advice for shooting in a theatre

Hi

 

My friends are acting in an amateur play and would like me to take some shots. It will be in a small theatre and

it will be possible to to get very close to the scene

 

Any technical and artistic advices (ie: where to position myself, when to shoot...)

 

I have a d300 with 18-200 VR and thinking of buying 50mm f 1.8

I dont think I will be allowed to use a flash but I'm thinking of getting a sb600 or 800 for other purposes and

could therefore use it as well

 

Thanks in advance

 

Olivier

i had good result shooting an amateur group in a small not well lit theater with the 50mm 1.8 lens @f2.8, 400 iso. It's a good lens. forget about the flash during the show, better use it during rehearsals, but anyway I find the use of flash for theatre performances to be often ugly. The best since you have a 18-200mm lens would be to use 2 cameras, no need to waste time changing the lens. Try to be present at one of the rehearsal, ask about the lighting that will be used, then you will know what to do.

If you are up really close then the 50/1.8 and if you can find it something like a 30/1.4 or 28/2 would be very useful (something wider then that would be great, but I don't know of anything fast that is appreciably wider on a crop body). Its always fun to see whole stage shoots from up close sometimes.

 

I don't think the 18-200 is going to be nearly fast enough to stop motion, the VR would help stabalize the image, but only if the actors were holding still.

Shoot during dress rehearsal ... position yourself wherever it's best....it's done all the time.

Using a Nikon D2x (cropping), I use a 70-200/2.8 VR for about 80% of my shooting and a 28-70/2.8 for the balance. It's best to shoot during the dress rehearsal so you can move freely and get close. I shoot from the audience and never on stage (except for setups).

 

Be sure to meter the faces and use the camera in manual mode. There's too much contrast on stage to use any auto exposure mode. Typically, I use ISO 400 and f/2.8 at 1/30 to 1/60 with the WB set to Incandescent. Let the colored lights and darker, moodier scenes take care of themselves.

In the work I do for theater, we arrange a special "photo call" just before or after an early performance. The actors run through several scenes just for me, I use a tripod and they hold critical poses from peak moments of the production. I am frequently on stage. We photograph approximately 20-30 moments from the play in under 1 hour using the actual lighting of the stage presentation... t<div></div>

I've had better luck using lower ISO settings and a tripod. Also, I found that if I set the exposure compensation to -3

stops, it not only preserved the highlights, but managed to boost the shutter speed to around 1/30 sec to 1/60 sec;

enough to capture most gestures and some of the less animated members of the cast.

 

I used a Nikon d80, a very bad tripod, and the 50mm 1.8 (which according to the exif data didn't always shoot wide open

but stopped down as far as f/3.5!).

 

The best things you can do with anything photographic is to prepare and to know what you're shooting. Sitting in on the

dress rehearsal, or, possibly dating a member of the cast, can give you the insight and experience to shot accordingly

come opening night.

Here is a grab shot that I took near the end of the second half. ISO 200 f/1.8 1/250 sec exposure compensation set to -3

 

http://i340.photobucket.com/albums/o326/taberphotography/intothewoods-1.jpg