BALLET / DANCE STUDIO PHOTOS HELP!!!

[birdie3]

New to digital photography, have recently purchased canon 40D, 18-55mm, 55-250mm.

I have been asked to take some pictures of my niece in the studio, who is a student at the Royal Ballet School.

I have no other flash equipment at moment other than one on 40D. The studio is light with large windows giving quiet good natural light , I will be taking photos on a morning.

Would appreciate any advice at all on , set up, lighting, settings for 40D, how best to take in these conditions, can I do without additional flash, should I use a tripod, the list goes on.... any help examples would be great
many thanks in advance
Bill

[Michael_Lambert]

Not sure if this has passed or not yet.

However you are going to want to shoot as bright as possible F/2.8 would be ideal but i think you are limited to F/5.6? IF so you are going to want to boost your ISO shooting at around 800, then use a clean up program like noise ninja if needed.

[birdie3]

Thanks michael, think lenses go down to F4 so hopefully will help a bit, but will try the iso at 800, if I get any good shots will post for comment, thanks again

[advaitin]

There are several ways to go about this. Use a tripod for some shots, always try to work with the light rather than against it, although sometimes you can get dramatic shots against backlight.

I immediately think of streams of light falling from high windows with dancers dust in the air--don't know why--just comes to mind. I'd also plan to get on the floor with the widest lens at its widest setting and higest ISO and have the girl do some leaps very, very close with and against the light. You might be surprised at what you can get. Also do some of the shots in monochrome in postprocessing.

Dancers somehow look great in black and white.

[Nouks]

Thanks michael, think lenses go down to F4 so hopefully will help a bit, but will try the iso at 800, if I get any good shots will post for comment, thanks again

Don't think of which ISO to use in advance; use the ISO with which you get the necessary shutter speed ;)

[advaitin]

Here's one of my granddaughter waiting to be shot by a studio photographer. I took this preferring an unposed shot to what he was doing. This was when I had a 10D, shot with a 16-35 at 23mm, ISO 800, 1/90s @ f4.5. I did a lot with the image in PhotoShop.

The second was a live performance, shot from the rear of the theater, tripod, 70-200 2.8
at 135mm, ISO 800 1/320s @ f4.5 with a 1D.

My trouble is that the kids instructor won't allow any shooting other than her contracted photographer. Each year she puts more restrictions on.