| It was supposed to be such an amazing event. Jennifer Cooper and her fiancé, Sean Steuer, had planned a May wedding in Mexico, complete with fire dancers, a secret island, and more than a hundred family members and friends. Alas. By mid-March, it became clear that no one was going anywhere for a while, so they started shifting their plans to something virtual. But the couple wasn't just going to prop up an iPad and say their vows. Oh no. They were going to have an emcee and a DJ and dance lessons and maybe a drone taking photos and a wedding painter (yes, that's a thing) and the technical situation was going to be tip-top. As Nicole Pajer writes this week on Backchannel, "When you think of someone doing a virtual wedding, you think 'oh they are just going to have a Zoom login and give it to relatives and that's it.' But not this couple. They went back and forth about what types of cameras to use, how the lighting should look, which cords would provide the best connection speed for the best AV experience, what cable they could use to link to their speakers, how many cameras to position around the apartment, how to integrate Zoom with Facebook Live so that people had two options to watch, and on and on." Pro tip if you're planning your own virtual celebration: hire an emcee and/or a DJ to control your music, mute and unmute participants, spotlight new Zoom windows if you're moving from, say, the living room ceremony to the dining room cake-cutting station, and pin different guests during their speeches. And at the end of the night, be sure to leave room for a remote dance party. (See the story for only slightly embarrassing video clips!) Turns out it was an amazing event after all. Sarah Fallon | Deputy Editor, WIRED |
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