I spent the last three days shooting dance pictures at Karl DiMarco Dance Studio and it was a great experience. The costumes for the upcoming recital were really fantastic. I was blown away by how great everyone looked. This was made even better by the fact that all my subjects were dancers... THEY KNOW HOW TO POSE! Everyone was attentive and eager to get good pictures.
The very last costumes that we shot were the hobo's. Unlike the other costumes, each of these was unique and made by the girls themselves.
It's very common to use Photoshop when shooting group pictures because it's impossible to carry a 20-ft wide backdrop with you to every photo shoot. So, you position your group in the middle and use Photoshop later to fill in where the backdrop is missing. However, in this particular case I actually like the picture in it's original form. By leaving the extra background clutter intact you change the feel of the picture. Now, the picture takes on a more casual observer feel.... it's not a "formal portrait" anymore, it's now a snapshot of a formal portrait session. (Does that make sense?) Magazine's will sometimes photograph celebrities this way to give the picture a sense of casualness while still getting the benefit of excellent lighting. This picture is the only one that I offered to the parents un-retouched. I'm curious to see if anyone chooses this one over the "perfect" one. I'm guessing that I'm the only one who like it better this way. :)
