When extreme high ISO is better than nothing: a rundown on my experiences shooting ballet

Hi Brooke,

I believe you gave me some advice in the past on this subject that really helped me get my head around this problem, and helped me rethink what I was doing.

In return, I'd like to add my own 2 cents on this discussion. What I've learned is as follows.

1. Perhaps the most important thing when shooting ballet is the metering. Spot meter the subject's leotard because for one thing it is larger than the face, and for another it will help you to get an accurate measure of what NEEDS to be exposed accurately. It is also the most likely object on the stage to end up with blown highlites that have to be corrected after. If the dancer is wearing anything white it must be metered. Generally speaking, you do not need to expose to for the background, and if you do, you will overexpose the face and/or leotard because they are most likely lit differently.

This is key because it saves you from unnecessarily setting the camera to high ISO, low shutter speed or underexposure.

2. Perhaps the most important thing when shooting is metering. Spot meter...oops! I guess that's all I wanted to say. After metering, everything that has been mentioned above can be tinkered with, but without an accurate meter, we're just tinkering with a mistaken exposure and wasting our time.

Anyway, I'm enjoying this discussion, and Brooke I admire your work. I'll just add a couple of my own shots to illustrate the point: