With hearings like this one, I have to preconceive of the scene. I make a layout in my mind of everything that’s going to happen: the moment he arrives, the moment he sits down, the moment he raises his hand to be sworn in. And I set up my cameras to capture all those moments, to be fired remotely, all at the same time. (When I fired the picture of Mr. Comey surrounded by the press, I had the three other cameras firing too.)

I put my fourth camera up on a full-length monopod and held it as high as I could. I pre-focused the shot ahead of time, and spent a little time making sure the image would be sharp. And, as more people arrived, I thought, “There’s no way I can’t put all these photographers into the foreground of the picture.” So I took three or four steps back and zoomed out a bit.

I wasn’t sure how well things would line up — where Mr. Comey would be, or what would be behind him. But, as it turned out, he was perfectly framed by the chairs behind him. Even before I looked at the picture, I thought, “Wow, this is going to be nice.”