Last night was the final episode of How I Met Your Mother. I will admit that I am a fan of the show and have watched the story of Ted, Robin, Lily, Marshall and Barney since the first episode. Tough to believe that was 9 full seasons ago. The reason I am writing a blog post about the show is that last year at the San Diego Comic Con, I was tasked with photographing the cast during their panel, press room and booth signing.
The panel shoot is the most difficult when it comes to lighting. The use of a flash is difficult due to the distance between were we could shot from and the performers on stage. Then there are the tables, water, name tags and other assorted junk in the way. Luckily I was able to shoot the entire panel and could take my time in moving from side to side and from the front of the room to the back. The settings for these shots were very similar to my concert settings. 1/250 seconds, f/2.8 and ISO 1600.
Next up, I was one of the few still photographers in the press room where we got to photograph the cast up against the SD Comic Con background. This involves a whole different lighting issue as you get to use a flash, but then again so does everyone else and there is no way to set up any extra lighting. So it is basic flash-on-camera type shooting. this is where I use (and love) the Rouge Flashbenders as they take a small light and make it bigger, giving me a softer light.
There is also a very limited amount of time to shoot as the cast needed to do a ton of interviews. If we are lucky, we can get individual shots and then a group shot or two. For this press room, the access was limited so we got a few extra second with each of the actors.
The final shoot of the day was the booth signing ton the expo floor. This is a crazy shoot. Thousands of fans line up early in the morning to get a coveted spot in line to get a HIMYM signed poster. The working conditions are cramped and the sight lines are tough. Again, I had to use the SB-900 on camera wight he diffusion dome and a FlashBender to spread the light.
It was a crazy day following the cast of HIMYM from panel to press room to booth signing. I enjoyed the show and I am glad that Ted finally got to tell the kids how he met their mother.
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