Julie Potter posted: " This past week I spent two nights photographing the theater department's rendition of Bright Star. As photo editor of The Wood Word I've photographed a lot of theater shows here at Marywood, including the main productions as well as student productions i"
This past week I spent two nights photographing the theater department's rendition of Bright Star. As photo editor of The Wood Word I've photographed a lot of theater shows here at Marywood, including the main productions as well as student productions in the Black Box Theater. This however was the most I had ever gotten to see of the work that goes into these shows, and I had a fantastic time capturing it all and got some great pieces for myself, as well as to share with the cast and crew.
I now attend each of the two main show's dress rehearsals that the university puts on annually to get coverage for The Wood Word before the show debuts. This started last semester and has been working out great, as it gets the word out there more about the play and gives me more experience shooting under complex lighting. For this show I got photos of the full two acts during the dress rehearsal and then came back for the second official showing to get behind the scenes photos. The behind the scenes photos were especially fun as I got to be more creative and take my time crafting shots, getting the right angles, etc. I have also found that being closer to my subject helps a lot with lighting quality, which makes sense as we all know light fades with distance, and photography is just a way of capturing the light bouncing off your subject.
For the 'getting ready' shots I got to play around with using the large mirror they were all looking in, and capturing multiple angles at once, creating a more dynamic and complex image.
When editing these I wanted to emphasize the brightness of the original shots and make them have a dream-like quality to them. To achieve this I decreased the clarity as well as the dehaze, but made sure to add a very small amount of texture in addition to regular sharpening in order to still keep the features sharp. This also contributes to the beauty and glamor aesthetics going on in the series.
For any shots were I was closer to my subject[s] I used my 24mm prime lens as it is really sharp, and I've been loving using a wider focal range than I typically use. I find that the 24mm also provides a more interactive photo when really close to a subject, and makes the viewer feel more immersed in the scene.
For the images of the musical itself, I used my 55-250mm lens and moved around the theater to shoot my subjects from the best angle. This was a lot easier and less disruptive to do during a dress rehearsal and let me get close to the cast for more up close shots.
Whenever I shoot an event like this were people are watching me take photos I always get the question of "what camera do you shoot with" or "your camera takes such good photos" but a PSA for my fellow photographers out there (and non photographers), it's not the camera that makes the photographer, but rather knowing how to use your camera. You can capture a great image no matter what you're shooting on, so long as you know what to look for! I still use my starter camera that I got in highschool, a Canon Rebel T6, and have been slowly adding to my selection of lenses.
For more of my coverage of on campus theater as well as other news, make sure to check out The Wood Word website, as well as our instagram page! We have a newly added page under multimedia that's just for photos, and myself and our other photographers will have work posted there from now on as well!
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