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MAKE YOUR OWN PHOTO BOOTH

This next idea is useful for both decoration and entertainment.

“Nicole and Kevin” got married at Lakeside Farms in Ballston Spa, NY. What they did was build a nifty custom backdrop for photos, borrowing from the photo booth idea.

The difference from a traditional photo booth here is this backdrop was a folding facade that had their names, the wedding date, and other important tidbits “stenciled” on it.

HOW TO MAKE YOUR OWN CHALKBOARD PHOTO BOOTH

1) Hinge three pieces of plywood together into a tri-folding formation.
2) Paint the boards in black paint, or CHALKBOARD PAINT.  (If you are unfamiliar with Chalkboard Paint, it is a paint that dries and allows you to write and erase on its surface.)
3) Headline the top center with the bride & groom’s name.
4) Decorate the sides in white writing and designs. Use white paint, white sticker letters, or chalk (if you have painted with Chalkboard Paint.)
5) Have your DJ announce the photo booth idea to your guests.

LET THE WEDDING PARTY FUN BEGIN

Accessorize – To add more entertainment value to this decoration, the bride and groom of this particular wedding also put out a folding table of costume accessories and props for the guests to pose with in front of their creation. (Some things in the box included sunglasses, rockstar wigs, inflatable guitars, feather boas, crazy hats and even costume jewelry.)

Chalkboard Paint – Another idea if you have used chalkboard paint is to allow guests to write messages on the backdrop to the bride and groom!

WAYS YOU CAN REALLY SAVE AT YOUR WEDDING VIDEO BLOG

DJ Kenny Casanova drops the bottom line on how to save money with your wedding in this inspiring Top 10 List video blog. If you need to be a bit of a spendthrift at your wedding, but don’t want your guests to know, relax. There is a way.

Invest in only 5 minutes of your time with watching this video. You will come up with some nifty ideas that will save you money, but not make you look like you have deep pockets in doing so on your special day.

For more on this topic, check out our article at: HOW TO SAVE MONEY AT YOUR WEDDING

Thanks and enjoy!

A DJ EVENT WITH GOOD CLEAN FUN UNDER THE MUD

Using my background in sports announcing, I had the pleasure of being the emcee and official DJ for this year’s Great American Mud Run in Pattersonville, NY.

All of the dirt and sweat took place at a familiar backdrop to Upstate, NY residents; The Indian Lookout Country Club of Mariaville, home of the world famous Harley Rendezvou, and also Club Bisco.

Despite droves of teams coming out for the run, the competition was fierce. America’s “muddiest 5k obstacle course race awarded cash prizes to four lucky finishers!

There was guts and gore and blood and mud in this crazy obstacle run.

I played a mix of  hair band 80’s metal and also some of today’s hits to a thousand or so of the muddiest athletes you have ever scene.

The run wasn’t all the fun… We also had some official merchandise giveaways including an air guitar and the first ever, open invitational muddy YMCA dance contest.

I appropriately played “Talk Dirty To Me” by Poison for the air guitar contest.

We gave away tons of muddy T-shirts, sun glasses and there was a bunch of fun by all. Before each wave of competition, I was able to throw hundreds of sunglasses out to the runners to try and keep them from getting “mud in their eyes.”

Here is a video of the muddy YMCA dance-off.

In case you made it to the run, here are some pictures of the 2013 event.  See if you can spot yourself!

For more information on The Great American Mud Run, you can check out their site at: https://greatamericanmudrun.com/

WHAT DOES PROFESSIONAL MEAN?

Arriving early really means something. Today, I just wanted to spend a little time giving out my thoughts on DJ’ing this past weekend and why professionalism matters.

We had five gigs this weekend. I personally had an awesome wedding in Esperance, NY way up on a mountain on Saturday and Sunday was a Sweet 16 in Schenectady. The wedding came off without a cuff, but the Sweet 16 brought about something worthy to blog on.

First off, it is safe to say that if you want to be successful in life, you have to put in the extra time. We have found that one thing that helps us to get a ton of gigs over other disc jockeys, and one thing that makes for a successful party is …to BE EARLY.

UP TO TWO HOURS EARLY? Yes. Being “on time,” is not good enough. That is why I often prefer to be up to an hour and a half to two hours early to set up for important events like weddings, corporate events and sweet 16s. This gives me enough time to problem solve the unexpected and pay attention to fine detail so everything comes off without a problem.

