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Photographing Ballet on a stage lit by artists!

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
The Challenge of Photography in Classical Music and Ballet: Lighting on stages seem to be made to satisfy the customs of the lighting crew and an audience that is not supercritical about where light is and how it gets there. To the photographer, of course, these factors weigh heavily in recording the scene. The photographer has to learn to fit in as mostly it's easier to get blood from a stone than altering stage lighting! Still, I have dreams, (or delusions) of getting my way some day! It's essentially available light stealth shooting to a melody!

Stage lighting, (mostly from above), can be accepted by audiences for concerts as their sophistication is in the listening part of the experience. Visual esthetics are tertiary issues! In any case, if the music is great, our eyes make enough sense of the scene that it works fine! No one ever complains that they cannot see the oboist and adjacent bassoons! (They are hidden mostly, anyway, by the conductor and the strings). It's the sound and excitement of the entire ambience of a stage filled with musicians in tuxedos and black dresses that works for us. Actual detail is unimportant! For dance, however, we now have the visual expression of the music in color and movement. So now we have to actually see what happens. The music comes from somewhere beyond the dancers and it just has to be great. We don't need to know where its being made. The dancers do not need to be seen in detail as it's the shapes of the bodies corresponding to music that counts.


Lighting then is for that transformative magic of movement, not the details of the face and arms.

The Music, The Dance and Dancers: Let me introduce you to the upcoming photograph by setting the audio stage as the guide to look at the image of the dancers floating before you. The following is a quote:

"The word "gnossienne" describes several pieces of piano music composed by Satie that didn't fit into any of the existing styles of classical music like a piano prelude or a sonata. Satie easily solved this dilemma by simply titling the pieces with a completely new and made up word, in this case - "gnossienne."

Erik Satie wrote 6 Gnossiennes. "Satie composed his first three gnossiennes around 1890, without time signatures and bar lines (often referred to as "absolute time") and traditional tempo markings. Satie's peculiar scores could be read like musical poetry - one can interpret the piece with very few restrictions, as his tempo markings were made of phrases like "don't leave", "lightly, with intimacy" and "don't be proud." The first gnossiennes (Nos. 1 and 3) were published in September of 1893, in Le Figaro musical Nr. 24, while No. 2 was published in Le Coeur the next month. The remaining three gnossiennes, Nos. 4-6, were composed in 1891, 1899, and 1897, respectively. However, these were not published until 1968. .."The inherent feelings of timelessness and infinity of each piece come from the works' cyclical nature".
(Source)


I ask you to now open another browser web page and being up this haunting music, Gonossiemme #1, , (played as the composer, Erik Satie, intended) on piano in this Utube recording, but in this dance at the Colburn School December 19th 2009 soulfully performed by guest accompanyist, Colburn Faculty Member, Kenton Youngstrum on guitar.


_MG_5792ACR_Dance_1_1000.jpg


Asher Kelman: The Dancers Perform Gnossienne#1,
Trudl Zipper Dance Institute at the Colburn School ,
Grand Avenue, Los Angeles, December 19th 2009


With dance, how the figures are lit can alter the sense of the choreography. Naturally then, the choreographer directs how lights will play on their dancers. For some reason, stage designers and choreographers seem to love "dramatic lighting". That essentially means a mostly black stage and lighting essentially from above.

The dark is very dark and the bright goes to white out easily, just as as with lighting for classical music except the gradients are even steeper! To make things even more exciting, sensual and creative, colored gels modify the already harsh lights. Add to that, for an end of the year holiday performance in a Dance School, it's a one time creative extravaganza: light intensity changes with no written program for the photographer and no rehearsal!

This happens since the performances are school enterprises where all the resources pull together until the last day to get one showing and then the show is over!

I actually thought I had the problem of photographing musicians on stage pretty well licked. Dance however is humbling, as it's much harder to compose, get the timing right in the dancers positions and still get the technical matters of exposure and shutter speed right.

I used the 5DII and the 70-200 2.8 L IS, here at ISO 800, 1/250 second f 3.6 at 200mm underexposed by about 3/4 stop and recovered in Adobe Camera Raw. I'll be reprocessing this in Phase One's Capture One software.

