polaroid camera with box of probs? i love the idea of a photo booth too but cant justify spending £400 for 1. x

ye slouby thats wat my mate did and i mite do! get a polaroid so they take a picture of themselfs then plaes it in guest book with their entry!! asda sell them cheap

Hi Cam,

I wouldn't recommend you do a video message booth 'on the cheap' because there is an art to creating video and making it look good. However, if I was going to do such a thing, this is how I would do it:

- Find the best video camera you can get your hands on (borrow it if you haven't got one)
- Set the video camera on a sturdy tripod
- Set the whole thing up in a bright area that's as far away from the disco / band / noise as possible
- Entrust someone to look after it for an hour while your guests come to record their messages
- Press record at least five seconds before your guests start talking to the camera
- Leave it recording at least five seconds after they finish speaking

You will end up with a fairly crude looking recording of video messages but at least it's something. You must test this before you 'go live' so that you can be confident the audio and picture is right and you're using the right settings on the camera.

If you want to improve the idea:

- Hire a better camera
- Use an external microphone
- Use additional lights and try lighting the scene from different angles
- Record your video messages when the band / disco aren't playing
- Try decorating your scene with tall plants or flowers to add colour and break up the flatness of the picture
- Use manual focus and exposure
- Find a professional videographer to edit the pieces together to make them look a bit more professional

If you want to do it properly:

- Hire a professional

For you to get good results might take you a lot of experimenting and practice, and there is no guarantee it will actually work on the night. You won't have these problems with a professional because they already know how to get the best out of video messaging. If you're recording to MiniDV tape as DV or HDV, you can pop the tape in the post and send it to me and I will clean it up and render it to DVD / YouTube / Vimeo / Flash.

Hope that helps. :-)


Kind regards,

Andrew.