The Click: Creative Collaborative Project

Generating 'The Click'

The Click *finger snap* is a little group formed by London Studio Centre students; Francesca Dunham, Sophie Eccles and myself, Nikita Softley. We set out to create a short documentary-style video of a photoshoot we planned around the heart of London. This video aims to showcase how location affects the aesthetic of a dancer’s line, and how site-specific photography can create new opportunities in terms of set and props. We hope that this project inspires other young dancers to go out and share their talent with the public and explore new performance spaces. 

Inspiration

'Dancers Among Us' Calendar shot by Jordan Matter

We were inspired by the YouTube hits of Jordan Matter and his 10minute photo challenge in which he invites famous dancers, gymnasts, contortionists and more to partake in a spontaneous photoshoot around New York. Matter implements a 10 minute time constraint on the challenge, which increases the pressure to achieve the desired shots. Each photo taken within this challenge is unplanned and improvised around the people and props found in the location that has been picked. Matter is also the photographer behind the annual Dancers Among Us calendar, which features dancers performing ordinary tasks in an extraordinary way eg. Running to catch the subway is dramatised into split-leaping across the platform. We decided to take this idea of dramatised reality and make it the theme of our shoot. However, it was decided that we would relieve ourselves of the time constraint seen in his challenges, as we are not professional photographers and wanted to make sure we had time to fully explored each locations photographic potential. 

Ten Minute Photo Challenge: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KW1guxc55pI
Dancers Among Us Website: https://www.dancersamongus.com

'Posting a letter' 

Featuring Francesca Dunham.

Trial Tuesday 

We organised a trial photo shoot around the Finchley area in order to get to grips with the photography and filming aspects of our project. During this session we tested the quality of the cameras we had on our phones and the angles in which we should be recording our work. We concluded that there was no need to hire out any extra cameras in order to capture our project: The hired cameras would only complicate the editing process, which was unnecessary when the quality of our film wouldn’t be significantly improved. It was also noted that the film should be shot in a landscape orientation, as this aided the editing process. This trial shoot also enabled us to develop our ideas in terms of the photographs we wished to capture. Long roads worked as a great back drop for jumps and classical ballet poses such as penché’s and arabesques and back bends worked well when holding props found in the environment eg. Picking up a piece of fruit in a grocery store or posting a letter into a letter box . Working among the public as apposed to in a studio appeared daunting, but became increasingly freeing as the session went on. We received many positive comments from people on the street, in shops and one woman even let us use her dog for one of the shots . This trial proved crucial to the development of our project. 

'Going for Walkies'
Featuring Francesca Dunham and a kind old ladies dog.

Unforeseen issues arose throughout the session which then became resolved in time for the official shoot day. For example; It was concluded that costume should be plain in design but bright in colour in order to stand out from the primarily industrial surroundings we were planning to shoot in. Eye line was best kept away from the camera in order to make the tasks performed appear natural, with just the position of the body highlighting our theme of 'dramatised reality'. Capturing jumps was possible through enabling the 'live photo' tool on an iPhone or by setting the camera to 'burst'. It was decided that the use of filters and light exposure was not necessary at this time and could be dealt with during the editing process.

Shooting Sunday

Covent garden was chosen as our starting point for the day as it’s the hub of tourist London and offered us many photo opportunities with nearby monuments and other places of interest. We set off for the shoot with a few photographs planned out…

1. A jump in the middle of a busy road, just as it’s getting dark, with the Christmas lights. For example, Oxford Street. 

2. A tilt or split whilst on the phone in a classic red phone box.

3. A rush for the tube, wearing a backpack and coat.

Before and After of the 'Tilt in a Telephone box' Picture.
Featuring Francesca Dunham and Spencer Church.

The rest of the shots we achieved were improvised around the locations we found. For this shoot we incorporated the use of pointe work and then contrasted this with some more urban shots, wearing Timberlands. On this day our role identities really came out. Francesca worked as our dancing subject, whilst Sophie documented our day through the video footage. My primary job was to get the shots of Francesca and direct her in her movements. We also acquired an extra pair of hands for the day in the form of my boyfriend, Spencer. Spencer was a complete god send, looking after our belongings, requesting for the public to move out of frame whilst we were shooting, and even capturing some extra footage for us in the form of a time-lapse.

The answer is ‘YES!’

What came as the biggest surprise to me was how generous everyone was towards us on the shoot day. We approached every photo opportunity with extreme caution, not wanting to get in anyone’s way or crossing any legal boundaries in terms of our location. Astoundingly, we received a very warm welcome from the local businesses, particularly in and around Covent Garden; The Royal Opera Houseand the Art of Dance market stand to mention a few. We were also lucky enough to approach a very generous Taxi driver who gave us full reign of his vehicle (whilst stationary, of course), and as a result we were able to achieve some of our favourite and most interesting shots. 

'Art of Dance' Market Stand, Covent Garden. 

Jumping into  a Taxi
 Featuring Spencer Church and the kind Taxi Driver

Art of Dance website: https://www.coventgarden.london/markets/art-dance

Royal Opera House Website: https://www.roh.org.uk

Editing Process

Back in November, when our trial shoot was conducted, we also carried out a trial editing session, where we created a trailer-like video of approximately 2 minutes that showcased our initial findings and ideas about our project. This process allowed us to get to grips with our chosen editing program and see in what way our work could be improved for our final cut. Footage orientation really got flagged up at this point, as the documentary screen would only be full if the project was filmed landscape. Unfortunately, this was a note that became forgotten later in January when we shot our final project in central London. This issue again wasn’t flagged up until the footage was reviewed ready for editing, by which time it was too late to recapture. As a result, we went through a few editing drafts, where we explored how we could crop and rotate utilise the footage we had.To further improve the quality of the video recording I would choose to work with a piece of video stabilising equipment, such as the DJI Osmo Mobile 2 Handheld Smartphone Gimbal to make the video smoother and more pleasurable to watch. 

'The Click' Trailer: : https://vimeo.com/315891728
Password: CCPT2019

Our roles during the editing process began to alter a bit. Francesca was responsible for the editing of the trailer and the first draft of our actual project, while I took to editing the final version. Editing styles and orders were also played around with. It was decided that it made best sense to present the documentary in chronological order to which we filmed it. We adopted the style of editing that Jordan Matter uses in his 10minute photo challenge; alternating between video and still photograph to create an overarching outlook of our project, from all viewpoints. Having said this, if we were to carry out this shoot again I would like to include an additional camera attached to the dancing subject, in this case that would have been Francesca, so that we could see how the process felt form every person’s perspective. Our editing style slightly differs to Jordan Matter’s, as we spent a considerable time more than 10 minutes on the shoot, thus had to significantly condense the footage in order to fit the whole process into just a few minutes. The documentary culminates in a slideshow that recaps and showcases all the shots captured on the day.

'The Click' Official Documentary: https://vimeo.com/314586490
Password: CCP2019

Bibliography: 

Matter J. (no date) New York, NY - Jeffrey Smith [Online] Available from: http://www.dancersamongus.com/photos/New-York-NY-Jeffrey-Smith [Accessed: 28th January 2019]