In the single image, above, I've tried to bring to you the way the dancers appear to float over the stage in some continuous river of innocence to worldly matters. They become feather-light living taffeta and silk containers for the rhythms and demands of the music appearing from the shadows to the bright lights and then disappearing again. They are the materialization of Erik Sartie's Gnossienne, timeless, ethereal, penetrating one's being with soulful beauty that has no beginning and no end.


Asher
 
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Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Some of the most delightful parts of ballet are the dances by one dancer on stage or just two, having turns as soloists or dancing together. Here I've tired to show this dedicated individuality.


_MG_5834_600.jpg


Asher Kelman: Casey Howes dances as Maria in Tchaikovky's Nutcracker Ballet Image #1

The Winter Concert, Professional Training Program, Trudl Zipper Dance Institute
The Colburn School Grand Avenue, Los Angeles December 19th 2009




_MG_5870.jpg


Asher Kelman: Casey Howes dances as Maria in Tchaikovky's Nutcracker Ballet Image #2
This picture appears light on some monitors so it will be corrected over the weekend

The Winter Concert, Professional Training Program, Trudl Zipper Dance Institute
The Colburn School #4, Grand Avenue, Los Angeles December 19th 2009


Feel free to comment on the photography, lighting or dance.


Asher

Note these two images are prepared merely from jpg files, not from RAW as my usual workflow demands. My apologies. The reason is that my CS4 computer crashed and CS2 can't handle the RAW files. Canon software is too sluggish on my laptop. I'll be eventually redoing the images with Phase One's Capture One Raw Developer Program, "C1", and then swop them out.
 
Last edited:

nicolas claris

OPF Co-founder/Administrator
Come on guys and gals!
tell what you think! Don't be afraid! Asher won't ban you LoL!

On my own I can't really and honestly comment as I'm not that aware of dancing and shooting into a theater.
They never allow me to get in with a chopper or a chase boat!

PS I just think that Asher's work deserve PP in C1 instead of the crappy ACR, the images would look even more beautiful… with better shade and black transitions, better highlight control…
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Come on guys and gals!
tell what you think! Don't be afraid! Asher won't ban you LoL!

On my own I can't really and honestly comment as I'm not that aware of dancing and shooting into a theater.
They never allow me to get in with a chopper or a chase boat!

PS I just think that Asher's work deserve PP in C1 instead of the crappy ACR, the images would look even more beautiful… with better shade and black transitions, better highlight control…

Nicolas,

Believe me, there's plenty of room for your helicopter of hover above the audience in the magnificent Zipper hall at the Colburn School. You'd just have to silence the blades with a massive Bose noise cancelation system. Also I expect the 'copter would need to be disassembled a bit to get the rotors through the doors.

I have been looking admiringly at C1 and plan to move to it as one of my New Years resolutions. Still, even for C1, the transitions are challenged simply by the lighting which is specular, uneven and not at all designed for portraits but to illustrate movement and not delicate features.

Please no one feel intimidated. Everyone is welcome to comment.

Asher
 

John Angulat

pro member
Hi Asher,

Nicolas is correct, you deserve comment. You have put an extraordinary amount of effort into this project. Not only from a photographers aspect, but from the research and commentary you've offered us here at OPF.
I apologize for not offering comment sooner.
It mostly stems from the fact I have no knowlege or experience within this area of photography. I guess I felt offering something such as "nice photo" or "nicely done" sounded inane.
The truth is these are great images, captured by someone devoted to documenting extraordinary performances by extraordinary young people.
I commend you for that, and I commend you for the effort you've placed into obtaining the best images under rather difficult constraints and conditions.
And...they're pretty nice photos!
 

Ruben Alfu

New member
_MG_5792ACR_Dance_1_1000.jpg


Asher Kelman: Dancers of the Trudl Zipper Dance Institute at the Colburn School #1, Grand Avenue, Los Angeles December 19th 2009


What a delightful image, it feels like they are floating in the air, I especially like the delicate shades of pastels in their tutus, it looks fantastic.

