This was a deep immersion week for me as far as theater photography was concerned. It started last Sunday when I scouted the technical rehearsal for Zach Theatre's newest play, Peter and the Starcatcher. I came to an earlier performance so I could watch the play and figure out where the memorable/marketable moments were. That way I'd be prepared to catch them when I came back on Tues. to shoot the dress rehearsal. The photography at the dress rehearsal went off without a hitch. It was my first time to use either the Nikon D610 or D810 for live theater photos and I think they worked well.
These shots of the mermaids (mermen? credit to Ben Stiller in the movie, Zoolander) were embargoed until today because they constitute a surprise scene and we didn't want to give it away until we were well into the run. The mermaids are shot with the D810 and the 80-200mm f2.8 Nikon zoom (ancient push/pull design). I knew what was coming and I still laughed out loud when I saw the scene in all of its glory.....
Wednesday I was at the Kevin Rollins Theater in the Long Center scouting and shooting the David Bowie Project 2. I turned those images around ( you may have seen the black and white images in a previous blog post) the next day and then went back the next evening (Thursday) to shoot it once again because this time they were using hazers to fog up the stage for a different look.
Today, while the rest of the country was watching the SuperBowl I was back over at Zach Theatre setting up two enormous soft boxes and a white, muslin backdrop in order to make marketing images for a future play. As I write this I'm also bringing the images from today's shoot into Lightroom so I can tweak them for delivery tomorrow. All in all I've spent five evenings this week shooting or working in some capacity at theaters. But I have to say, it's all been a lot of fun.
I heard an interesting factoid about the SuperBowl today on NPR. I'm not sure if you fans know this or not but those "athletes" at the Superbowl will spend less than 18 minutes actually playing and being active on the field out of a four hour game.
I'd rather be shooting at a theater.
3 comments:
Kirk,
In the relatively short time (under 3 years) that I've followed your blog, I've got to say this: You turn out fine work, no matter what camera and lens you use. (Would the Fuji QuickSnap be a challenge?)
Me, I'll side with Timothy Auger's comment: "+/- 15 MP is quite sufficient to expose the limitations of my technique and creative vision"
Thanks Mike. I think I'd agree with Timothy's comment as well. The D810 was just something I had to try but it feels like the D610 is the real day to day workhorse for me. Perfect blend of file size, detail and price. For most stuff the extra 12 megapixels just gets thrown out with the trash.
I always like seeing your Zach Theater pictures. Great color and lighting.
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