Greetings from the dance photographer!

Hello,

Just in case you wanted to know about me. My first ever photo shoot was with my housemate and her friend who are both dancers. I guess that planted a seed that would grow over the years into someone who is passionate and pretty much nuts about dance photography.

It all started off in a park using the available light to now working in dance studios and on location with extra lighting to give the dancer that extra zing to make what already is beautiful, out of this world!

The challenge for any dance photographer is how best to capture an art form that is movement based using a medium that is static! How do you show-off the energy and grace of the dancer or dancers before you? There are quite a few ways. Using lighting is one of them. Lighting is the key to making a good shot into a photograph that will leave people stunned.

It is also important as a photographer to understand your subject. What are their needs, abilities, requirements, the nuances of their craft etc? How do you communicate with them so you are both reading off the same page? If you can answer these questions plus know the techincal and art of photography to capture them, you can produce photographs that they will be delighted with.

I hope, after looking through my portfolio and various blogs, you will see that my work speaks for itself. I love what I do and I do what I love.

I would also like to thank all the fantastic dancers I have worked with since the beginning. Some of you are now my dear friends and I love working with and feeding you cake.

I look forward to working with you!

Hubert (the Phunky Photog)

Hubert Hung

A few thoughts on when dance meets photography

Dance and photography are two very different artistic disciplines. But what I have found is when a creative dancer and photographer work together they can create something that is very special. Often it is something neither of them could have imagine beforehand. It is the job of the dancer to show the photographer what they can do and for the photographer to then find the best way to light it and angle to shoot it from. You must be able to work with your dancer or dancers.

Dance photography can be static, but for the most part it should convey movement and have a dynamic element to it otherwise it will lack life. A bit a song that is played on one note and interval. It is just a constant pulse not music. The same goes for dance photography. It needs to have rhythm and sense of energy.

One of the skills of a good dance photographer is to bag the shot in a few takes. Anyone can ask a dancer to jump in the air in good sunlight and hold down the shutter in burst mode. You should, by pure luck, bag a decent shot. The trick is to time it. It is hard to use burst photography in a studio or in low light outdoors. You have to use high ISO which mean the photographs are fuzzy and full of motion blur. You really need to use strobe lighting, but then you can only take one shot!

If a photographer can learn and refine these three elements they can become an excellent dance photographer. Now that is a challenge! This is part of the reason why I love dance photography, it pushes me to be creative and to be a better overall photographer.

What to expect during a dance shoot

It will be very relaxed and fun. There will be a lot of discussion about what you are after and what the photographs are for even the outfits.

You show me the moves you want photorgraphed and type of look that you want. I will then set up the lights so the optimum lighting is used. If this is a shoot that incorporates a location, then we will discuss what you want featured and excluded. Sometimes for a location shoot lighting specific features can add to the overall feel. E.g. a dark area of the ceiling or a tree canopy.

We will take a few shots of you just standing there so I can check the lighting is spot on and you can see how I have framed the shot. If we are happy we will start taking the photographs earnest. Even then we will continue to discuss the look of the photographs and make tweaks as necessary. If there is look that hits the mark then we will stick with that.

We can review the photographs on the back of the camera and on a laptop. I will discuss with you any changes I wish to make during post processing and how the final photograph should look. You can make requests and pick-out your initial favourites at this point.