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danceafterdark — Fire Dancer
Published: 2004-10-12 16:33:20 +0000 UTC; Views: 13870; Favourites: 484; Downloads: 304
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Description
Last shot of Eddie Montesa, fire dancer from Chicago, ILRelated content
Comments: 49
I realize this has been here a while, but it's still beautiful and it crops up on the search. Stunning, you truly capture the essence of the dance and the fire, all in one. I know you say it was a luck shot because of your equipment, but it's lovely. Do you recall what he was spinning? Just standard poi or was it a double? It looks like a single head in the image, but I could be wrong. 
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Thanks, Ren. This remains one of my favorite photos. Shooting Eddie was my first experience with fire dancing. He had two poi in this shot and a staff in some of the others. I believe you're right that each poi had single head. At one point Eddie even produced a snake (think that's the right term) for some very dramatic results.
Whereabouts are you located? I haven't been traveling much in the last year, but I typically make a big trip or two every year. Most often I head out to NM or AZ, but I've got friends all over the place. If I'm ever in your area we could discuss shooting. I do this just for the art and enjoyment.
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I'm actually out in AZ - there's actually a couple troupes in Tucson that I know of. I'm still learning, but I work with some really talented people if you wanted to shoot them. Er, photograph... them. They're pretty neat. Thanks for the fav and comment on the sunset piece!
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Rock on. I'll keep that in mind for the next time I head out there.
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Fantastic picture. Do you know the artist?
I really like how the fire is making some kind of shield around the artist.
I diffidently fave this shot
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For most of my fire dancing shots I didn't get much chance to talk with the artists. However, this one's an exception. His name is Eddie Montessa, and this was actually a scheduled photo shoot. (The others were taken on the beach in Clearwater, FL.) At the time of shooting Eddie was based in Chicago, and he left to head back to Chicago almost as soon as we were done shooting. I caught him on his last day in town.
Thanks for the +fav!
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O.O this is SO amazing! Do you know how exactly fire dancers do this kind of thing without burning themselves? And what do they use to do it with?
Augh, this is so cool! It fits with your username too
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Thanks. They do it very carefully, and they still get burned every once in a while. It's unavoidable. After a while you get a little used to it, so at least the minor singes don't bother you.
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Wow. It must take tons of talent to do that.
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Pretty much. I have a lot of respect for fire dancers.
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Thanks. This is still one of my favorite fire dancer shots, despite having better equipment and more experience now. Sometimes you get lucky.
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nice...
were you playing with the zoom aswell....?
the top line looks asif you were,
nice seeing a frie performance picture taken before dark
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It's been so long, I don't know how much I was or wasn't zoomed in on this shot. I have a dSLR now, but this was taken with a point & shoot. Maximum zoom on the old camera was 3x.
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fair nuff... i meant did you zoom in whalst the shutter was open? but if you had a point and click then you probably couldnt, the effects nice though... i have an example of it in my gallery
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I did that once while shooting random Christmas lights, but I never played with the technique again. Thanks for the reminder. You're right - it wasn't an option with my old camera. Eddie (in this picture) was visiting Orlando, but the closest resident burners are hours away in Clearwater. I'll have to get back out there and try your way.
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brill...
its great fun
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I love dancing with fire could you take me a pic like that? hihi... its just great
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Thanks. I take pictures of fire dancers whenever I can. They're easier to find on the coast. I'm in Orlando, and I don't think the burner community as very big here. I'm always looking for more people to photograph.
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last but not least!
Very good capture, even though you hadn't have much control
If you have more fire dancing pictures I would love to see them!
Take it easy,
J.
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Thanks, J. More soon. I got sick and missed the last opportunity (mentioned above), but this weekend looks promising.
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good luck!
I'll wait to see them
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Not much poi love out there anymore.
Great image,lovely lighting and the fire is gorgeous.
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I'm only three months behind on my replies. (heh) Still, thanks for the compliment. I'll be shooting more fire dancers on Saturday night, and I imagine I'll post the images as soon as I get home. I really lucked out. I'm dating a girl who has a gaggle of fire dancing friends.
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Thanks. In all honesty, this photo was taken before I upgraded to a dSLR. I was using a Coolpix 4300, so I didn't have exact control of the exposure. If memory serves, the camera had a "fireworks" setting that gave longer exposures. I wish I could say it was all manual.
According to the EXIF data, it was a 4 second exposure with f-stop 7.6 and ISO 100. Bear in mind that I did add a bit more contrast and take out a dead pixel in Photoshop, but otherwise the photo is untouched. The photo was taken at night, several hours after sunset. The light you see on the horizon is light pollution from Orlando, about 20 miles away.
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Wow, cant beleive you got that with a point and shoot digital. Thats amazing! Thows fire chains must have been moving really fast at the time of the picture. If there was one chain then I thinnk it rotated 10 times in 4 seconds, if there was two, they each rotated 5 fimes i think by the looks of the photo. Really well captures. In my city we also have weird sky colors because of pollution from our neighboring cities, Toronto and Hamilton. And smog warnings...
In fact yesturday we had the firsdt smog warning EVER during the Winter....
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Close. Two chains, and I think there were three or four passes each in this photo. Eddie has been performing as a fire dancer for years, so all I had to do was keep up. If you want to see some real speed, check out the fire wheel (I forget the title I posted it under). He spun the chains on a shorter radius to make a solid wheel of flame.
I hadn't thought of Orlando as polluted until I visited New Mexico. There's nothing out there, and I do mean *nothing.* It's beautiful and clean. The air here is heavier with all of the humidity, not to mention chemicals and such. Mind you, the "light pollution" I mentioned was more a reference to city lights reflected off the clouds, like being able to see Miami glow on the horizon from many miles away in the Florida Keys.
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Yeah I know what you mean. I lived in Brazil for a year. Went to Sao Paulo and the amazon, big differences.
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woah 
a fave
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Thanks, Lord Smarty Pants. *grin* We had fun taking these photos.
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