The Right Light

I was photographing a drag show at Toucan's Tiki Lounge for Metromix tonight and it was coming to the end of my time when I saw this opportunity. 

Being a lighting designer, I had a pretty good idea on how I wanted the photograph to come out.  The follow spot had followed the artist into the audience and I lined myself up so that her head hid the light source and because I didn't have much time, I dialed the camera to one of the custom settings I have set up for low light situations knowing that it would also disable the flash so that it wouldn't ruin the effect I was going for.  I made some minor post processing changes in Light Room including converting it to Grayscale, boosting the exposure, brightness, and contrast.  Since the exposure was at 1/80 sec at f/4.5, ISO 3200, I had to also use a little bit of Noise reduction.  Copyright 2010 Metromix, LLC [Credit: Anthony J. DeMeglio | IMAGES BY DeMEGLIO]