[Douglas_of_Sweden]

From what I've seen we have plenty of Pentaxians on the forum who like "stage photo", be it live music, theater, stand-up commedians, clowns, opera or anything else where artists perform to entertain us. Despite the wide variety of activities you could cover with stage photography, it has some things in common. For example we often have to do it in low light. Unless you are a pro covering the "show", you have to take your shots from the ordinary audience, which itself can cause some difficulties. Sometimes it has much in common with sport photography, sometimes with street photo (if it is a street perfomer, it is of course also street style photo). If some of you shoot your favorie rock-star, jazz player or opera singer, you may not think that it has much in common, but it does. It is not only that it has much in common technically. If it is a famoused star, or your own kids performing in the school theater, it is something special to manage to capture an artist in work.

So I think it would be nice to have a thread where we share this sort of photography, both what we managed to capture, and how we did it. Crazy stories are also welcome as well as related technical questions.

I've always enjoyed this sort of photography. When I was young I shot a lot of live music on black and white film. Nowadays it is more theater, for example when I take my kids to see something.

So let me start with some of my modern shots.


Theater for children, Pippi Longstocking and two pirates. DA*50-135.


Alice in wonderland played by Swedish pop star Amy Diamond. A*135/1.8.


Historical outdoor theater: "Viraspelen" A*135 on the old *ist DS.

[robbiec]

A Jazz band playing in a small west Cork village during the early summer

[Stratman]

Saint Charles Oktoberfest, Glockenspiel. ES II, SMC 55mm 1.8, Kodak BW400CN



Saint Louis Strassenfest, Spotmatic SP II, Sears 55-135 F3.5, Fujicolor 200

[georgweb]

Good idea Douglas and some interesting shots to start it off. After all we are getting to see cultural varieties from everybody.

Talking about, Steve/Stratman, I didn't know that St. Louis is all german ?-)

Here's an orchestra rehearsal for a concert at the same venue lateron. Ever changing lights (rehearsing, too) made this harder than I thought.

[Stratman]

Good idea Douglas and some interesting shots to start it off. After all we are getting to see cultural varieties from everybody.

Talking about, Steve/Stratman, I didn't know that St. Louis is all german ?-)

St. Louis has a fair amount of folks with German ancestry. My mothers grandparents came over on a boat from Bavaria, so, I have I guess 25% German heritage. Lots of Irish heritage here in St. Louie too...they have a huge St. Patricks day parade here..

[georgweb]

Thanks for explaining Steve. I never imagined St. Louis had been crowded once by Germans and Irish people, but what do I know ?
Auf Wiedersehen ,-)
Georg

[robbiec]

'Brian Hanlon', Crane Lane, Cork Jazz Festival, Last night. Horrific lighting in there, lots of reds and yellow glows. Was using Mr Parmars K50 f1.2, ISO 800 and just tried to concentrate on getting in focus, the speaker shot is f1.2, the others probably f2.8

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Last edited by robbiec; 10-28-2010 at 02:50 PM. Reason: Artist name

[bbluesman]

All from the Taichung Jazz Festival which ended yesterday. I had the pleasure of listening to this trio play some nice jazz and set the mood for me to shoot tons of great portrait shots of the crowd as well as some of these performance shots. Jazz on a Sunday afternoon outdoors is sweet!

[Douglas_of_Sweden]

Some interresting shots here. Starting to think I will learn a bit about fellow members music preferences too.


Keep them comming.

[Douglas_of_Sweden]

The outdoor theatre I flashed an example of before is known as Vira-spelen.
Some 130 amateur actors play the same story each summer outdoors at what used to be the largest weapon forging factory during the years of the Swedish empire (roughly 1600-1720 when gradually large parts of the Baltics, Norway and parts of norther Germany and Poland was concured almost making the Baltic sea an interrior sea), in particulary known for theirs swords. When king Karl XII lost the great Nordic war against Peter the great of Russia, much of the empire was lost, and as the king died in 1718 in a battle in Norway, most emperial dreams were forgotten, the army was downscaled and the blacksmiths in Vira lost their weapon contracts and had to start to make plows and schytes.
This is the historical background for a low story where the son (a young blacksmith) and a daughter of the two leading blacksmiths are to be married, but she fall in low with a blacksmith from a competing factory. Sort of a Romeo and Juliet story. I must admit that I have forgot much of the complex story. Every year they hire some professional actors for the lead roles. The great name in 2005 was the Swedish actres Julia Dufvenius.

Somewhat aged members of the surviving Karolinean army:


Blacksmiths having some sort of meeting being nostalgic over the good old days of sword-making. The guy inspecting the sword is the father of the young girl...


...played by Julia, to be married to this guy because their fathers want them to.


But there is another young boy, a visiting blacksmith...


....who takes her by storm.


I believe you can guess where this is heading?

All shot with the SMC Pentax-A*135mm f1.8 on the good old *istDS. Pretty sure that lens outresolve the 6MP sensor.

EDIT: Looking at those blacksmiths, they don't look that authentic. Don't think the real blacksmiths were usually that clean, and their leather aprons looks like they never been anywhere near a smithy.

[Nomad]

Here is the Ringling Bros Circus from today
[IMG] [/IMG]

Alice Cooper from a couple weeks ago
[IMG] [/IMG]

[JeffJS]

I wish I could have used a flash, the photo would be better but here it is. The single non family live performance I've ever captured.

[Douglas_of_Sweden]

Nomad, great shots both the Elefant and Alice.

JeffJS, what's the occasion with the knitting lady? A play?

What a width we have have here, from Elefants to knitting ladies...

More from the Vira-play:


The new guy can dance...


...and fight.


Smiths going over from swords to schytes.


Torn between...


...two men,


...only one can win.

[Douglas_of_Sweden]

After some resistance from her father, she is about to mary the new fellow.


But the wedding is interrupted by soldiers!


It turns out that he was contracted to work at one of the other weapon factories for the army, but he had run away.

[bbluesman]