Ballet Pianist - Again (2010)

I'm still receiving blog comments from my ballet pianist posts 2 years back, so I decided to blog again.

The search for ballet pianist has begun again after our other regular pianist who has played for 2 years is going to study music in Melbourne in June.

As I finished playing for this year's ballet exam (my 10th year playing for exams), my teacher once again encouraged me to play on, as she received compliments from this year's examiner, Jan Mills from Australia, about my playing.

I am still wondering why it's so difficult to find pianists. Is it because the standard is too high for the school that I am playing? They prefer pianists that can improvise free music on-the-fly as the teacher creates exercises for the students on the spot. Is it because the pay is too low? Certainly the teachers wouldn't mind paying as much as I am getting if the pianists are as good as me. Is it because there is a lack of an interest in the area of music accompaniment? It's such a worldwide phenomenon that the RAD actually revised their Pre/Primary syllabus to include instrumental accompaniment that is allowable for exams. In fact, the instrumental CD is better than the piano transcription because it is more musically adequate to bring out the dance movements. The RAD also created an alternate music syllabus taken from the classical music genre to go with the existing Grades 1-5 dance syllabus in hope that more pianists who are less skilled can master the music.

I remember starting playing for ballet classes in Dec 1993. I remember I had a bad first class. The teacher required me to play for 3 grades, but I only could manage 1 grade. So the teacher asked me to operate the cassette player. 2 months later, she recommended me to play for another ballet teacher. So I went on, playing for years. Then over time, I tried improvising for free work in 1996, the time when I started composing music. Again, I remembered I struggled very hard, as I listened attentively to the teacher going through the dance steps with the students. I had to think on my feet what music style should I use, what melody should I create, what chord progression should I attempt. As the months go by, it got better. After all, everything is about practice.

So when do you want to start?

Dance Photos: Movement. Libre.

8th March is International Women's Day. So I dedicate this post to celebrate the beauty of women, by capturing them in dance.

There was a recent newspaper article about the gaining popularity of Lomographers in Singapore. Lomographers are basically photographers using lomo-effect cameras. Lomo cameras are known to create images that are unpredictably exposed due to the quality (lack of, that is) of the lenses and the casings.

This idea of creating the opposite of what digital photography has been trying to achieve all these years - sharp, grain-free, perfectly exposed images - is what inspired me to create the following sets of images, shot in a single day during the dance classes.

Slow shutter photography is nothing new, but my endeavour to dedicate an entire session shooting something unpredictable and unsharp is. It's literally light painting: moving the camera intentionally while the exposure is taken to create the effect. These are not panning-shots-gone-wrong. These are blurred images shot intentionally to depict movement.

In many ways, these images are easily replicated by skilled photoshoppers using clinically sharp images. From an end-viewer, these images probably aren't eye-opening. But I am wowed by the result. It's probably the same feelings lomographers get when they shoot with their Lomos. Best part is: I don't have to be concerned about sharpness.

Having said that, there has to be some technical considerations behind the shots in order to achieve a higher hit rate. All the framing composition rules apply. Select a shutter speed that is just right to blur the subject yet allows the object to be visibly clear. Too fast, and you can't get it blurred enough. Too slow and everything turns unrecognisable.

To add to the visual impact, the objects should have some contrasting elements. Understand the environment and what you want to blur and what you want NOT to blur. The rest, then, is left to chance.

Unlike Lomographers, digital medium lets you fire away without burning holes in your pocket, see the results instantly, make adjustments, and shoot more.

Here's to women, and their physical sacrifices to bring us form and beauty through dance.

Visit http://facebook.com/chesterphoto or http://www.flickr.com/photos/chestertan/sets/72157623569162486/ for more liberating photos.

Stage Dance Photography for Joo Chiat CC

Earlier this month I photographed a dance show for Joo Chiat CC Dance Classes, and they cover a wide range of dance genre, from classical ballet to modern dance, and tap syllabi.

If you do take up any stage performance assignment, here are some points that may be of use to you.

Focus on the Objectives
The major objective of photographing a dance school show is for parents and for archive. Many photographers do too many close-up shots of dancers but not enough group and general shots, and that's typically frowned upon. What I do is to take general stage shots on Day 1 of actual performance by positioning at the last row of the venue, then do close-up shots on Day 2 by positioning closer to the stage. Along the way, grab those artistically-styled images.

If you have more than one photographer hired for the event, you can then cater for more range of styles. Photographers should be assigned to different positions and to focus on shooting different things. Make sure that each photographer covers different areas, or else you end up with duplicate images.



Framing Close-up Subjects
If the dance item is a solo or a couple, it's quite easy to zoom in and grab the subjects. The challenge comes when it's a mass dance item, which is mostly the case for dance school performances. Who do you shoot? How do you frame? Whatever you do, you risk missing someone out in the frame. Students who are dancing at the back rows will not get photo coverage. As a photographer, I try to observe and frame groups of dancers logically. But if the dance item does not allow me to achieve that, then I will simply zoom in and shoot in sections. Parents will buy the photos as long as the faces of their children appears in it.


