Here is some more photo-volunteer work I recently did. The DC Revels are a group that puts on performances of song, dance, story telling, and other fun things on a yearly basis. Since I'm always looking for something new and interesting to photograph (photographing actors performing on a stage in this case), I was happy to photograph them put on a sailor-themed performance at the Corcoran Gallery of Art's theater. Two thirds of the sound track of the video is actually from their performance there but the opening song is done by the Irish group "the Wolf Tones."

In terms of a photographic challenge, the Revels was a mixed bag. On the plus-side, I was able to move around freely in the theater and get up close to the performers. On the minus side, I didn't want to use flash because it would naturally distract the audience and performers. And the theater lighting was not very strong. Also, some of the performers wore hats that threw shadows over their faces in the first act (some of them helpfully doffed them for the second act). But by applying the tried and true strategy of "take gobs of photographs and inevitably get good ones" paid off pretty well here.

I touched up the pictures in Adobe Lightroom 2.3 and did minor work in Adobe Photoshop Elements 7.0. Since I was shooting at very high ISO, I also used Noiseware 2.0's stand alone application to knock down some of the resultant graininess. I also used the Topaz Adjust plug-in inside Photoshop Elements to make some of the pictures "pop" a little more.

I used my Canon EOS 7D SLR primarily with a Canon L-series 24-105mm short zoom.

The performance was a lot of fun to watch and listen to, and anyone in the DC area ought to check out the Revels' website.

http://revelsdc.org/

As for the photographs that make up this video, I posted them on flickr. If you wish to use them for any publication, please let me know in advance (I won't charge anything. I just want to be able to record the fact that they were used on my resume).

http://www.flickr.com/photos/maskirovka77/collections/721... (less info)