D is for Dance
As i carry on working my way through the alphabet of photographic subjects, today I had the opportunity to photograph a cultural event at the Auckland War Memorial Museum. I have undertaken a fair bit of dance photography over the years but with good stage lighting and the option to roam in and around the stage.
As this event was for the general public I had to use what ever space I could use and of course the event location itself presents some interesting challenges.
Firstly the cultural performances were held in a Gallery within the museum. For those of you lucky enough to have visited this wonderful museum, you will know that (A) the Gallery lighting is very low and subdued and (B) there is no flash photography due to the beautiful pacific and Maori artefacts on display being sensitive to light.
Not a problem, it meant leaving my 28-300mm at home and running with my Sigma 17-50mm F2.8 lens.
First thing was to up the ISO. I started on 800 but I soon cranked it up to ISO2000.
I then opted to go with a smaller focus zone, and on my 7D I have a square 9pt option, so I selected this.
The dance routines was slow with sudden erratic movements, so my exposure times generally sat between 1/40 – 1/60. The guy with the spear certainly spun this with some speed and I think using the smaller focus range just on the subject really helped to capture the movement.
As you can see from the female dancers, their hair sprayed around as they flicked their heads so it was important to capture this movement and the lower exposure times helped.
ISO2000 F2.8 1/50
I was limited in terms of my location, the galleries have a lot of exhibition cases around so after some cheeky moves I managed to get close to the front.
When doing indoor shooting don't be afraid to increase your ISO real high, and as you can see even without a flash the shots have come out all right.
A most enjoyable day.
E is for Exposure
I thought I'd best get back on to my A to Z of photography and having just recently visited an excellent exhibition around wearable arts (WOW), It presented plenty of opportunities to shoot with slightly longer than normal, exposure times.
Firstly no flash photography, so had to get out the Tripod.
The surroundings had very subdued lighting with plenty of directed LED lights around. I had to make sure I had none of these directly into the camera so as to reduce any flares or heavy over exposures.
I did a few quick test shots to gauge what my camera was looking for then flicked over to Manual for the final shot. and here is the result
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| ISO100 F/8, 8secs, 18mm |
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| ISO200 F10, 6secs, 24mm |
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