A Wedding at the Aga Khan Museum - Venue Review

Lets go straight into the real stuff...

Pros

Contemporary architecture - will upload some picture at a later date.

Really friendly staff willing to help. One of their staffs even helped me monitoring my audio recorder and adjusting gain knobs on the fly! He also asked me for a XLR cable and a pair of 1/4 cable - wow I'm impressed! Even so, I suggest that you make sure that audio connectors are connected to the right channel - especially when you are running 48v phantom power on some channels, so you don't fry their mixer board. Another staff member who looked like a manager - even held one of the heavy doors open for me for 5 minutes when I was executing a group shot. I know managers are usually busy running all over the places, I do appreciate that she spent 5 minutes even just holding the doors.

Guests can go for a tour in the museum when they are waiting. I wish that I could visit some of the exhibition and take pictures for my wedding clients but we spent a lot time shooting outdoors. I guess it's just a trade off.

All exhibition rooms can be opened upon request for pictures although they may not allow flash in some of the rooms. 

Cons

The ceremony was held at the courtyard - surrounded by glass walls and an open-space ceiling. The main concern was the weather - like all outdoor ceremony sites. In fact we've got ice hails a hour before the ceremony. Everyone was worried but luckily enough, it stopped, so we didn't have to go with plan B. Sound echo is an issue - due to the fact of that glass tend to bounce back sound waves instead of absorbing them. In situations like this, placing an audio recorder anywhere in the courtyard will give you reverberate sound. So it's best grab the sound right at the source of it. I clipped a wireless Sennheiser G3 lavalier mic on the groom,  covered the tip with mole skin to prevent from friction noise. The bride will speak into the groom's mic because they will be standing close to each other. In fact I do have an extra G3 for backup in case I absolutely have to mic-up the bride or plant it somewhere - say in an overhead chandelier, in this wedding I didn't have to use it. I didn't mic-up the officiant as I used to because he's holding a reliable Sennheiser G3 handheld mic, which was offered by the venue or the DJ and connected to my audio recorder. During the ceremony, I do expect the officiant to share his mic with the bride and groom when they are saying their vows, but he didn't - I could hardly hear their vows through the speaker but luckily, I had a mic on the groom, it turned out the audio recording was wonderful. Oh, did I mention there was wind noise and airplane engine noise? I can hardly notice these noise in my audio file because the signal to noise ration is pretty high when you place the mic right by the source. 

Electric outlet is hard to find along the reception hallway area. Yes tables are placed in the HALLWAYs which surrounds the courtyard. Depending on how tables are setup, it could be hard to find a space to place lights and cameras. I brought two extension cords reels and they saved my day. I even had to crouch underneath a coffee bar to access power... alright I do what I have to do. Ok, here are the places that you can find power - the reception desk of the museum, behind the bars... and in the courtyard - they are like weather sealed pillars, there are four of them on each corner of the courtyard and there are four sockets in each pillar. I thought that I could even place my studio strobes in the courtyard and let them shine through the glass walls to light up the reception tables - as long as it's not raining in the courtyard.

That's all for now. Thanks for reading!