Erin Martin ’02 gives Ernst Stavro Blofeld and Dr. Evil a run for their money.
When Erin Martin ’02 accepted her fiance’s marriage proposal, she never expected it to turn into a wedding of blockbuster proportions.
Erin and husband-to-be Jeffrey Wong (HMC ’01) eschewed traditional paper invitations to their October 2010 wedding in favor of a video save-the-date. Having dabbled in art and video production while in Claremont, the two imagined the project would be a fun weekend experiment; instead, it grew into an action-packed four-minute movie “trailer,” complete with professional voiceovers, explosions, and dozens of Hollywood clichés.
“We started coming up with more ideas and were having more and more fun with it,” says Erin. “As you can tell, we just got carried away.”
Friends pitched in time, recording space, equipment, and even “evil” cats to make the shoot a success. To complete complex special effects shots, Erin and Jeff filmed themselves in front of a lime green storefront near their home in Sydney, Australia. But stakes were raised when voice actor Larry Wayne accepted their request for help and returned a performance worthy of any multiplex.
“Once he sent back the audio … we were blown away!” notes Erin. “How could the video live up to the standards set by [his] voiceover?”
Easily. Packed with bank robberies, romantic encounters, carpet bombings, martial arts, and extreme sports, Erin’s wedding announcement quickly became a viral sensation, receiving close to one million views on YouTube and garnering media mentions by ABC, NBC Los Angeles, the Huffington Post, Boing Boing, and a dozen others.
“We’re quite overwhelmed by all the love coming in,” Jeff admits.
The two met while students at Scripps College and Harvey Mudd College. Since then, Erin and Jeff have traveled the globe and become “true blue dinky di fair dinkum Aussies!” Now dual citizens, Erin advises students about off-campus study opportunities at Macquarie University while Jeff works in Canon, Inc.’s Australian research arm.
At least that’s their cover story when they’re not busy saving the world.
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