Your birthday party, filmed by everyone there, edited by us

Then they aren't. Put whoever is planning it as the shipping address — a friend, a sibling, an office. The box is plain on the outside with no branding, and the kit arrives five days ahead, so there's time to test the cameras somewhere other than the house.

That's what makes these films work, and it's worth deciding the question before the night. Add the prompt cards at checkout and we'll print it, or write your own on the place cards. One question asked forty times gives the editors a spine to build around instead of forty unrelated clips.

Appoint one person and give them the job in advance rather than hoping. It takes about ninety seconds a guest, it works best after dinner and before the toast, and the person who does it should be someone who can interrupt a conversation without it being awkward. That one job produces most of the film.

No — and it's better to know that now. The film is cut after the cameras come back, which is three to four weeks depending on your kit. If you want something screened on the night, that's a separate thing you'd make beforehand. What you get from us is the record of the party, not a piece of it.

Most of the film isn't footage of them. It's the room talking about them — forty people describing the same person differently — which is a different experience to watch and a much easier one to sit for. People who dread a videographer following them around tend to be fine with this.

You don't pay for the edit. If the kit comes back without enough usable material to cut a film, the editing charge and every add-on are refunded in full. You keep paying only the kit rental — 20% of the package price, less than the rental is worth on its own — because the cameras were held and shipped for a date we couldn't book to anyone else. It's rare, and we show you what came back before we make that call.