Private dancer
May, 2018Views
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Behind The Lens
Location
This photo was taken at a dance studio in Johannesburg South Africa. The lady in the photograph is a dance instructor, and she has a pre-fabricated dance studio at her home.Time
Seeing that this photo was taken indoors with a flash setup, it could really be taken at any time of the day. This happened to be taken at about 4pm on a Saturday afternoon. Doors and windows were blacked out, and a large black sheet was pinned up against the one wall which she danced in front of.Lighting
The lighting for this specific series of images was very basic. The whole idea behind the shoot was to capture movement through long exposure of the sensor. At one end we had a modelling light to provide constant, but dimmed lighting. Just enough to expose for the dancer's movement. On the other side we had a single strobe behind a large soft box that was triggered at various intervals in order to freeze the movement of the dancer.Equipment
This was shot on a Nikon D750, coupled to a Nikkor 14-24mm f./2.8. The camera was mounted on a tripod with a modelling light to the one side of the dancer and a strobe inside a large soft box to the other side of the dancer.Inspiration
I do a lot of night time long exposure photography. What I especially enjoy is capturing light trails of motor vehicles from a high vantage point. Given the fact that I'm always on search for that extra bit of creativity, a friend made a suggestion that I expand the long exposure to a totally different subject, and use the lighting in a totally new creative way. This time however I would not be capturing the light, but using the lighting in a totally different way to expose movement and freeze movement, all in a single frame.Editing
I use Lightroom for the normal basic editing, being exposure, contrast, highlights, shadows, blacks and whites. Because there was a large empty space in front of the dancer, I needed to place another element in order to create compositional balance. I decided to use the multiple exposure function in Nik Analog Efex Pro 2 and placed a larger part of the dancer in a part of the empty space. I added a fade effect to this as well as a darkish vignette to draw the viewer's eye to the main subject.In my camera bag
Equipment I always have in my bag is a Nikon D750 as well as a D3 body, a Nikkor 14-24mm f./2.8, Tamron 24-70mm f./2.8, Yongnuo speedlight, remote triggers, batteries, cards and a hotshoe spirit level.Feedback
Ensure that your shooting space is completely dark. Make sure to also have enough light bouncing off your subject so you are able to record the dancer's movement. Focus on your dancer and then disengage your autofocus. Make sure that your aperture is small enough to ensure sharpness of your dancer in all positions throughout the frame. Although it is difficult to control, try and get your dancer to keep to one path and always at the same distance that you focussed initially. Lastly, don't be afraid to experiment with your strobes!!