The other two photos with the dancer dressed in red are great too. To me the first one is just perfect in all senses, it´s very dramatic with all that black space around her, which enhances the magnitud of the moment. I like better the exposure in this one than in the second one, but in both cases you did an admirable job keeping detail in the shadows and highlights.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
What a delightful image, it feels like they are floating in the air, I especially like the delicate shades of pastels in their tutus, it looks fantastic.

The other two photos with the dancer dressed in red are great too. To me the first one is just perfect in all senses, it´s very dramatic with all that black space around her, which enhances the magnitud of the moment. I like better the exposure in this one than in the second one, but in both cases you did an admirable job keeping detail in the shadows and highlights.

Thanks Ruben,

I appreciate your visit and comments. Thanks!

I must admit I'm delighted with this picture as the dancers seem to serve just the music and we see things from another dimension, just music to delicate transparent shape, moving and reshaping with flags of color and texture. What a lucky fellow I am to be able to record this vision!

I have the greatest admiration for the dancers who work so hard to build this experience for us. The faculty that nurtures and inspires them are to be commended! All this would not be possible without the amazing generosity of a donor who funded the program with $9,000,000, anonymously, so that the other training programs of The Colburn Music School could continue at full force while the dance program was actually expanded.

Asher

As far as lighting is concerned, the photographer has essentially zero input. So we have to be more skilled, alert and responsive. Whatever lighting one assumes will be wrong so one has to continually recheck the histograms or one could leave with major under or over-exposure. I'd like to have a second camera set up with auto ISO and my combination of settings so that one camera would be adjusted on the fly by my judgement and the other would respond to the light. Then I could, perhaps improve the exposures. I think the key is to under-expose, (as they move into brighter light), or everything gets blown out and one has nothing. It all happens fast and one can easily make the wrong assumption and miss an amazing peak moment.

The technical discussion, here by Bart van der Wolf and Doug Kerr have helped sharpen my ideas on exposure.
 
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Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
_MG_5925ACR_Dance_600.jpg


Asher Kelman: Sidney Scully performs in the Dance of Mirlitons

Trudl Zipper Dance Institute at the Colburn School #1, Grand Avenue, Los Angeles December 19th 2009




_MG_5897_600.jpg


Asher Kelman: Cristina Rodriguez performs as the Soldier Doll, Image #1

Trudl Zipper Dance Institute at the Colburn School #1, Grand Avenue, Los Angeles December 19th 2009




_MG_5879_600.jpg


Asher Kelman: Cristina Rodriguez performs as the Soldier Doll, Image #2

Trudl Zipper Dance Institute at the Colburn School #1, Grand Avenue, Los Angeles December 19th 2009
 
I love movement, I love ballet dancers (not ballet itself) and colors.

Asher you struck it all, congrats on a stunning and captivating series.
 

Jericho Soh

New member
Wonder shots dude. I know how challenging these performances can be. You have like a split second to capture that magical moment ... you have to think on your feet and not to mention be able to shoot without disrupting the audience's enjoyment of the performance.
There was once I never got threw out of a Piano Recital as my Shutter was too loud but my D300 is already very soft but the truth is it was totally silent and thus the shutter was loud in contrast.

Flash is also not allowed so you will have to crank it up to the highest ISO without getting all grainy. That is why I always enjoy the challenge of shooting performances. In fact, I should have a Arts Festival coming up soon..... althou the University has yet to get back to me on the itiernary.
 
_MG_5792ACR_Dance_1_1000.jpg


Asher Kelman: The Dancers Perform Gnossienne#1,
Trudl Zipper Dance Institute at the Colburn School ,
Grand Avenue, Los Angeles, December 19th 2009

Hi,

I find this picture is really fantastic, for several distinct reasons.

