Twilight and Dusk

Return of the Crystal Skull

Indiana had his adventures with a Crystal Skull and I have been eyeing up the one my wife received for Christmas, just waiting for it to be emptied of its tasty contents. I have been wanting to see how light reflects through it when it is empty as well as when it is full of liquid. A little experiment to satisfy my curiosity and to help me understand the effect of water as a diffusion device. It has been empty for a couple of weeks now, just waiting for me to make my move on it wondering what I had in store.

The Crystal Skull. Empty, its contents consumed by worthy adults.

I finally decided to try my experiment out but it took motivation from another object to really get me going with this. A little get together, a nice fire and a warm house prompted our guest to remove an article of clothing………… a sheer, fashionable scarf. WHAT WERE YOU THINKING! While it was being folded I noticed it was see through……ding, ding, ding…diffusion device! Grabbed the camera, the scarf in between my lens and a vase of roses, SHABANG! Yes, I stole that word from a head shot photographer I follow. Seem to fit though. So, today the skull, my wife’s purple scarf (with black skulls on it no less) and I became acquainted.

Before we get to carried away, the original intent of this little project was to measure light refraction through glass, with and without water. The set up for these shots – an 85 1.8, a glass end table, glossy black wrapping paper with a cut out of the base of the skull, a speedlite set at 1/4 power and zoomed to 105 mm and the Rogue Grid with the 45 degree head on. I also used some gels for added effect. The flash was placed on the ground, underneath the table and pointed of course, straight up.

I was not liking the look with the cap on so I removed it to decrease the bounce and to eliminate over cooking the top. So here is the empty skull without cap and a view of the cut out…..whoops.

And full of water:

For overall appearance, I think I am liking the empty version better. The water does bring out certain facial features in the mouth and chin area and picks up the purple gel more but it dulls the top. It also carries the light through the hole in the top which is why I took the cap off. I bet a couple of drops of red food coloring would have been cool. Save that for another day.

Time to break out the scarf…..hung up on a stand about 8 inches in front of the skull. One more speedlite, through a 12″ octobox, was added overhead to assist in lighting the scarf. The skull was still full of water.

Good stuff. The water gets dumped, changed the gel to red and I do not remember what prompted me to try it with the cap on. The scarf was moved closer to the skull so I could get more…..skulls in the shot.

And with the cap off, I also moved up.

I think it is very interesting the way the gel is coming through. Looks like it is bouncing all over and not quite sure what little crevice to fill. I did the red gel a couple of days after we got this, lots of liquid still in it and it filled the entire skull up. The difference in that shot is that is was straight through a glass base and not directed by a cut out.

My final shot in the sequence with the scarf was placing the scarf against my lens hood – very interesting results. Had to focus manually as well.

A very interesting and enlightening time with the scarf and the skull. And…..possibly feeling the effects of this crystal skull too much, I decided to change colors one more time and see if I could make a happy skull. Believe it or not, this is a Pink gel……

Pretty in Pink? Whoa, Flashback……whatever happened to Molly Ringwald?

I hoped you enjoyed my little experiments. Thanks for stopping by!

Till next time….

A Wintery View

With Winter waning

it lets us know

I’m not done yet

here’s some snow.

It’s been quiet all season

Perhaps, there’s a reason.

It’s almost like something new.

Finally,

A Wintry view

A Mighty Tally for the Dance Team

What a fantastic weekend! The dance school had 15 numbers in their latest regional competition held in NYC – The total tally was 12 Firsts, two seconds, one third, Best Costume, Overall top score Large Group, First runner up high score small group and second high score runner up for Line.

Fourteen dance schools gathered in Brooklyn for this regional competition. All of our dances were in one day which meant a very long day for the team. The first one kicked off at 08:15 and the last one went on at 21:15. I was exhausted by the end and all I did was take pictures of them, I can only imagine how they felt. Our daughter was in six of those dances including the first one and the last one but her adrenaline was still going at 23:30. Ah to be young again….

I was chided by my wife for not getting many pictures of our daughter during one particular dance but here’s the thing – when I am shooting them I do not look at who they are, I look at how they are. Body positions, expressions, groupings and lighting. There are those dancers though who always seem to be in my frame though and some who do not make it in. I try and spread the shots out to get everyone, but it is difficult at times isolating one person in a crowd of moving dancers.

