Green Screen photography at the Chronicles of Narnia premiere

Another interesting green screen job for us. We were invited to cover the opening of Sky's new Screen 11 at the O2 arena. This is the biggest 3D cinema screen in Europe and is absolutely stunning!

We were setup in the VIP area with our green screen studio and instant printing kit. We had worked with 20th Century Fox on the original posters of the Voyage of the Dawn Treader as this film is titled. They provided us with layered artwork and we set it all up so we could put kids into the main ship or the smaller boat.

We automated the whole process for speed using a batch file to combine the layers into a composite image. This gave a great effect and the kids were amazed to see photographs of themselves on the Dawn Treader or in the smaller boat with the actors!

The whole process was so fast we didn't even have a queue so we were getting people from the face painting and magician queues and photographing them. Again brilliantly organised by Tania and Emma. We even had time for a meal at the O2 before packing up and getting home.

Capital Radio Jingle Bell Ball

A very busy weekend at the Capital radio Jingle Bell Ball sponsored by Microsoft Windows 7 at the O2 arena. We had to provide two pods to entertain guests before and during the concert. So one was set up for Green Screen, the other for Video.

Early start Saturday as I had the scarey job of photographing the stage. Scarey because I had the whole arean watching me and had to direct the lighting and get the big screens fired up to show Windows 7 and Capital FM's logos. Those screen refresh slowly so it was a tricky shoot in low light but the Nikon D700 coped as usual by cranking up the ISO, didnt even use a tripod! 

On the Green Screen pod we had a huge dressing up box and a couple of electric guitars. We photographed kids and sometimes parents in front of the Green Screen, then dropped them onto the concert stage with an overlay of a cheering crowd. Then we printed and mounted a photograph for each of them. These will be up at www.capitalradio/windows7.

The video pod was to celebrate MSN's 15th birthday, we filmed guests dressed up again in all manner of weird costumes wishing MSN a happy birthday. The best one gets to be featured in their advertising. It was a hard weekend, but great fun and well organised by Jeremy, Tania and Emma.

On the Sunday evening our crew were all allowed in to watch the concert whilst I volunteered to guard the equipment.

Green Screen Photography in a tight space!

We attended a brilliant party organised by FMI Group for Sony Ericcson to treat the Carphone Warehouse group as a thank you for their work. The party was at the Circus bar in Covent Garden. We had a very small space to work in but managed to put up a small green screen and floor. Lighting was tricky, no room either side for the usual shoot through umbrellas to light the green screen, so we had to position wireless flash guns on the floor lighting up the screen. We shot the guests using a softbox with another wirless flash inside, all driven by the built-in commander flash on the Nikon D700.

We managed to get a viewing station set up on a counter, with the Mitsubishi Click system powering a 9550 photolab. We shoot wirelessly using a Nikon D700 with a low light 24-70mm f2.8 pro lens linked by a WT-4 to a hub. As we shoot photos are sent to the viewing station. Guests choose the pose they like then the images are sent to the Click system. Elaine was operating the Click's green screen software. We had designed a selection of Circus themed backdrops all branded with Sony's logos.

The most popular by far was the Tiger in the cage, followed by a circle of fire, then a more subdued harlequin backdrop to match the Circus theme. There was entertainment all night, Burlesque dancers, trapeze artistes, Hula dancers and stilt walkers, who all performed on the stage which is right in the centre of the venue. But we were by far the most popular attraction, absolutely mobbed all night, and by the end of the evening 280 large 9"x 6" photographs had been shot, editted, green screened, printed and framed!