Funkamania 2002 (Inter-Tertiery Dance Competition)

[Daniel]

Funkamania is an Inter-Tertiery Dance Competition started 8 years ago and has gained quite a following over the years. The latest 4 competitions that I've been to, have performed to full house crowds at the NUS Forum. Highlights of this competition are big name hosts like ex-MTV DJs Sonia Couling, Belinda, Nadia and not forgeting the dance teams themselves, decked in outragously creative costumes, packed with niffy dance moves.

This year's Funkamania has scaled down a bit (no thanks to the economic downturn) with past big name sponsors missing, but that has not damped the spirits of the dance teams who in my opinion put up a better show than last year's. Of course no Funkamania is complete without our babelicious host in a sizzling red hot number, who else but...

Kumar!!!

Here are the rest of show, enjoy!

 

[Daniel]

Are we hot or what?

"She-devils" from Singapore Management University

NTU Flaming Lamborgini

King Edward VII Vampires

 

[Daniel]

Eusoff Hall "African Survivor"

NTU Titanium (Funkamania 2002 Champions)

Temasek Hall "Boxercise ala Para Para Sakura style"

We are the Ultra Violet Rangers!

Hail the raising sun!

 

[Red Dawn]

Hi

great shots! hey! u were there??? where were u standing?

me and ckiang were there as well, originally to shoot the Lindy Hop Ensemble's guest performance, but we ended up shooting every dance item as well
i haven't even looked through the shots i took that night

i'm the first "daring" guy who kept my 70-200 f2.8L long zoom and walked right up to the edge of the stage and shoot from close up with a wide angle lens. And the same guy who kept kneeing down and popping up for the shots so as not to block the audience. Not long after i did that, i noticed a lot of the photographers also did the same, crowding the base of the stage... But they didn't seem to observe the no-obstruction-of-audience rule..............

kumar was damn funny no?.....i realised....i ddin't even take a pic of him cos i was laughing too much at his jokes!

 

[Daniel]

I noticed one guy with a white colour L lens & monopod but he was not using a canon digital body (not D30?) and he had a friend (Ckiang?) using a nikon system. I was amongst the audience in the front row with my 707 mounted on my manfrotto tripod. I was directly behind these 2 guys when they first unpacked their equipment.

Actually I'm really glad that you guys (all the photographers) move closer to the stage and not prop yourselves on the table officially reserved for photographers coz then you will be blocking all the audience behind.

The organisers this year are really dumb, they block half the view with the raised judges' table and if that's not worse enough, they set up another table for photographers to mount their tripods and cameras on, thereby blocking almost all the view of the stage. Luckily most of the photographers worth their salt know they can't only stay at one place if they really wanna get good shots but constantly move around the stage area.

Unfortunately, there's just one inconsiderate photographer who was sitting on the table throughout the entire show with his camera locked at a fixed angle thereby blocking all the poor souls standing behind. Can't imagine how it's like to have all his shots taken from the same angle and why is this guy so special especially when almost everyone who has bigger better equipment is down on the floor.

Here's a shot of someone urging the photographer to get down the table and not block the audience behind.

The photographer's response: "I have the right to be here." Duh!

 

[ckiang]

Hi,

Originally posted by Daniel
I noticed one guy with a white colour L lens & monopod but he was not using a canon digital body (not D30?) and he had a friend (Ckiang?) using a nikon system. I was amongst the audience in the front row with my 707 mounted on my manfrotto tripod. I was directly behind these 2 guys when they first unpacked their equipment.

Actually I'm really glad that you guys (all the photographers) move closer to the stage and not prop yourselves on the table officially reserved for photographers coz then you will be blocking all the audience behind.

The organisers this year are really dumb, they block half the view with the raised judges' table and if that's not worse enough, they set up another table for photographers to mount their tripods and cameras on, thereby blocking almost all the view of the stage. Luckily most of the photographers worth their salt know they can't only stay at one place if they really wanna get good shots but constantly move around the stage area.

Unfortunately, there's just one inconsiderate photographer who was sitting on the table throughout the entire show with his camera locked at a fixed angle thereby blocking all the poor souls standing behind. Can't imagine how it's like to have all his shots taken from the same angle and why is this guy so special especially when almost everyone who has bigger better equipment is down on the floor.

Here's a shot of someone urging the photographer to get down the table and not block the audience behind.

The photographer's response: "I have the right to be here." Duh!

Doesn't sound like us. I did see the Canon 70-200mm f2.8L user on a monopod though. I am using a Nikon F100 + 50mm f1.8 most of the time, moving around the stage front.

Cute thing about the show is that someone actually came up to us to buy film. Red Dawn obviously didn't have any, and I sold him one of my spare rolls of Fuji Superia XTRA 400. (Was using Press 800 pushed to 1600 - quite unpredictable lights.)

I am quite impressed that you managed to get such good shots! I wonder how mine will turn out.

Regards
CK

 

[Daniel]

Think I got a shot of ckiang

 

[Red Dawn]

Originally posted by Daniel
I noticed one guy with a white colour L lens & monopod but he was not using a canon digital body (not D30?) and he had a friend (Ckiang?) using a nikon system. I was amongst the audience in the front row with my 707 mounted on my manfrotto tripod. I was directly behind these 2 guys when they first unpacked their equipment.

nope that wasn't us. i noticed that guy with the L lens and monopod as well.....he was there for most of the segment....moving about only later in the show.....

