Fire Groove and special guest Anah Reichenback of Hoopaliscious rocked a mesmerizing and comedic fire show at GUSH on Saturday night at the Ford Amphitheater in Hollywood. Check out the review in the LA Times! "And the flames became even hotter in "Firemageddon," with Hannah Mooney, Kamala Mathis, Anah Reichenback and Jade Mangiafico manipulating burning hoops, batons and poles around the central performer, a supercool Lester Mooney."

Fans are one of the safest yet most graceful forms of fire
dancing. They allow the freedom to incorporate many different styles of dance and creative expression into a performance. Styles range from simple and sensual to a more complex martial arts technique. They are absolutely mesmerizing to watch and so much fun to perform with. This workshop will cover movement, dance, flow, performance, choreography and fire safety. It will end with a lighting-up ceremony where each individual will have the opportunity to explore dancing with fire in a safe setting.

Dancing with fire has many benefits! It will help you feel more balanced, clear, confident, focused and connected. If you are new to fire dancing, fans are a wonderful way to start. If you've been dancing for many years, fans will provide a useful and fun new toy to your arsenal.

This workshop will be scheduled in early October. If you are interested, shoot us an e-mail. More details will be posted on the website soon!

The natural law of energy states that when you give, you receive. There are few things in life that feel better than to give without expectation. Thank you to all of the people who supported Yoga for a Cause here in Los Angeles and in Oregon. We ended up raising $1,000 for Katrina Mangiafico and a priceless amount of healing, positive energy. She is now doing much better. She is out of the hospital and just returned from Earth Dance. We would expect no less from this amazing woman!

If you missed our Yoga for a Cause classes, you can still donate!

Dan Gordon-Levitt a.k.a Burning Dan is one of the rare photographers that has the ability to capture the beauty of fire and the dancer in a still image. Could it have something to do with his warm and wild fiery energy? I think so. Dancers, performers, actors, life livers... if you want to capture the essence of a moment, book a photoshoot with Dan now!

FireGroove: How long have you been fire dancing?
Dan: 5 years this week.

FG: Would you say that fire dancing has changed your life? How?
D: Most definitely. The biggest way was in helping me believe that the idea of "Other kinds of people" who do the outlandish things is a complete myth and there's nothing that I can't or shan't do (time travel and playing shortstop for the Dodgers next year notwithstanding). That notion and the actual practice itself both helped bolster my confidence and quixaudacity. Fire dancing has been a big part of the impetus of a lot of the traveling I've done and the intro to a lot of my favoritest people. Had I never picked up the poi in center camp in '02, I'd have a completely different lifescape than the beautiful life I live and love.

In spinning, I've also found the most effective meditation I've ever found. It took me a good long while of spinning before I clicked into it. It can be done/spun in such a way as to make it an excellent physical mantra. Synched with the breathing and focus and repetition all jedi zen-like.

FG: You are also a fire dance photographer. What intrigues you about taking pictures of fire?
D: I like taking pictures of people deeply ensconced in something intense. like, say, arduously dancing while surrounded by fire. I like photography tricks of light and timing... like when you take a picture of a fire dancer with a flash and a long exposure, you can freeze the motion of the dancer and then have the long trails with which we've all become so familiar. It amuses me as a mixture of time moving and time stopped in a moment.

I like finding the patterns in the dancer's spin and making shapes of fire in the photo I like the necessity of staying on your toes as the light produced by the fire is changing throughout the spin and requires nearish constant adjustment of camera settings to have the fire be bright vibrant textured yellowrange instead of blank white. I also like pretty pretty things.

FG: Do you have any fire photography advice you could give amateurs?
D: If your equipment will do it, take pictures with flash (or don't if you prefer that look, but don't think that flash isn't an option). To make one cool picture of a fire dancer, I use a sequence about like this...

1. Start taking pictures with no flash. Trying to make the fire look how you want it.

2. The F stop, not the shutter speed or flash, is what affects the texture and color of the fire. I usually start around F11 at ASA 100 and adjust from there.

3. Once the fire looks the color, brightness and texture that you want (remember the part about keeping on toes and that that will change after a few seconds), then I look at how the spinner is spinning and decide on the shutter speed to determine how long the fire trails are. I usually start at half a second and adjust from there.

4. With settings like that, the fire will look beautiful, but the dancer will be almost invisible. Once you have the fire looking how you want it and the dancer nearly invisible, then add the flash to illuminate the dancer in frozen motion.

Tips - a tripod hardly matters for that technique of photo. Try it. Instead of pre-setting the shutter speed, try the Bulb setting and judge the trail length yourself. Shoot digitally, shoot a lot - I adjust the aperture SO MUCH during a single spin and it'd take SOOO much practice to eyeball and judge the amount of light coming from the fire that I view it as not practical to shoot it with film.

Photos by Dan Gordon-Levitt
www.burningdan.net