Last night I shot show photos for Rochester Civic Theatre’s production of Shadowlands. This tells the story of a middle-aged C.S. Lewis finding love rather unexpectedly. It’s a rather emotional story, and knowing a little about the plot, I was surprised at the humor that finds its way into much of the story.
It’s always interesting to me the choice of color of the lighting and costumes. Those colors can set the mood for the show. Here, there were rather muted colors, lots of browns and dark shades, and there was an overall magenta cast to the lights.
I think the most colorful costumes were those worn by Joy, Lewis’ love interest. It isn’t too hard to understand why, as she brings some color into Lewis’ life.
A golden tree hides in the shadows at the back of the set, lighting up rather unexpectedly during the show. It serves as something of a gateway to other worlds including those of Lewis’ books such as Narnia.
In terms of the photo shoot, actors tended to be more or less together in areas of the large set. That made my job a bit easier. I often have to find some way to include either a large cast (think about big musical numbers) or cast members at the far corners of the stage interacting. Here I had less of that, and I was able to zoom in more and get in close to the players. That’s always nice.
The more challenging aspect of this show was probably the lighting. None of the scenes were brightly lit. Often, there was one or a set of bright lights with an otherwise muted background. This is similar how spotlights affect the shot – lots of contrast. There were a few shots with very low lighting, but I’m able to reasonably deal with that.
After I returned home, I started to wonder how many shows I’ve shot. This show makes 65. I’m beginning to figure it out, I think!
