Tim Monzon

I love going to Postsecret every Sunday to find a treasure trove of people’s secrets. Some are funny, some are depressing, some are downright dirty. But the ones I love the most, are the ones that inspire. I look out for those ones more than any other secret. Maybe it’s because I feel like my love for life is lacking, or my creativity is hitting the wall, I’m not sure. But when I see secrets like the one I posted above, they just give me that one extra reason to stop and think, “God blessed me with a wonderful life”. It usually tends to be something awesome to think about while I drive to church the same morning.

Okay, before I go on with the rest of the post, I’ve been getting a lot of messages from my dear friend Kina Grannis‘ followers about photos from the show over the weekend. For future reference, you can click HERE for photos from the show and HERE for photos from the Street Team Meetup. Yes, I will make the photos downloadable, but give me a couple days please . I’ll let Kina know so she can tell you, or I’ll drop a note in the forums for you guys. Thanks!

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So I was thinking about another show I had watched over the weekend, and that was my friend Heidi’s dance production that I watched on Sunday. It’s been a while since I’ve seen a dance production live. And with the friends I’ve had, I’ve been to quite a few dance competitions back in the day. Ever since high school, watching Nikki and Justine dance for MKR Productions, up to college, watching Mika and James for JPD Studios and Carolyn dance for MKR, and even as recently as last year, watching Heidi for Dellos Dance. And I’m not even counting the highly competitive and highly regarded California hip hop dance competition scene (it’s been going on way longer than the folks at America’s Best Dance Crew would like you to think). But I never really got the whole concept of dance as an artistic expression until after college, around the time I started taking photography seriously.

I never really liked watching the fine arts competitions therefter, because everything is so frenzied and somewhat chaotic. But once you slow things down, and get things really prepared for the productions, they’re amazing. The music sets the scene. The lights emphasize the emotions. And each movement helps tell a story. There’s something to be said about watching a dancer letting their emotions flow through their movements. I’m no dance critic, but to me its a beautiful thing.

So back to Sunday… what I really liked in particular about the dance show was their use of lighting. As a photographer, I can definitely appreciate light. From using a spotlight to key in on soloists, to backlighting the scene to make each dancer a mysterious silhouette (man I wish I had a big enough light to do that at home…), I constantly found myself taking still images in my mind. I was enthralled with each new lighting scene. There were countless times when I kept thinking “this would make for a wonderful photo”, and hopelessly kept grabbing for a camera that wasn’t there. Give me a camera, a long lens, and an isolated seat in the back, and I could have given you some great photos out of it. Alas, I was out of luck that night.

All in all, it was an inspirational jolt to the senses to come back to a dance production. Something I think I’ve needed. I can only do so many standard headshots and portraits before the creative juices cease to flow. I also love that fact that watching or seeing something creative makes you more inclined to go out and do something creative yourself. Inspirational. I need to go out with my camera and take some photos.