True/False Opening Night
Stephen Bybee
Columbia, MO
2011
This photo was taken on the opening day of the True/False Film Festival in 2011. Once again, my vantage point for composition was across the street from the theatre on the front steps of the Methodist Church. This image was almost certainly made with my 50mm lens on a Nikon D700, wide open and handheld. The preceding image of the Missouri Theatre before the renovation was taken on either a 28mm or a 35mm lens using a film camera, on a tripod, and much later at night.
2011 was my second year to volunteer as a photographer for True/False, and this type of Columbia street scene, with the festival juxtaposed on a recognizable Columbia landmark, was one of my favorite ways to photographically document this hometown film festival. In the photo you can see a Q line of movie-goers waiting in line for the next screening, a very busy YogoLuv full of patrons who opted for yogurt instead of documentary film, and a rain-glistened Ninth Street, busy in its own way moving pedestrians and traffic up and down South Ninth Street on a rainy Thursday evening in late winter.