It is actually the third in a series of posters for Ballet Blake's dance performances.

We thought it might be fun to blog about the path a project like this takes.

It actually starts a couple of months before we do the photo shoot.  Ballet Blake starts the process by letting me know when the next show is.  And then they give me a little hint about a key theme in the show.  "Think floral" was this show's hint.  From there, I start my research, looking for floral themed dance photos.  

A week or two later, they let me off the hook and actually fill me in on the name of the key ballet they will perform.  This spring the show is centered around Le Jardin Anime.  Now we're talking.  Now I can actually watch a version or two of the choreography and start to develop posing ideas.  The Blake's are, of course, thinking about poses as well.   After putting our thinking caps on for a little while, we pick a date for the shoot.

The shoot is a lot of fun for me.  We've all brought our posing ideas and we chat about them while I get set up.  With the background and gear all put up, we'll have a little fun with the dancers while I set exposures and all that photography stuff.  Out takes are plentiful and usually elicit a giggle or two from the dancers.  And finally, we get to the money shots.  We usually have a small number of poses that we really want to try and see how they translate to "film."  One of the parents was kind enough to send in a behind the scenes photo while we did the serious shots.  

We ended up with three images that we liked, but we needed to see them closer to poster form to decide.  As you can see from the next photo, the images are a fair distance from a poster, which takes us to post production.  

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

The world of digital photography is wonderful.  I have many images from the film era that could use a bit of tweaking.  Now I get use Lightroom and Photoshop to massage the images into a poster form.  The tools allow me to create composite images to build up to the baseline of the poster.  Here is where I ended up and handed the work off to the Blake's to add the finishing touches that are one their various pages.

I love it.  I love the research.  I love the collaborative posing conversations.  I love the giggles from the dancers.  I love the discipline the dancers have when it is time to get serious.  I love having the tools to edit images in ways I never thought possible.  And I love having partners like Ballet Blake.