Ckiang and i never went onto that table reserved for photographers. we weren't carrying any monopod or tripod as well......we started on the floor and then moved near to the stage....which is currently now my favourite shooting position for such dances (shot Lindy Hop at Bedok performance this way as well....)

well for me it's great to be back in NUS...........hey the girls look better after my batch...not fair!

 

[Red Dawn]

Originally posted by Daniel
Think I got a shot of ckiang

yup that's CK all right, with his F100 and probably Nikkor 50 f1.8

 

[ckiang]

Originally posted by Daniel
Think I got a shot of ckiang

Yikes! I got sniped!

Yeah, that's me. :embrass:

Regards
CK

 

[Red Dawn]

Originally posted by ckiang
Hi,

Cute thing about the show is that someone actually came up to us to buy film. Red Dawn obviously didn't have any, and I sold him one of my spare rolls of Fuji Superia XTRA 400. (Was using Press 800 pushed to 1600 - quite unpredictable lights.)

the guy didn't seem to believe when i said i don't have any film

hey, wat's film anyway?

 

[Daniel]

Originally posted by Red Dawn


yup that's CK all right, with his F100 and probably Nikkor 50 f1.8

Err...thanks for "appearing" in a number of my shots ;p

 

[ckiang]

Originally posted by Daniel

Err...thanks for "appearing" in a number of my shots ;p

Oops!! Very sorry about that. :embrass:

Regards
CK

 

[Daniel]

Originally posted by ckiang

I am quite impressed that you managed to get such good shots! I wonder how mine will turn out.

Actually many of my shots didn't make the mark. The slow AF of non SLR digital cameras really hamper the capturing of fast action shots, miss a lot of good shots because the camera take too long to focus and capture. Most of my shots were taken without flash (not that my internal flash will make any difference anyway from so far out) with ISO pushed up to around 250-320 (sounds unbelievable I know). The type of shots I can take are also quite limited, I cannot afford to use faster shutter speeds without underexposing my shots and also by the fact that I'm stucked in the audience. Actually I could have moved into the vip area coz I know some of the organisers but too paiseh to show my camera in front of all the SLRs.

Anyway I just brought my camera to shoot for fun, didn't expect to shoot anything at all, was glad my shots turn out better than expected.

Thanks Red Dawn and Ckiang for the compliments.

I bet your shots will be much nicer than mine.

 

[Jed]

Nice shots... and some very nice dancers too! :angel:

 

[Daniel]

Originally posted by Jed
Nice shots... and some very nice dancers too! :angel:

Thanks Jed for your compliments.
Very honoured to hear that from a pro

 

[ckiang]

Originally posted by Daniel


Actually many of my shots didn't make the mark. The slow AF of non SLR digital cameras really hamper the capturing of fast action shots, miss a lot of good shots because the camera take too long to focus and capture. Most of my shots were taken without flash (not that my internal flash will make any difference anyway from so far out) with ISO pushed up to around 250-320 (sounds unbelievable I know). The type of shots I can take are also quite limited, I cannot afford to use faster shutter speeds without underexposing my shots and also by the fact that I'm stucked in the audience. Actually I could have moved into the vip area coz I know some of the organisers but too paiseh to show my camera in front of all the SLRs.

Anyway I just brought my camera to shoot for fun, didn't expect to shoot anything at all, was glad my shots turn out better than expected.

Thanks Red Dawn and Ckiang for the compliments.

I bet your shots will be much nicer than mine.

Thanks for your "early" compliments. Well, they are not too bad (somehow your's still brighter though I am at ISO 1600....)

They are here:

http://forums.clubsnap.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=822

and here

http://forums.clubsnap.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=823

Regards
CK

 

[vincent]

Daniel,

that must have been one of the best concert pictures taken with a Sony F707.
I am pretty sure by now, a friend (kevin) of mine who just bought a F707 would
be so excited after I showed him your pictures.

They are all very well taken, care to share some of the setting used?

And also about inconsiderate photographer... and the cool people from our forum
(referring to ckiang and reddawn)... really making everything so fun at the shoot!
Wish I was there, I would have gave that 'rights to be there" guy some lecture in
NUS!!!

 

[Daniel]

Originally posted by vincent
Daniel,

that must have been one of the best concert pictures taken with a Sony F707.
I am pretty sure by now, a friend (kevin) of mine who just bought a F707 would
be so excited after I showed him your pictures.

They are all very well taken, care to share some of the setting used?

And also about inconsiderate photographer... and the cool people from our forum
(referring to ckiang and reddawn)... really making everything so fun at the shoot!
Wish I was there, I would have gave that 'rights to be there" guy some lecture in
NUS!!!

Don't laugh.......but I shot at full Auto the whole time, ISO was also auto set (somewhere between 250-320). I did so because light conditions were very unpredictable and the action was happening so fast that I don't have the time to tweek with manual settings. Actually anticipation, raw instinct and pure luck played a big part in the shots too. After having attended 3 funkamanias before, I sorta able to predict what are their moves. Pure luck in the sense if you just take continuous shot after shot of an interesting sequence, there's bound to be one frame that turns out well, if you are lucky.