I had a shoot that I was a little bit concerned about today. When trying to pick a word for how I felt, I could only come up with “concerned.” I suppose “nervous” could also be a word to use, but I don’t think that’s right. I knew I’d end up with something at the end of the shoot, but wasn’t sure what it would be. I had this idea in my head of how I wanted it to look, and how I’d set it up, but it was complicated and I wasn’t sure if I could pull it off. The subjects were an improv duo called Entropy. They paint and make music based on an audience suggestion. I think the idea is extremely cool, and I wanted to illustrate how the two of them influence each other in the performance of their art. I asked them to bring a keyboard and an easel with some artwork painted during a show.

They had asked for a kind of serious, sophisticated classy look. I went for a Karsh-type lighting-style. I finally remembered to take a photo of the setup of the shoot. I usually forget to do this, but I’m glad I remembered this time.

I used all three of my Alien Bees lights with grids and kind of wish i had a fourth. In hindsight I could have used one of the Vivitars but it might have been too much.

I’m really proud of this result. They’re very happy with it too.

Wow I’ve been shooting a lot lately. I feel like I did when I first started getting serious about photography, shooting almost every day. The skies are beautiful at this time of year, so I’ve been going outside a lot. I think my trip to Thailand got me more comfortable with the idea of shooting in natural light and at wide angles. Not only that, but I’ve been shooting lots of pro stuff too. When it rains, it pours. I hope I can keep up this output. It’s fun.

I had my first show in Toronto in quite a long time. The first time was over a year ago, doing the Midweek Mayhem show at the Bad Dog with Affirmative Action. We sucked big time. How embarassing. This time, I played with my Saturday class at Clinton’s Tavern. We performed a Harold, which is a longform with a specific structure. We were all a bit worried, since Saturday’s practice was horrendous. We were low on energy and imagination. None of our scenes went anywhere. But the show turned out ok. We concentrated on keeping the energy up in our scenework, and everything flowed from there. We did an organic opening and some organic games too, which can seem weird to those watching. Apparently the audience loved it. Anyway, I feel good about the performance. During the break I went to have Korean food. I felt good about that too. rool:

I’ve been going through a phase of non-blogging lately. I am not feeling particularly inspired to write anything about my life. I guess it seems pretty vanilla after returning from Thailand. But, I like vanilla, so I’ll try to jump back in again.

I taught the beginner’s workshop at the Staircase tonight. My topic was “positive acceptance,” which is a basic building block of improv. It was a pretty big class, which I usually ended up splitting into two groups for manageability. There were some challenges… new players, and a couple with learning disabilities. But, it all worked out ok. I think people had a good time. The exercises that stress positive acceptance usually end up being pretty fun, and having unexpected results. I was slightly worried how the “Make up a Performance Piece” thing was going to go, because it can be pretty weird and artsy. But this group was well warmed up for acceptance, and the improvised performance pieces were a blast to watch. It hammers home the point that our society teaches us to say “no” faster than it teaches us to say “yes.” And in the end it all boils down to trust. When you can build an atmosphere of trust within an improv group, it quickly demonstrates how fun “yes” can be.