A Storybook Second Career
By Jennifer Kirby
After 30 years in education, half teaching English and half being Midway High School’s media coordinator, it’s not surprising that the pursuit of creative excellence is what drives Beverly Warren’s new career as an onsite videographer and studio editor and producer.
“I really enjoy the creative process of it,” she said. “You don’t have to have a big studio to do good work. You just have to be creative.”
Warren’s company, BLW Productions, became a full-time project in May. But for much of the last decade, she was acquiring the skills for this venture.
For years, Warren coordinated the video-production studio and produced Midway’s daily school news-and-information broadcast. She also was the chief videographer for school pageants and performances, and each year she created a kind of video yearbook, recording highlights of the school year.
She didn’t retire in order to start BLW Productions, but it was a natural transition. “I probably would have retired anyway,” she said. “This was a new vision and a new calling, and I had to fulfill that need for creativity.”
So six months ago she invested much of her savings in top-of-the-line video equipment, converted a storage room in her home to a studio and went to work. Although she has made videos of reunions and the birth of her twin grandsons, her specialty is weddings.
Warren said her philosophy is that wedding videos should tell a story. And that’s the strong suit of this former English teacher and self-declared romantic. Her wedding packages are named “Dream Wedding,” “Storybook Wedding” and “Fantasy Wedding,” and she begins each video by establishing the setting: when and where the event is taking place, and who the characters are.
One of Warren’s most common requests is for a video collage, typically composed of about 150 photographs, divided into headings such as “The Early Years” and “Falling In Love” and set to music. These videos usually are about 12 to 15 minutes long and are popular at wedding-rehearsal dinners.
Besides investing in quality equipment and putting dozens of hours into the videos’ production, Warren takes extra steps to ensure her products will meet her own standards and please clients.
When filming weddings, she and her husband and business partner, Mason, attend the rehearsal dinner to plan camera placement and coordinate with the still photographer and wedding director. And in addition to the camera’s external microphones, she likes to put unobtrusive microphones on the groom and the pastor, so the wedding vows are clearly recorded.
Thanks to a large, ready-made client base – former students – Warren hasn’t had to depend on any advertising except word of mouth.
She maintains a three-week turnaround time by working at about two weddings a month and then spending 50 to 60 hours editing each one and setting it to music.
“It’s very time-consuming, but that’s why they look as good as they do,” she said.
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