We survived the TV crew from Weekend Today. Actually, it was pretty easy and a lot of fun. We had four people total (camera guy, sound guy, segment producer, publicist), but they were very nice and tried hard not to intrude too much. They were around for six or seven hours.

First, they did individual interviews with Susan and me. These were carefully staged with arranged camera angles and lights:

When Susan brought the boys home from school, there was a quick discussion about whether to get a shot of them getting out of the car, but since they hadn’t set up for it, they missed their chance. I said they could have them re-enact it, but everyone in the crew immediately said that was out of the question because they are part of the news division, and it would violate their code of ethics!

Once the kids came home from school, there was a lot of tramping around with the cameras, trying to capture regular stuff going on. Of course, that was a little difficult, since there were all these people around pointing cameras in people’s faces:

Nat was a little apprehensive about the guys and the equipment, but we had told him all about it beforehand, and he really did very well:

I was surprised at how close the camera guy got sometimes. I was afraid for both my kids’ faces and his lens at times, but he knew what he was doing. He had a wireless monitor for the camera (that’s what the producer is peering at in the second photo). We could sit in the other room and watch on the monitor, and the shots he was getting really seemed like “real” TV shots.

The end of the event was making and eating dinner:

We ended up eating about two hours earlier than we normally would have, since we had run out of things to film, and the crew wanted to get going. When it was all done, we were all pretty exhausted. It should air sometime soon. I’ll keep you all posted.