Rehearsals
Even a photographer should rehearse the shoot! By attending rehearsals, you are more likely to get better photos because you can anticipate the dance formation and highlights. Shooting rehearsal is just as rewarding as shooting actual performance. You have greater freedom in shooting at inaccessible places, like shooting towards the audience, or on stage near to the dancers. If you take up assignments for any stage performance, be sure to attend the rehearsals to increase your chance of getting good photos and delivering satisfaction to your clients.



Metering
Shooting for stage performance with constantly changing lighting effects is horrendously challenging because you cannot rely on your in-camera exposure meter. I say this again: NEVER use your in-camera auto metering for stage photography. The only way to achieve correct exposure is to constantly change the exposure manually. the camera will always over-expose because the dark areas occupy the major bulk in the frame, which averages out to be interpreted as underexposed.


My workflow is: take a photo, check the LCD, then quickly adjust the shutter speed and carry on shooting. Even if you get the correct exposure, you still have to continually adjust the exposure depending on lighting changes. Use your intuition: when you see lighting is dimmer, reduce the shutter. When the lights get brighter, increase the shutter. Do this constantly, depending on how frequent the lighting changes are. Shoot in RAW allows you to recover lost highlights in the event of an over-exposure within 2-stops.

No Flash (and that's fine)
Flash? Don't bother. You never need flash for stage photography, because the stage lightings are sufficient to give you ample exposure. Even if the lighting is dark, your flash will not help to boost unless you are in close range. And remember: your flash adds another light source to the stage lighting, and what turns out in your frame is not a representation of what is being presented. After all, if a dance scene is meant to be dark and in silhouette, then you should reflect that same light intensity.

Presentation of Photos
After 5 days of shooting during rehearsals and actual performance, I captured 2500+ photos, and eventually processed 1000 photos. Photobooks are popular, efficient, and a unique way to showcase the photos. I compiled all the 1000 photos into a 200-page book, and instead of using a generic contact sheet template (meaning, each page shows fixed 3x5 photos like a photo album), I arranged the photos such that group photos are larger sized (so that the faces can be seen clearer). I even did a 2-page spread on the finale shot, and it really look great.
Cost-wise, it's certainly cheaper than printing 1000 4R photos at 20-cents. This 200-page softcover photobook was printed for less than S$100 using Blurb, an overseas on-demand print vendor.


To see more photos of the event, visit the album at Facebook.

Red Nano for the Red Dot

Today, the Straits Times (and probably many other national newspapers) features large prominent adverts on Red Nano, the new search engine created by SPH (Singapore Press Holdings) solely on the Singapore market. It makes sure that all the search results are localised to Singapore context. One of the methods is to pick up keywords unique to Singapore, for instance, street names, food terms, even Singlish.

So this morning I tested it out, using keywords like "Chester Tan", "Piano Spa", "Dance Photographer", "Ballet Accompanist", "Piano Composer", "Photo Story", "Rock On Piano". Happy to say, my site came up as the top of the search list, while some other keywords like "Wedding Photographer", "Portrait Photographer" came up within the first page.

What really surprises me is that when I search using the keyword "Timeless", my first CD album also came up tops on the search engine! Seriously, I have no idea how it got there.

Haha this is so exciting! Feels like as if this search engine is created for me!

Red Nano is really great, not just because of the above. Now, using Red Nano, I can search for sites that is truly from within Singapore. No longer do I need to dig through pages of Google to find relevant local sites.

Ballet Pianist, Anyone - Again?

In Jan 2007, I wrote a post looking for ballet pianist.

One year on, the situation remains the same.

There are some positive responses since that post. I have had one pianist who had taken up and played for a few classes, before she decided to return to Hong Kong for good to pursue further studies. There are several enquiries, one of which came to the ballet classes to watch how the sessions are conducted.

No matter how hard I convince them that they will be given ample time to practice the pieces, the response has been, in one word, bad.

Doesn't anyone play piano in Singapore? Or should I rephrase: won't anyone who takes piano lessons willing to play scores other than the exam syllabus?

Not to brag, but it took me about 30 cumulative hours to practice the new RAD music syllabus and play decently for class and for exams. That's about 120 individual pieces, short (16 bars) and long (64 bars). My sight-reading is not good at all, and I cannot play a song without playing it through at least twice. I bluff in sight-reading, and in music accompaniment, bluffing is better than not playing in time or worse, not at all.

Imagine if you are a sight-reading talent, you would have no problems learning the scores and earn some cash.

Even if you are not, you will be given ample time to learn the scores. If you need one year to learn, fine. See you in 2009. At least I know you can start in 2009. If the person who responded in 2007 had started practicing then, he/she could have started playing for classes NOW.

Am I looking at the wrong places? I'm sure there is some local community or forums full of pianists desperately looking for pianist jobs, and they would be lamenting why it's so hard to find pianists job in Singapore. Haha.

Please, just refer this post to anyone you know who plays the piano. Perhaps it will lead to somewhere.

By the way, it's a skill and experience that can take you a long way. I know, because I have played for 14 years.