We purchased the “Gold Package” which featured a 2 camera HD shoot by the assistant videographers, not Thomas Hart. We knew this from the beginning; however, Thomas assured me his... team was great and that they are requested frequently. The guys who filmed our wedding were very professional. They arrived on time, and we hardly noticed them at all. It took almost four months to receive our wedding video. Thomas communicated this in advance, and I did not mind because I did not want to compromise the quality of the editing process.
However, after waiting four months, I was very disappointed with the final product. Our wedding date was September 10, 2011. We received a video with the caption September 9, 2011. More than half of the video was grainy and did not look HD at all. Thomas said this was due to the low lighting inside the reception venue. I would expect a professional videographer to plan accordingly; they knew in advance the reception would take place inside. The quality of the picture was poor.
Before they begin editing the film, you have to answer a list of questions regarding the editing process. Some of these questions include what style of film you would like (i.e. romantic, cinematic, fun), and specific moments during the wedding that stood out. I noted that we wanted a cinematic style. In fact prior to securing Hart to Heart Media as our wedding videographer, I sent Thomas an example of what we were looking for, and he confirmed that they could definitely deliver the style of video we wanted. He also sent an example trailer that he had edited which looked similar to what we wanted. The video we received was not cinematic at all. I also noted that the toasts made during the reception as events that stood out, and we wanted to see them in the film. They were not in the short film, and the toast portion of the documentary video was completely inaudible due to all of the background noise. Thomas said that this was due to the fact that our DJ did not send the microphone through the feed to their camera.
When I contacted Thomas regarding these issues, he agreed to work as hard as possible to correct the problems, but noted they would not be able to completely eliminate the graininess. They did correct the date, and added a little bit of cinematic music at the beginning of the film. The audio on the toasts was improved some, but the reception portion of the video is still grainy. I am extremely disappointed. We definitely did not received $2,200 worth of service. The video we received was worth at most $1,200, and I feel our video was not given the same level of effort as some of the other videos that this company has produced.
Update 2/16/12: P.S. I left this same review on Wedding Wire and the vendor followed up with a statement saying that "The bride and groom have a dark complexion, which makes it even more difficult in a dark room without any grain". I find these comments to be rude and offensive. The video was grainy in general. This includes background objects too. Seriously, does one have to have a certain skin color to receive a quality video?