blues_photo_equip.txt 090929 2100 Introduction: Photographing blues dancing in available light requires good equipment, better technique and lower standards. For those not familiar with it, the current blues dance scene grew out of the lindy hop revival, and is generally done in very low light. The dancing is generally partnered, often very sexy, and bright flashes of light would be very inconsiderate. Modern equipment makes it possible to get good photographs of people blues dancing, but it takes high ISO sensors, fast lenses, and being able to accept noisy images that are prone to subject blur. This article will primarily concentrate on photographing social blues dancing, in available light. However, many of the techniques should apply to photographing most sorts of dancing, in difficult lighting situations. If you are doing a specific photo shoot of dancers, then I assume that you will be using proper lighting, i.e. strobes, or at least a tripod, and a lot of the material here will not be nearly as applicable. I will assume that you know at least the basics about sensor speed (ISO), shutter speed, aperture, focal length, depth of field, and how they are related to one another. If you don't, then you may need to read up on a few terms as I discuss them. ========================== ========================== Equipment: I will start with a discussion about equipment. I'm a firm believer that the photographer, not the equipment is usually the limiting factor in the quality of the photographs. However, when one is pushing the performance envelope of the equipment, it does take better gear to be "good enough". Does this mean that you need a top of the line, full frame camera with an image stabilized f/1.2 lens? No, you don't, but if you use a point and shoot superzoom be prepared for a very low percentage of shots that have good enough image quality. I have not had the chance to try photographing a blues dance with a top of the line system like a Nikon D700, or a Canon 5DmkII with an image stabilized f/1.4 or faster lens, but I have shot a lot of blues dancing with both a Pentax K100Dsuper and a Pentax K20D. My primary lenses for shooting dancing are the Pentax FA31/1.8 ltd and the Pentax FA 50/1.4. At current prices, the most expensive of these items is the FA31, and while I haven't had a chance to shoot with the sigma 30/1.4, despite a reputation for being soft at the edges, it would very likely do a very good job. At today's prices, especially if you bought used gear, you could get a K20D and an f/1.4 lens for under $1,000. =========================== Camera body: This isn't an article on how to decide what camera body to buy. If you're reading this, chances are that you already have a DSLR and are looking to get the most performance out of it, so you can probably skip to the lenses section and not miss out on much of importance. I do, however, find it helpful to understand everything that affects my goal, and will therefore discuss how the camera body itself relates to taking low light dance photos. ---------------------- Resolution: You don't need more than 6MP. As a matter of fact, for low light work, there are a lot of advantages to having fewer, larger, pixels to having lots and lots of small ones. Any DSLR made in the past several years will have enough resolution for just about any picture an amateur will take. If you're already making a living doing this, you already have a camera body, and what I say in this section doesn't apply to you. ---------------------- Image stabilization: I currently shoot Pentax. It has a couple of major advantages over Canon and Nikon. In my opinion, in its performance range, Pentax gives you more for your money than either of the two big names. Another is in-body shake reduction. There are endless debates about whether lens based or in body image stabilization works better, with the general consensus that with everything being the latest issue, lens based may have a slight advantage. However, in-body image stabilization will work with any lens, including a 30 year old 50/1.4 lens that you can pick up used for under $100. Ten years ago a major advantage of in-lens image stabilization was that it wasn't possible to do in-body stabilization with film. ---------------------- Sensor size: For the same angle of view, a smaller sensor will give you more depth of field than a larger sensor. However, you can always put the same lens on a "full frame" body as you would on an APS body, and crop it to take advantage of the greater depth of field of the wider lens. The 24x36mm SLR was optimized to work with a 50mm lens. This is why most of the manufacturers made 50mm f/1.2 lenses, and 50mm f/1.4 lenses are relatively affordable, while it is hard to find sharp lenses faster than f/1.8 in the 28-31mm range, which gives a similar angle of view on APS. Since photography of social dancing tends to be in close quarters, a "standard lens" i.e. 30mm in APS or 50mm in "full frame" tends to be ideal. If you want to use a fast 50 and get the wider angle of view, that means using full frame. There is no theoretical reason that a full frame sensor should have better low light capability than an APS sensor. The limiting factors are the size of the light collecting area and the noise level of the electronics. In theory a 6MP APS and a 12 MP full frame should be able to deliver the same performance in low light. However, since the top of the line cameras tend to be full frame, and market pressures push towards more pixels (whether or not they improve image qulity), the cameras with the best low light performance tend to be full frame. There is a major disadvantage, however, to full frame camera systems. They cost a lot more money, both for the body, and for the lenses (unless you're using legacy, manual focus, glass). ---------------------- Brand: Every brand of camera body has its advantages and disadvantages. There is a commonly held belief of camera brand monogamy. You buy a camera body, commit to that lens mount, buy lenses for your camera (often more expensive then the body itself) and that switching camera systems ends up being the financial equivalent of getting a divorce. In the 21st century, however, camera bodies have become the equivalent of film in the 20th century. At $20 for film and processing a 36 exposure roll, you can buy a very good camera body for the cost of thirty rolls of film. That is a thousand frames, or about what I'll shoot in an average week. My feeling is that you should find the lenses that you need to do a particular task, and get the camera bodies you need to use those lenses. In reality, I have Pentax DSLRs, and it is handy to be able to swap lenses between them. However, if a compelling reason comes up for me to get a body and lens by another manufacturer, then I'll have no hesitation to do so, use it for what it does best, and use my Pentax gear for what it does best. ---------------------- Technical improvements: The price for a particular level of performance in camera bodies continues to drop. Today's $600 entry level camera will outperform the $6,000 top of the line professional gear of just a few years ago. If you wait a few years, you should be able to get camera bodies that'll let you use your slow f/2.8 lenses in light that requires f/1.4 today. ---------------------- Technical specifications: In the early days of hi-fideltiy audio, there were no standardized measurements of power output, Distortion or Signal to Noise ration. In the same vein, there are currently no standardized measurements to accurately compare the high ISO performance, sensor noise, or image stabilization of one camera to another. While published specifications are not meaningless, just keep in mind that they are published by the marketing department, not an independant test lab.