A shout out to the mom’s who help with the costume changes! Their day can be as stressful as the dancer’s.

Lets get to it!

1st place in category and winner of Best Costume.

I shot a 135 mm prime lens for the majority of the day and I think I went more vertical than horizontal because I was close to the stage. I love that lens, It is fast, crisp and clean. I so desire the infamous 70-200 2.8 IS but a bit out of budget for me at the moment. I did alter my position in the room for a couple of the small groups and used a 200 mm prime but the light fall off was not too my liking so I reclaimed my spot against the wall, stage right within the first ten rows. I managed to get myself into the front row during the last two hours and used the 24-105 f4 for some wider takes.

It has proven very difficult to chose a favorite picture from the weekend but this one is definitely in the running. Form, texture and emotion! And my slightly bohked out daughter in the background.

This next dance screamed black and white so I tinkered with a black and white conversion in Lightroom. One of our new dancers made this shot rock!

And I should include my daughter here too…Love the expressions…The dance is called Monsters.

When we had a break of more than 90 minutes I cleared my card, putting the pictures on the laptop and external hard drive. Naturally once they go on a computer you want to see how they look, then you see some that you really like, then you edit those and of course once that is done might as well get them up for the parents and team to see. I was hoping this would generate some excitement for everyone. This is the first time I have turned around the shots that quick. I was also much more selective than last year in depressing the button so I did not take as many shots. I will admit that once I got home and viewed the posted ones on a desktop there are some that you can tell were quick edits on a small screen. I am currently going through everything on the desktop for full viewing pleasure.

This shot is from the rear of the room with the 200. Not quite as clean as the ones from the front. This is one of my favorite dances and one of the ones I will be keying in on for our next competition.

And another with the 200 from the first dance after I changed, looks like I was not dialed in quite yet. The shutter speed was too slow so we can see some motion blur here.

While I love my prime lenses it does prove difficult to compose in tight quarters with action. A few shots I have were great except a hand would be missing, or the feet, but live and learn for every press of the shutter is a new learning experience for me and one that I can build on for the next time.

This next dance the had the highest overall score for large groups, first place in its category and brought warmth to a cold and snowy day. It also had the judges overjoyed because the girls incorporated their props into their routine which apparently does not happen that often. This competition has the judges and the audience all on one level, the stage is elevated about three feet off the ground, so heads are always in the way and I am constantly cursing at them. This is also the reason I prefer to shoot at an angle at this venue and do my best to avoid said heads in the way.

Much like any event you see a little bit of everything at these competitions – I will leave you with this…..

First I must preface this by saying….

It is not our dance….

Check out the shoes…..

Dance competition right???? speechless…..

Thanks for stopping by! Till next time…

Dress Rehearsals

The dance school had their dress rehearsal today for our upcoming regional competition in Brooklyn. This was also a dress rehearsal for me, as it has been a while since I have taken crappy light action photos. The project I did in December for the school was low light, and for the most part my 7D handled it quite nicely and produced some very nice photographs. I also benefited from being very close to the dancers. Today, not so much.

My goal today was to get some wide-angle shots of the dances and I did succeed in doing that. Today though my throw away counts were much higher than normal. Since I am a canon guy….5D mark III anyone? l can dream right? I was tempted to ask the light guy for some more juice, but we were guests and I wanted the challenge.

The overhead pots were the only ones on here, the strip in the back is not on.

The past couple of years we have had dress rehearsal at one of the local elks lodge’s and because I am who I am and the space was isolated I very well could not be present when the dressing rooms were in the same room as the dances! This year rehearsal was held at a local high school which meant all was safe for me. Sweeeet!

So back to this light stuff and my desires for wide-angle today. The competitions also have some low light but it is your typical indoor event stage lighting. I can get away with an iso of 2000 and produce a decent exposure. I was at 2000 today and my meter barely registered. The actual competitions are not wide-angle friendly. Lots and lots of heads in the way. Heads of the audience, heads of the judges and a riser in the middle holding the music and photo crews. So it is more of a long lens day and normally from a slight angle. Today was for the groups, not something I often get to do.