First, it makes me think about a decomposition of a single movement, as ones in Muybridge's pictures at the end of 19th Century :

acf678eaadec86dd22ec476749e8ca4.jpg


Second, it also evokes the evolution of man which is classicaly represented as following and which can be seen as emergence of civilization and cleverness :

evolhom2.jpg


So, Asher's first picture relies on these main ideas : movement and grace, flow time and art as representation of human mind and value. Presence of young women and delicate colors and lights could also suggest a metaphor for life which could resume to a graceful passage through a black ocean. More, looks in all directions give an impression of universality.

Other pictures are also well done and interesting (above all the last two ones) but i think #1 is the real masterpiece.

Cedric.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Hi,

I find this picture is really fantastic, for several distinct reasons.

First, it makes me think about a decomposition of a single movement, as ones in Muybridge's pictures at the end of 19th Century :

acf678eaadec86dd22ec476749e8ca4.jpg

Second, it also evokes the evolution of man which is classicaly represented as following and which can be seen as emergence of civilization and cleverness :

evolhom2.jpg

So, Asher's first picture relies on these main ideas : movement and grace, flow time and art as representation of human mind and value. Presence of young women and delicate colors and lights could also suggest a metaphor for life which could resume to a graceful passage through a black ocean. More, looks in all directions give an impression of universality.

Other pictures are also well done and interesting (above all the last two ones) but i think #1 is the real masterpiece.

Cedric.

Thanks for your insights. These are indeed helpful. The choreography of Gnossienne and directing of the students here by Leslie Caruthers-Aromaa, Direcotr of Dance ant the Tudl Zipper Dance Institute at the Colburn School was brilliant. The dancers moved across the stage in forms of chilling beauty, transfixing the audience as Gnossienne # 1 was played on a classical guitar with a freedom yet measured discipline. I had only heard the music previously on piano and the guitar was no less captivating and haunting. Your references to the graceful passage of life are apt and helps me understand the wonderful experience we had of the dance performance.

Now I know why Degas was so imprisoned by the muse of dance!
 

Cem_Usakligil

Well-known member
Excellent!

Hi Asher,

Like the others before me, I think that these are excellent pictures worthy of a big praise. Considering the technical challenge at hand (changing lights, everybody's in constant movement, high ISO, etc), the results are very, very good. I agree with Nicolas that C1 would do a better job but they are more than good enough as they are. I have done a brief research on the net for older (i.e. film based) pictures of various ballet performances and these are amongst the best with respect to the image quality, believe me.

Coincidentally, my daughter plays Satie on the piano quite often; so the music was rather familiar to me. And I agree that it enhances the value of the photograph immensely.

A small detail perhaps, but I like the cyclic nature of the 1st picture. It seems as if the left hand side (where the wrist and hand is cut off) can be continued on the right hand side where we only see a hand a wrist. And thus, iterate things to infinity. Just imagine :).

Now I wonder whether you'd consider cloning out the chair in the background? I don't think that it would harm the integrity of the picture much, unless this is meant as a documentary piece?

Thanks a lot for sharing this know-how and the great results with us. I commend your perseverance and talent, chapeau!

Cheers,
 

Charlotte Thompson

Well-known member
Asher

well here I come- just saw these and good job!
but for me it's the first shot the show of all the ballerinas that employ you to look
each one in there own graceful movements
but the "top" part for me and was genius was the very end dancer you just caught part of her leaving!
what a great metaphor for the very graceful movements to an exit-" a woosh of her breath"
just inspiring!
now that won't ban me will it-

Charlotte-
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Hi Asher,

Like the others before me, I think that these are excellent pictures worthy of a big praise. Considering the technical challenge at hand (changing lights, everybody's in constant movement, high ISO, etc), the results are very, very good. I agree with Nicolas that C1 would do a better job but they are more than good enough as they are. I have done a brief research on the net for older (i.e. film based) pictures of various ballet performances and these are amongst the best with respect to the image quality, believe me.
Thanks Cem for paying attention to both the technical side as well as the pleasure that the dancers bring. I intend to move to C1 and use a Mac Pro for the processing from RAW and, yea, I'll remove the chair! The pictures shown here are prepared to be shown just several 3 inches or so wide in a news letter this week and the ones for printing will be worked from scratch with C1.

