Indoor Salsa Photography - Advice needed!

[gman]

Was doing a Salsa class shoot last week which was held in a function room of a club but came across quite a few problems which I'm not sure how to solve.

The lighting consisted of a series of small spot type lights (like the ones in a kitchen or bathroom) in the roof and I also managed to get two extra high power spot lights on (almost like disco lights) but they were quite localised spots.

The lighting would have been fine for posed shots, however, as it was Salsa they were all moving quite fast so I needed a higher shutter speed but there wasn't enough light for this, even using F2.8. I ramped the ISO to over 600 (400 wasn't enough) but both the D1X and the 400D didn't handle the noise well and to be honest the shots look almost like camera phone shots

Would anyone have any ideas on what I could do? The only thing that comes to mind is to bring down some 500W flood lights as I don't have any studio lights but as there were about 16 people I reckon that could cast a lot of unwanted shadows on half the group!

 

[adsayer]

faster glass and high ISO is really the only way forward if you're limited by the lighting man.

I'd probably concentrate on the where the lighting falls and wait for the couple to fall under it then machine gun it picturewise I mean.

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[gman]

Cheers, I did try that but when exposing for the main spot lights those who weren't in it were massively underexposed. Because of the high ISO it was also difficult to recover any details with the RAW without it looking awful. Also trying exposing for the general light but then those in the main spots were overexposed and again struggled to recover

 

[adsayer]

Not really that familiar with Nikon stuff dude. Have you got any examples at all?
In a hindsight approach from me... I would have set my camera to Av mode, probably spot or partial metering, AI Servo (constant AF tracking), separate AF and AE so '*' button for focusing then shutter for exposure.

I'm not a dancer photographer but I did some band shots which is kind of based on the same principle... I'm surprised you weren't too happy about going high ISO I was using ISO 1600 and 3200... It's pretty much defacto for that sort of thing it wasn't too bad I found. I know its a pain if you're trying to preserve detail but I feel it's probably more better to get a sharp albeit noisy image, than a blurry 'clean' image. Good luck with the next stuff dude

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[who?]

Would they let you use flash?

 

[justinframe]

get a flash mate, try bouncing off the ceilings!

 

[rh1944]

I did manage to get some decent salsa dancing shots with a nifty fifty, ISO 400 and the 400D's flash.

 

[gman]

It was during an actual teaching course and using flash would have probably put them off a little but I think a good flash may be the answer. Out comes the wallet again

Cheers for the advice all.

EDIT: Hmmm, flash for the Canon or Nikon? The Canon has onboard which isn't great but it would mean if I got a flash for the Nikon I'd have a flash for both cameras....but, I'm not sure how long I've have the 17-55 lens for the Nikon so if I get a flash for the Nikon I'll be left with just a 70-300 lens so I'd have to buy a new lens.

 

[rdh]

Bounced flash would be your cheapest option. Avoid the on-board flash if you can, they have a terrible reputation for creating harsh, flat light.

Having said that, it is possible to attach something over the pop-up flash that diffuses the light quite well.