Review of Progress

I have attended approximately 10 events and taken several hundred photographs. My 'hit' rate i.e. the percentage of photographs that stood out as better than the rest was, for each individual event roughly 25% although this varied enormously from one event to the other. This 'success rate' depended very much on the nature of the event that varied from one side of Morris Dancers at Sleaford  in Lincolnshire to a major event in Loughborough, Leics where there was a great deal going on and plenty of opportunity. It also varied as I became more experienced with this type of photography and what was and what was not possible. There was also an awareness of the needs of the Course and that had an impact on what I retained and what I put to one side. I was conscious of the need to create a portfolio that was of the necessary high standard and interesting in its own right. For example I found myself always being conscious of images that I had kept from previous events and attempting to balance those with what was available from the shoot of that day.

I have found the photographing of people less fraught than I thought. In large part this is due to the willingness of re-enactors to talk about themselves and naturally assume that they will be photographed. Their willingness was both a blessing but also something of a curse. There were a number of occasions where my intent was to shoot as natural an image as possible but the enactor would spot the camera and strike a pose that was interesting on the one hand, because this hinted at how they saw themselves in costume, but something of a curse because they too often looked like mannequins in a shop window. I found the best time was either when they were involved  in staging something for the general audience or immediately after they had struck a pose for another photographer. In fairness there were also a significant proportion who ignored the camera and stayed in part.

As I looked through the photographs that I had taken I became aware that there were two types of photographs that I had to be particularly aware of when shooting - the mannequins and the onlookers.

Mannequins.

In this image the elements are all their to show the clothing and type of work this woman did in the era (Tudor) that she was representing. Whilst that is of itself interesting a portfolio of this type of shot  where the woman could be a mannequin would be boring and restrictive.

Similarly although there is a bit more interest in this photograph there is very little evidence of any action and it has a sense of having been posed.

Onlookers

You quickly learn (if it was not already obvious) that it is almost impossible to avoid including some of the spectators. I found that how much of this could be tolerated before the image is of the spectators and not the subject matter depends to a great extent on the ratio of the two - not in so much as the relative numbers but in how much space the two occupied within the photograph.

In this image the maypole dancers in their red costumes occupy the foreground and are the element that the viewer sees first. Although there is a large crowd accompanying them they are not sufficiently obtrusive as to take attention away from the main element.

In this image the two dancers represent a smaller proportion of the picture and the eye is drawn away from them to look at a quite interesting background.

These two images were taken right at the beginning of the project and I have learnt to be more patient although on occasion you just have to go with what you have got. In the case of these Maypole Dancers there were no angles at which the photographer could avoid the onlookers simply because the activity was circular so wherever the spectators stood they would get a good view.