Sankofa Dress Rehearsal 2 [Orange You Glad It’s Friday]

    This continues the Sankofa dress rehearsal mini-series. I should note that shooting under dim lighting, coupled with the rapid movements of dancers, created some difficult challenges. Thus, the choice of shutter speed, ISO and aperture made for quite different outcomes, depending on your intentions. In the first half of the rehearsal, I was set up on a tripod and shooting using Aperture Priority [f/5.6 was the widest opening of my zoom lens] and 3200 ISO. I noticed that the shutter speed was never faster than 1/90 sec. Also, early on I had to switch to manual focus because the auto-focus response was way too slow. During intermission, I chatted with a pro photographer, and decided to try the following changes: I switched to Shutter Priority [1/250 sec] and ISO 6400; the camera chose the largest aperture. With these settings in place, I got sharper images and better exposures. Moreover,  I was able to shoot hand-holding the camera, which was more convenient than the tripod. So, this was a productive learning experience.