The music is hip-hop. It’s battle time. It’s a non violent street-fight, the weapon is breakdance. The dancers are ready, inside the ring, formed by the audience surrounding them. The first competition is a knock out battle between two pairs of dancers. The winners are selected by the judges, and the objective is to outperform the other team in execution to a tune not controlled by the competing teams.
I am here at the venue (Kulturhallarna) in Norrköping, Sweden, together with Pelle and Susanna. To take photos of the event. The audience is a mix of all ages, eager to see the dancers perform. There are no bleachers nor chairs in the venue. Organically the closest spectators sit down on the floor forming a ring, and the rest standing or kneeing from behind.
And wow! did we get a show!!! Dance pair after dance pair had it out in fierce battles. Truly showing their skills while they improvised to different tunes that the DJ had them dancing to. It was spectacular, and the crowd showed their delight when the most complex movements were on display.
Here, below are some nerd reflection’s on the photo shoot. If you came for the photos – go to the bottom of this blog and click on the picture and then scroll among the many frames. You will find a lot of photos! If you use them for personal use make sure to credit: www.dalbyi.se. Enjoy!
From a photographer’s perspective is was a complex photoshoot. The light in the room were dimmed with a muted green and blue spotlights making the scene dark. Resulting in the dancers appearing in a slightly monochrome green/blue tint. To capture the fast moving scene, in the low light the shutter speed had to be high and shot through a wide open aperture. Still the ISO would creep up in the thousands. Pelle had a Nikon D850 with a 28 mm prime lens. Susanne had a Nikon z8 with a 24-70 mm zoom lens and I had a Nikon z9 with a wide 14-24 mm zoom lens. I also had an on camera flash that worked for a while until it finally got overheated. In the photo series, it is easy to detect the ones taken with the flash, as the green, blue light tint is suppressed, overpowered by the flash light spectrum.
All in all I am pleased with the photo result. The ones taken without flash is grainy, slightly monochromic dark, but it plays well with the subject matter. Our aim was to capture the battle element, with the opponents showing a attitude towards each others – in a way heckling the other team as part of the dancing act. See for your self!and enjoy!
