Chicken Blog

Complete! I finished the editing, the music arrangement, the panning and cropping and zooming. And we burned 14 copies of "Wedding Weekend." It includes scene selections and a nifty title page. That's the good news. The tragic news is that after successfully burning 14 copies we sort of completely lost the file. So, unless we can copy from a disk, these 14 are limited edition and therefore priceless and rare.

Grandma wasn't able to attend the wedding, which was sad. She didn't think she could handle the monumental task of packing, preparing and caring for Grandpa in an out of town scenario, and then he was sick, which only confirmed her belief that it just wouldn't have worked out.

Having missed the whole wedding weekend, Grandma was the perfect "test audience." After 40 hours of watching hundreds of photos over and over again, I couldn't be entirely sure that I had produced something good. I was particularly concerned (read: obsessed) with including a fair balance of "his guests" and "her guests." In effect I think I probably did have more photos of the guests I knew; I should have more been more assertive about taking pictures of people I did not know...I'm rambling here...

Back to Grandma as test audience: She liked it! She laughed some and she cried some and she felt sure Bill and Alison are going to like it. The best part of her remarks came when she said that it looked as though everyone was having a genuinely fun time. "Everyone looks so relaxed and happy!" She noticed the warmth, even through photographs, and the informal and easy manner assumed by all. "Everyone is smiling so much and looking so pleased."

Grandma's impression is a perfect and affirming review of the slide show. I had not quite put in to words the mood and atmosphere of the entire weekend and in making the slide show I wanted to capture some of the emotion and even tangible aspects of the celebrations. What she saw in the slide show is a true reflection of the good times had by all. There was no bad mood, or pretense, there was no tension or anything to cause doubt or regret. I am glad I was able to convey the generosity of the hosts, the grace of the guests, the joy of the families and the fun we had all weekend long.