As most will know, I got married in August and had a bit of a scare when the videographer seemed to disappear off the face of the earth and only got back to us two weeks before the wedding (after several months of emailing).
Little did I know this was the start of the bother.
It took months for us to get even the first cut of the video post-wedding – and this was after a fairy story about having it posted to the wrong address (we checked the address he sent it to, they hadn’t received it). When we got the first cut, we were stunned to find the grainy picture, poor lighting and terrible sound. Now – I understand that a wedding is not going to be a studio but I would expect that we’d be able to, for example, hear the vows or most of the speeches or that the best mans speech wouldn’t be cut off just before one of the punchlines?
Next, the promise of two video cameras was not realised which meant that during the marriage vows, we can’t even see my face. Just one camera so we have a fetching view of the back of my head.
In all, the experience was less than negative – it was complete disaster. It’s taken us five months now and we’ve just given up and asked for the original footage because, to be honest, unless the footage itself is complete dross, my dog could do a better job of editing it. We sent an email requesting the tapes to be sent special delivery.
Your wedding day is meant to be the happiest day of your life and we were meant to receive:
Your day captured and presented in beautiful display cases with five copies to give out to friends and family.
- All the shots from your big day.
- 5 DVDs.
- Attractive display cases.
We paid extra for him to film the bride getting ready at the house but he was late so only got the bride leaving for the church.
This is what we got in the post.
So, I’d wholly recommend that everyone avoid Mark Gillespie as a videographer for your wedding. He’s slow, unreliable, belligerent and even though he was paid in advance, treated us like second class citizens. We were subject to his whims. A thorough lack of professionalism throughout his work.
He writes:
Whilst considering which Wedding Videography company to go for, you have not only to consider quality but budget and style. This is why we believe that our wedding dvd packages are, and shall remain, highly competitive and flexible enough to incorporate any ideas you may have for the day. Our process fully involves you, from the very start, in the layout of the final production – from visual effects to background music.
Absolute lies.
He continues:
We use two Sony HVR-Z1 Cameras. From Sony’s professional camcorder range the HVR-Z1 records stunning picture quality in standard DVD video format or in the latest high definition.
Again, more lies. He used one camera and there’s no way anything was recording in DVD quality, never mind high definition. The sound was apparently from Sennheiser microphones? Maybe if they were buried under the carpet?
It just goes to show that having a nice web site doesn’t guarantee quality especially when the web site says:
Today wedding videographers are a penny a dozen with every Joe and his camcorder taking up the challenge, for a fee of course. That is why you need not only know that the videographer is experienced and competent, but that they use the latest equipment to ensure that your production is of the utmost quality.
The man is a charlatan and an idiot.
What a cock. Time for the Small Claims court.
damn, sorry to hear about that. what an asshole.
seems he thinks its one of his best videos as on as a showcase…lol
http://www.markgillespie.net/mgvideos/arlene.html?keepThis=true&TB_iframe=true&height=376&width=600
Man that sucks, sorry it went so badly for you.
What did he charge you?
Did he give you a contract, it should have specified what he was going to do; did you read it and agree it? if he failed to deliver two cameras after claiming he would then you are entitled to a refund.
No videographer can control lighting at a wedding, outside, in the church, in the reception at night. How can you complain about the lighting?
Using sennheisser mics he has no excuse for missing the vows etc, using sony hvr-z1 he has no excuse for grainy footage until he gets down to double figure gain.
White dvds in a Jiffy bag is appalling
Sounds like he’s simply a bodger. he’s also posted recommendations from ‘satisfied customers’ on a few wedding planning sites. Curiously the recommendations are posted by different ‘customers’ on consecutive days, clearly an extremely busy videographer.
Darn! Nice website though. Looking one done so might look up the web company. Crap videographer though – look at those plain discs!
Oh crap!!!!!!!!! You have just describe our experience with this man…still waiting for my so called DVD and soooo stressed out as seem to be getting no where, its coming up to six months after our wedding and nothing! I wa suspicsious after he only contacted us only 2 week before the wedding after Id left a sarky message about getting someone else but so relieved at the time to have a vidoographer and not having to go searching…did a goggle at the time as well and couldn’t pull up anything negative but as was getting a bit more worried thought I d check him out again and found your blog….. will have to get on the case asap now will be devatstaed if film is ruined X here’s hoping he learnt his lesson after your wedding (bet not)!
Married on April 29th 2011, chased this guy for months on end and pretty much every day for the last 3 weeks, getting nowhere!! Absolutely useless! Everything you guys mentioned applys to myself and my wife! I am going to continue ringing him everyday until we get somewhere, maybe I will pay him a visit in Ballymena, so useless!!!
Avoid this guy like the plague. Absolutely shocking quality, we have given up after months and months of trying to get our money back, stress and quite a few few tears along the way, my eight year old really could have done better.
This guy is a CONMAN.!!!!
We had the same thing happen to us 3 years ago with Mark Gillespie. We are still waiting for our DVD in the post! He didn’t even turn up to our wedding but sent a teenager to film it! Our friends got married two weeks before us and had used him so we too went with him; they also had a nightmare and only got their DVD when their solicitor wrote to him. His excuse for us was that he was taking long term illness leave and wouldn’t be able to work on our DVD sending us only the raw footage. He is a con-artist and I believe he works under several alias. I wish the BBC would do a programme on him because it is nothing less than criminal to charge that sort of money and produce next to nothing. I can’t believe he is still operating – I just hope someday I meet him at a wedding do that I can chat with him face to face.
Ps just found his Facebook page
https://www.facebook.com/markgillespiedotnet