I had a very nice shoot earlier this week at Le Manoir, the hotel and restaurant of highly regarded TV chef Raymond Blanc. The subject of the shoot was a discussion between Raymond Blanc and another TV chef, Heston Blumenthal about how things have changed in the world of fine dining since Raymond Blanc opened Le Manoir. The conversation between Raymond and Heston was lively and often humorous. We had to deal with a few interruptions from noisy delivery trucks and amorous pigeons, but there were no complaints from anyone when we had to stop and start again. To add some added interest to the shots I used a small camera jib to track left and right as well as booming up and down. Even though we were outside with plenty of natural light I used a 600w Fresnel just to lift the faces of the chefs just above the background which helps keep the audience focussed on them. An HMI would have been better for this as by the time you add a full blue gel to a tungsten lamp the light output is greatly diminished. Really need to invest in some HMI’s!