Dance

Two To Tango

ERWhittington 4 Comments

Just thought I’d show off a few shots from a recent shoot with J H (I think this was our fifth shoot, but I may be wrong) and Kayleigh Lush, before I go away for a while for fun and holidays.

J wanted to photograph a tango theme. Both Kayleigh and I have varied dance experience, but neither of us had properly done this particular style before; I took one class once! Everyone knows that this is the dance of love though – passion and drama are what it’s about! We did this shoot in Brighton, and there were many, many people walking past constantly, who were suitably blasé about us (mostly).

Kayleigh is wonderful to work with; I highly recommend her to photographers looking for a versatile (and tall) art model with fantastic dance skills. For this shoot she was playing the masculine role, and did a great job of being strong and supporting me. (We’d worked together before; I will blog some very cool images from that shoot another time!) We had lots of fun trying to work out the anatomy of the positions as we did them; whose leg should go where, how best to place our arms, tension in the hands, etc… For some of the poses we tried, we worked out that it was best to swing into them or for Kayleigh to catch me as I fell into a position for the shot, so you can see my foot tipping and hair blowing in some, etc. It made the tension and passion more real. Other more investigative/ambitious poses ended up with both of us falling on the floor in a heap of giggles and a knee-in-sternum position which should never be repeated by anyone ever.

Anyway, without further ado, and with thanks to J again for a fun challenge:

Ghost & Grapes

ERWhittington 3 Comments

I love images which show movement blur – to be honest I’ve never been a huge fan of the ‘stop motion’ school of photography. I much prefer to move around like a mad thing and hope some kind of shutter release makes some kind of cool ghostliness happen. The following (very experimental) images were taken as part of the second shoot I did with Keith Cooper at Cheltenham Film Studios. I think they’re really cool – I’m barely even in some of them, so they’re nice and ‘anonymous’. I love the bright freshness and vibrancy of the colours in the first few, then the muted, soft, pale hues in the second lot. The piece of silk fabric I’d brought along (hand-dyed from Cairo, dontchya know) looks a bit like flames, flying up in sultry licks.

Here we are then:

We also did some Roman/Greek/Latin-esque images against a be-lettered piece of fabric Keith had brought along to use as a background, avec grapes and some of my be-coined dance pieces. A productive shoot!

Queen Vashti (AKA ‘Why wear normal clothes when you can wear Aladdin trousers?’)

ERWhittington 3 Comments

The link to this video was sent to me a couple of days ago. It’s a recording of a dance performance I took part in a few weeks ago at a theatre in Oxford. My improvised solo is last, but watch it all the way through! Sadly, the quality doesn’t allow for some of the more intricate movements (smaller shimmies layered over other movements, etc) to be particularly visible, but you get the general gist of the prancing.

The track is called ‘Vashti’ and is a bit of a feminist feast – Queen Vashti features in the book of Esther in the Bible and is most noted for her refusal to appear at the King’s banquet (other interpretations say she refused to dance for the drunken king’s entertainment there), choosing instead to host her own party for the women on the same day. She was subsequently banished, and lost her status as queen (she was succeeded by Esther, who was presumably more obedient).

The shed with a cave inside…

ERWhittington 3 Comments

I worked recently with Rayment Kirby at his home/shed in East Sussex (before the Ophelia shoot detailed below). I think Ray is absolutely brilliant – so refreshingly ingenious with his make-shiftery. He creates backdrops, lighting and even camera equipment himself, making the most of what he has to hand. He has such a creative approach to ‘things’ and this makes the results even more special, I think. The photographs below are intended to go towards a book he’s working on at the moment, and you can read more about his fascinating methods on his blog.

Here are some of the shots from the session. Some of them were taken against a blue screen, with the idea that they would then be re-worked digitally into different backgrounds, but they work well in themselves I think.

The first shot is proabably my favourite. In front of the blue screen was hung some plastic sheeting, draped to create interesting plays with the light.

Through the window…

You can read about the methods involved in the last shot here – ‘Caving for Beginners’!

Thanks Ray and I look forward to the next one!

Perspectives

ERWhittington 4 Comments

Well, Dubai was fun! Ridiculously hot and humid, a breeze was like an oasis in the desert. I stayed on the 44th floor in my friend’s apartment (ears popped each day on the way up and down! I hate lifts but am proud to say I remained calm at all times; even I didn’t fancy all those stairs…), managed to avoid tan lines (I’m not entirely sure how I did that; probably a mixture of paranoia and factor 40!), got a henna tattoo (slight infactuation with tattoos on feet – and yes, it’s pretty much faded now), went on a desert safari where we surfed around dunes by car at top speed (felt like a rollercoaster – totally unsafe – amazing!), saw a belly dancer (and indulged myself in some new costumes), went to a 12-hour beach party at Nasimi beach and saw Armen van Helden, Chicane, Zero 7 (MUST persuade them to let me join the group as a guest star one day…) and others, swam in a pool surrounded by sky-scrapers (I woke up on my lounger and briefly thought the sky was falling down on me; scary perspectives out there!), saw all the various superlatives (7 star hotel, tallest building in the world, biggest gold ring in the world – that’s a lot of bling!), floated in the beautiful warm sea and was shown around the textile, spice and gold souks by a guy who bought a jet ski but forgot to use it more than twice…. What a fascinating place Dubai is and full of interesting, ambitious people. Omnipresent, palpable sense of possibility. Really pleased I packed quite a lot into one week. Lots of inspiration for one of the characters in the book I’m starting to write and some other things I have in the pipeline at the back of my mind. Other interesting facts about Dubai: 51% of every single business over there is owned by a sheik, no one is allowed to be unemployed (i.e. they kick you out if you are, hence the many abandoned vehicles lying covered in layers of sand-dust!), you go to jail if you write a cheque and it bounces, and there is NO income tax.

(Sorry about all the brackets… It’s lazy of me but I like the fast pace.)

Anyway, I worked recently with Tim Pile, who has a bit of a thing for interesting perspectives and angles in his photography. I was very pleased to be shooting with him (and two other photographers he often works with, Mary and Dinah) as he’s produced some fantastic work so far, describing himself as an ‘improving amateur’ and shooting for a camera club and national/international competitions. The location was very unique and characterful – the Victoria Baths in Manchester, so we had about a million sets to play with.

Here are some of my favourites from the day. Tim likes to experiment with treatments to bring out the best in the shots, so I’m posting a variety. I call this first set my ‘floating down the shaft/falling down the rabbit-hole) look:

I also have these from Dinah:

The lighting conditions in the first shot were very challenging, but I think it came out really well and makes an interesting, quirky image. It was a tiny room full of a very eerie, green light. I’m sitting in a rocking chair, like a strange Miss Havisham; just me and the shadows…

The previous day, Tim came along for part of my shoot with Rebecca Parker (see previous blog entry) and got his own take on the fields of heather, again working with his interest in unusual perspectives: