Pitchfork Disney Pre-Show

My videos go showed in the pre-show of a 3rd year final project theatre piece pre-show. I really liked the way they used the venue to work with the piece. It wasn't crucial for the public to see it in order to make sense of actual performance, but it added to it. The pre-show was the walk from the entrance of the building to the performance room; one of my videos got shown on a small tv and the second one was projected in a dark room. I really liked to use of the space. The warehouse was very flexible; I liked the way they described it as 'a blanc canvas that's waiting to be coloured in any way'. This made me think about doing something similar for my final project, having few videos screened in different rooms or spaces in a venue. But I need to work on ideas more. I made this video to show the pre-show and added bits of the videos that got screened as they are not obvious on the recording of the pre-show

Pitchfork Disney Pre-Show from Diana Stefanescu on Vimeo.

Pitchfork Disney - performance

Last week I filmed and photographed Pitchfork Disney, a very odd and dark theatre piece. It was quite chalenging because of the low light, but it was easier to photograph than other ones as the lights didn't change throughout the piece, so I didn't have to change the settings on the camera before every shot.

ONE.THREE by Fish Bowl - Dance Performance

This week I had a dance piece to film and photograph as well. Quie prowd of my turnaround. Pictures were published on the same day as the performance and the video the next day. I love photographing dance pieces because of the lighting. And the center piece of this peticular performance was the light. Maddy who produed the piece is doing light design for her degree show, so this was the main piece and she has another 6 to do, so emphasizing the use of light in these pictures was crucial. I think I was successful in doing it. She is very happy with the pictures which is all that matters

"Unpublished by Alex" theatre piece

This week I filmed and photographed this piece. I also produced all the videos that were used within it. It has been the biggest challenge I had when it comes to production; there were 18 videos that had to be filmed and produced in 10 different locations. For some of them Rolandos, who wrote the script, shot already in Cyprus and I had to edit them in as well. The problem with that footage was that it was shot in MTS format, so I had to use Premiere Pro to edit it, and Final Cut Pro to edit what I filmed. It was the hardest when I had to use footage that I filmed and that he gave me as the weren't compatible so I had to do a lot of exporting and importing again. I also struggled with exporting in Premiere Pro, as some of the videos only worked on MAC and he had PC so I had to go back and forth a lot. We first started shooting in Deceember 11 and we finished everything 4 days before the show! It was very stressful at times as I had tight deadlines and also other things to do alongside it (like my MA!!!) but it was a great learning experience and I can say I had my first public screening!

MAke>shift 2011

The MA Dance students held their performances on a Saturday and I was asked to photograph them. It was such a nice experience running around from a performance to the other and go home inbetween for a break and to edit the pictures. This project is one of my prides so far, as I edited and delivered the pictures to the 5 performers on the same day at their afterparty.

I believe that in this industry you need to be as fast and professional as possible, and to keep the 'client' if you wish, happy as in any other industries. With photography is just a bit harder now because anyone who has 500 pounds can get a DSLR and call themselves a photographer and ask for less pay. Of course experience is important but very often people will look at expenses instead of quality. This is why my technique in being successful is to get the pictures back within 24 hours.

But above all this, I loved the buzz of having to photograph five performances in one day, especially because they were all so different.

Glass Menagerie Theatre Performance

Man-Kind dance performance

Pictures from a contemporary dance performance called Man-Kind