clause in my contract which says I retain the right to final cut on every video — especially in the event a couple doesn’t pick enough music, which was the case here, leaving me to pick some songs to fill the gaps.

 

I’m not pointing any fingers or name-calling. Merely I’m putting this out there as a cautionary tale to any couples who, if their tastes in music are somewhat eclectic, may want to make sure that list of ten songs is a bit overstuffed. As it stands, this little bit of Lightcraft history will remain online, but will be excised from the final video, much to my own dismay.