Coincidentally, my daughter plays Satie on the piano quite often; so the music was rather familiar to me. And I agree that it enhances the value of the photograph immensely.
You are blessed to have such a talented daughter!

A small detail perhaps, but I like the cyclic nature of the 1st picture. It seems as if the left hand side (where the wrist and hand is cut off) can be continued on the right hand side where we only see a hand a wrist. And thus, iterate things to infinity. Just imagine :).
A good idea to keep in mind! I just have to look at the pictures I have and remember that in the future. Certainly, that will fit in with the cyclic nature of the music.

Asher
 

Kathy Rappaport

pro member
Dance!

Dance and theater are not easy. You must be ready for everything like a sports shooter. You can't shoot too long (focal length) in a dark place because you can't handhold the 200 or 300 and have fast shutter speeds or you will underexpose even in the theater lighting. It is very practiced. I got hired to do dance at an event and found the 35 L1.4 the best lens for what I was shooting. Too wide would have distorted the dancers. My images were published on the front pages of a local Newspaper/publication.

When did some theater work a few years ago as the dog handler (I own a professional Toto for Wizard of Oz performances on stage) and I tried to photograph during the show it was difficult for me then to get the light and exposure but I was shooting too long to handhold and didn't understand ISO 5 years ago in digital.

The professional photographers typically shoot the dress rehearsals. This way, they have a 2nd opportunity to reshoot if needed.

Congratulations, Asher. Beautiful.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
The professional photographers typically shoot the dress rehearsals. This way, they have a 2nd opportunity to reshoot if needed.

I wish! It all comes together with costumes and lights, (a big surprise) just once and that's the performance for the training program. However, I shoot musicians week in week out and so I have tools at my disposal. Longer lenses do turn out best for the distances used as any sound is at the back of the concert hall and we are less disturbing to people. Also from the back, the DOF is excellent at f 4.0. with IS, we do well at anything above i/80 sec. Often it's 1/150 and second nature.

Congratulations, Asher. Beautiful.

Thanks Kathy, that's appreciated!

Asher
 

Doug Kerr

Well-known member
Hi, Cedric,

Hi,

I find this picture is really fantastic, for several distinct reasons.

First, it makes me think about a decomposition of a single movement, as ones in Muybridge's pictures at the end of 19th Century :
Incredible that this invoked Muybridge to you. I had the same thought, but I was tangled up in something else and didn't mention it.

Best regards,

Doug
 

Mike Shimwell

New member
The Challenge of Photography in Classical Music and Ballet: Lighting on stages seem to be made to satisfy the customs of the lighting crew and an audience that is not supercritical about where light is and how it gets there. To the photographer, of course, these factors weigh heavily in recording the scene. The photographer has to learn to fit in as mostly it's easier to get blood from a stone than altering stage lighting! Still, I have dreams, (or delusions) of getting my way some day! It's essentially available light stealth shooting to a melody!

Stage lighting, (mostly from above), can be accepted by audiences for concerts as their sophistication is in the listening part of the experience. Visual esthetics are tertiary issues! In any case, if the music is great, our eyes make enough sense of the scene that it works fine! No one ever complains that they cannot see the oboist and adjacent bassoons! (They are hidden mostly, anyway, by the conductor and the strings). It's the sound and excitement of the entire ambience of a stage filled with musicians in tuxedos and black dresses that works for us. Actual detail is unimportant! For dance, however, we now have the visual expression of the music in color and movement. So now we have to actually see what happens. The music comes from somewhere beyond the dancers and it just has to be great. We don't need to know where its being made. The dancers do not need to be seen in detail as it's the shapes of the bodies corresponding to music that counts.


Lighting then is for that transformative magic of movement, not the details of the face and arms.

The Music, The Dance and Dancers: Let me introduce you to the upcoming photograph by setting the audio stage as the guide to look at the image of the dancers floating before you. The following is a quote:

"The word "gnossienne" describes several pieces of piano music composed by Satie that didn't fit into any of the existing styles of classical music like a piano prelude or a sonata. Satie easily solved this dilemma by simply titling the pieces with a completely new and made up word, in this case - "gnossienne."