The opening of this dance…..picture Peanut on steroids. I had one of those mouth wide open in disbelief moments.

My apologies to the dancer I cut out, just was not wide enough for this next one.

From the same dance, and to show a good example of the challenges of stage lighting:

There looks to be about five different textures of light in this one. Good times! Very difficult to edit, impossible for me to do. I am not that skilled.

One of my favorite shots of the day, and a dance I am looking forward to shooting live:

My favorite discipline is still ballet and these young girls are beautiful. The light even adds an interesting pattern

Five days to go! Wish us luck!

Before I sign off, I just had a fleeting thought of what some people may be wondering. Am I a dance dad. Technically speaking, yes. I have a daughter who is very involved in dance and my wife and I support her artistic desires 100%. But we leave it right there, we know she is in good hands. I do not think anyone in our studio is remotely close to resembling that show that I have seen for about 15 minutes just to fulfill my curiosity. I will even say this, dance moms is like the show Jersey Shore. Neither one of them is a true representation of what either is really like. Reality TV my @%%. Bring back The Sing Off, that was enjoyable.

All for now, Till next time….

Tiny Dancers

Tiny Dancers may actually be a bit of a misnomer since the age range of these dancers go from 9 – 17, but I like the way it sounds. And when you are on the upside of the middle age bracket, well we will leave it at that. I had the pleasure of spending three weeks with the competition team at my daughters dance school during their rehearsals. These young ladies and a young man spend upwards of ten hours a week honing their passion for dance in addition to all their school work and other school related activities. Most of them are honor students at their respective schools, some even made the National Honor Society’s achievement list. God bless them for being dedicated to such an expressive art form.

Tap is one form of dance I have never completely understood. I come from a musical background, I have a fairly eccentric and eclectic taste in music, hell, I can even shuffle, but I have never understood tap…..(Ok, you can stop laughing now, really I can, may not look very pretty but I can)…..Yet it is one of the most popular forms of dance there is. I do know one thing about it though, it is incredibly hard to do. Before my daughter started dancing I saw tap in a much different light. Other than Grover, Hines, the late Sammy Davis Jr. and White Nights anyone? I had not a clue. I get it now and continue to be amazed with how some of these girls can move their feet.

My Daughter has been part of the dance school for 7 years now and this is her third year on the competition team. This is the reason I have become so enamored with photography. I think I had a Powershot 30x when she first started dancing and once she made the team the upgrades began. From a Nikon D60 to my current horse the Canon 7D. Taking photographs in the dance studio was indeed a challenge and it certainly tested the iso capability of my camera, not something the 7D is known for. I hovered between 1600 and 2000 for all the sessions switching between a 20mm f2.8 and a 24-105 f4 all while trying to keep my shutter speed above 300. I had a 50 1.4 with me but aside from a handful of shots I rarely used it. Teenagers either love pictures or they hate them and I was very worried that some of them would feel awkward with a camera pointed at them at such close range. Maybe it would prepare the new girls for the stage, I thought, for they are stepping into the world of unknowns. The director of the dance school was very helpful in making me feel at ease. As much as I was doing this for me and my experience, I was also doing it for her and this helped put things into a different perspective.

Onto some pictures.

All the dancers on the team are required to take ballet, these are the “Senior” girls working on some technique.

And one of the juniors:

Last year was the first time our school had a competition ballet, I was incredibly proud that my daughter was one of the five girls selected for it. I feel ballet is the purest form of dance, emotional, beautiful, graceful and strength like an ox. The calves on these girls are better than some of the cyclists I know. One of my goals is to photograph a dance troupe professionally but right now I feel lucky to have a daughter heavily involved in dance and a studio director that is kind enough to let me to hone my skills.

My daughter during a momentary pause in the action:

Competition ballet group getting some instruction

A senior working on a tap routine:

On stage these girls look and dance like mature adults, I am still in awe of them after every performance, I marvel at the excitement they exude, I have experienced tears of joy, I have shaken my head in amazement, I have felt sorrow when they do not win. Our first competition of the year is in two weeks – NYC here we come! Good luck!

Thanks for stopping by, till next time…

Help spread the word!

Help spread the word!

Help spread the word!

Help spread the word!

Help spread the word!