At his particular Sweet 16, one of the kids wanted to be “DJ Helper.” When this happens, I play along and let them take a few unbreakable things from my car and bring them into the venue with me. While unloading a few gear bags my Jeep Patriot, I pushed my door shut with my hip. The helper kid from the party tried to follow my lead and help me by also shutting my passenger door on the driver side… right where my keys were sitting. When the door shut, the electronic brain of the car thought I was in the car with a large portion of my unloaded gear. Therefore my car decided to help me, as well, by locking the doors.

If I hadn’t been an hour and a half early, I would not have had time to call the police, then the Sheriff, then a towing company to finally find a person available to unlock my doors and let me unload the rest of my gear. If I wasn’t early, I wouldn’t have had enough time to still set up and have everything come off without skipping a beat.

The party still came off and with a tip at the end, to boot! (And the tip just about covered the tow truck fee!)

Looking for an alternative wedding reception site for your special day?

Last Saturday afternoon, I was the DJ for a fun wedding at Camp Scully on Snyder Lake in the North Greenbush / Wynantskill, NY area. I have provided entertainment before at the pavilion at Snyder Lake Beach, but never at the neighboring Camp Scully. It’s actually a nice little place!

With Camp Scully having a bunch of camper cabins for bridesmaids and groomsmen to get dressed in, lots of grass and a pavilion of its own with Snyder Lake as a backdrop, it really is a neat little alternative for a wedding location.

The camp also has a volleyball court if you want to sport things up on your special day.

Another plus… you can bring in your own catering service and save tons of money!

WEDDING THEMES JUST GOT REAL

In a world where everything was hoped to be perfect for their wedding day, the bride and groom thought they had seen it all, until the zombies showed up.

Now, I thought I had seen some real wedding disasters in my day… everything from a collapsed wedding cake to a groom that was so drunk he could barely wallk down the aisle. …However, when it was done at the end of the day and the dust had settled, in comparison, I guess I have really seen nothing. SEE THE GALLERY AT BOTTOM!

Look out for your an attack on your wedding party. The new trend in wedding photography is here. Finely crafted photoshopped wedding pictures to not make things look better, but to rather make them worse. Much worse.

If you are familiar with my work as a wedding DJ, you know that I really love theme weddings. I have written several blogs on how to throw successful theme weddings that your families and friends will NEVER forget. This is one more added piece to the puzzle. With technology as it is today in the photography world, you can decorate everything just right and add the finishing touches later to make your theme wedding, “the best ever.”HOW TO PLAN YOUR OWN ATTACK –What JosiahX did in his photoshoot for the picture above was to actually plan out what the envisioned shot would look like and set up the shot with the intent to add particulars later to enhance the theme. To the left are the before and after shots. The photograher  chose to shoot certain amount of extra headroom space above the bride and groom to add fire, later. Otherwise, it is probable that this photo shoot would have been tighter and more focusing on the people in the shot. However, allowing for the extra space and the perceived photoshop fire time back at the studio really adds to the overall post-apocolyptic zombie invasion feel that the bride and groom were hoping for.

There is a time lapse video from youtube of the creation of the zombie attack shot from Josia X. It shows the process he used to create the picture above. To see, CLICK HERE.

FIRST ATTACK: THE T-REX WEDDING GUEST

It seems that a lot of this craze started with photographer Quinn Miller. Miller wanted a “Jurassic Park”-themed wedding photo, but not just using the decorations from the wedding. Miller Photoshopped a giant T-Rex chasing the entire wedding party out of their ceremony at The Myrtles Plantation in St. Francisville, La., on May 26, 2013.

He did so by shooting the picture allowing space to where the T-rex would be added later, and having the bridal party react to nothing; much like directors do in the movies.

After Miller uploaded his masterpiece, the picture went viral and the new craze was born:

Wedding Party Attack Picture Gallery

SUBMIT YOUR ATTACK SHOTS HERE – Forget walking down the aisle, some couples want to see the bride running for her life. We want your wedding attack pictures!

If you have exciting wedding attack pictures that I can add to this page, (and even more particularly something fun shot from the Albany, Schenectady, Troy, NY area,) please email me them at ken@thedjservice.com .