Elliott Franks
Top tip
There are three ingredients that help to make an award-winning photograph; if you are able to capture all of them in one picture then I guarantee you’ll have an image that should do very well in any competition. This rule applies to all people photography, not just dance, so it’s actually a very good rule to learn for all the pictures you take.
Try and capture:
- Animation – the state of being full of life or vigour; liveliness.
- Expression – the action of making known one’s thoughts or feelings.
- Emotion – a strong feeling deriving from one’s circumstances, mood, or relationships with others.
Dance photography really lends itself to this, capturing movement, life, emotion, feelings, passion, and excitement. It is by no means easy to do and it will take a lot of experimenting, and trial and error, but slowly your confidence will build and you’ll be taking some amazing pictures.
What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received?
I started photographing ballet some 20 years ago. Many of the other photographers at the Royal Ballet were generous with their tips and advice especially Frederika Davis (whose astonishing work included photographing Rudolf Nureyev and Margot Fonteyn on and off stage). Frederika said: “listen to the music, above everything else listen to the music and the photography will flow from there”. When photographing dance it is easy to forget about the music because you’re so focused on the technical aspect of capturing the movement, the controls of your camera, the lighting and composition, the shape and lines of the artist but if you’re feeling the music your pictures will be much more in sync with the dancers on stage; it really does make all the difference.
Dance photography is always very challenging, every piece of dance is different, there are lots of things to consider as a dance photographer, the lighting, the scenery, the costumes, the blocking or positions of the dancers on stage, the music, the layout of the stage and auditorium, will you be moving about or behind a camera mounted on a tripod, the duration of the piece, how long you have to take your photographs, what you need to end up with whether it’s an image for a newspaper review, a blog, a production shot and so on.
No one ever said that a photograph has to be in focus. Some of my favourite dance photos are very blurry and animated, perhaps with only the dancers’ feet sharp. Pictures like that really help to convey the feeling and emotion of the work – this is especially true with contemporary dance. Ballet is different because dance companies and dancers usually want photographs to show a ‘perfect’ ballet position. If you can accomplish this everyone will be delighted as it is extremely difficult.
Sometimes photographers will like a ballet photograph for its pleasing aesthetics not because it’s a perfect position. Eventually, you will instantly know if you like a picture or you feel that it has potential if for example it was cropped, edited in Photoshop etc.
Humanhood. Photo by Elliott Franks.
What’s your favourite dance image you have taken and why?
A picture that I really like is from the Mark Morris Pepperland tour, it was taken on stage at Sadler’s Wells and shows the very colourful dancers all jumping at the same time in tune to music from the Beatle’s Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band album…. Mark Morris is one of my favourite choreographers and his work is always such a pleasure and a thrill to photograph.
Also, a blurry motion picture that I really like is from Humanhood (Rudi Cole and Júlia Robert Parés) at Sadler’s Wells ‘Sampled’. It’s an extract from their first full-length duet ZERO, which explores the interconnections and synchronicity in the universe.