Erik Satie wrote 6 Gnossiennes. "Satie composed his first three gnossiennes around 1890, without time signatures and bar lines (often referred to as "absolute time") and traditional tempo markings. Satie's peculiar scores could be read like musical poetry - one can interpret the piece with very few restrictions, as his tempo markings were made of phrases like "don't leave", "lightly, with intimacy" and "don't be proud." The first gnossiennes (Nos. 1 and 3) were published in September of 1893, in Le Figaro musical Nr. 24, while No. 2 was published in Le Coeur the next month. The remaining three gnossiennes, Nos. 4-6, were composed in 1891, 1899, and 1897, respectively. However, these were not published until 1968. .."The inherent feelings of timelessness and infinity of each piece come from the works' cyclical nature".
(Source)


I ask you to now open another browser web page and being up this haunting music, Gonossiemme #1, , (played as the composer, Erik Satie, intended) on piano in this Utube recording, but in this dance at the Colburn School December 19th 2009 soulfully performed by guest accompanyist, Colburn Faculty Member, Kenton Youngstrum on guitar.


_MG_5792ACR_Dance_1_1000.jpg


Asher Kelman: The Dancers Perform Gnossienne#1,
Trudl Zipper Dance Institute at the Colburn School ,
Grand Avenue, Los Angeles, December 19th 2009


With dance, how the figures are lit can alter the sense of the choreography. Naturally then, the choreographer directs how lights will play on their dancers. For some reason, stage designers and choreographers seem to love "dramatic lighting". That essentially means a mostly black stage and lighting essentially from above.

The dark is very dark and the bright goes to white out easily, just as as with lighting for classical music except the gradients are even steeper! To make things even more exciting, sensual and creative, colored gels modify the already harsh lights. Add to that, for an end of the year holiday performance in a Dance School, it's a one time creative extravaganza: light intensity changes with no written program for the photographer and no rehearsal!

This happens since the performances are school enterprises where all the resources pull together until the last day to get one showing and then the show is over!

I actually thought I had the problem of photographing musicians on stage pretty well licked. Dance however is humbling, as it's much harder to compose, get the timing right in the dancers positions and still get the technical matters of exposure and shutter speed right.

I used the 5DII and the 70-200 2.8 L IS, here at ISO 800, 1/250 second f 3.6 at 200mm underexposed by about 3/4 stop and recovered in Adobe Camera Raw. I'll be reprocessing this in Phase One's Capture One software.

In the single image, above, I've tried to bring to you the way the dancers appear to float over the stage in some continuous river of innocence to worldly matters. They become feather-light living taffeta and silk containers for the rhythms and demands of the music appearing from the shadows to the bright lights and then disappearing again. They are the materialization of Erik Sartie's Gnossienne, timeless, ethereal, penetrating one's being with soulful beauty that has no beginning and no end.


Asher



Asher

I am surprised I missed these when you first showed them. This first picture is lovely and I can only echo Cedric's high praise. the flow from left to right is delightful.

Mike
 
To be honest, I haven't read the entire thread...so I may be repeating some things that others point out..
For me the first image with the 4 dancers (and the 5th foot) doesn't work with the music.. Yes, the taffetas needs movement... it's very static,. And I think in that case, the lightning would have well match a longer exposure... But I must admit that the woman in red with the doll, is better for that point of view and fits well with the music. In that image, for some reason, I think the lightness is better rendered, maybe because she's on her pointes and because she's alone, the image is less "cluttered". The costume makes her stand out with this bright red when the muted tones of the others costume dilute the "action" with the background. I think the first image deserves a more "abstract" mood.
just my two cents!
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
For me the first image with the 4 dancers (and the 5th foot) doesn't work with the music..

Well Sandrine, it does work very well in the performance. The movements are very graceful and minimalistic so the dancers appear to glide. The cloth seems un-raffled indeed, as the girls float. So we have a continuous flowing of movement, with the haunting music. The persistent, almost melancholic beat, marks time for as a flock of taffeta colored swans gliding by.

The Gnossiennes music only applies to that first picture.

Asher
 
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