DAY 215

PORTRAITS

Freeze Frame

RICHARD DORMER, ACTOR AND PLAYWRIGHT

To capture a photographic moment that has inherent movement, you must choose a shutter speed to freeze the motion (above 1/500^th of a second), literally making a freeze frame of the action as it appears before your eyes.

Richard wrote his one-man show, Hurricane, about the rise and fall of Alex “Hurricane” Higgins, a troubled snooker player. His acting was consummate, powerful, and inspiring throughout. Using effective stage and lighting design, Richard captivated his audience with his complete immersion into the character, realized further by the action all taking place inside an oversized snooker table.

In this portrait of Richard in character, I used strobe lights to freeze the falling paper and beer cans that he throws up in a key moment in his performance while using a slow enough shutter speed to allow the existing stage lights to still illuminate the stage, and by also adding a red-gelled strobe head to side light the action. —SA