One of my ideas for interesting shots of some performers was to use what I dubbed the "Groucho stick" - which consisted of my aluminum Bogen monopod expended all the way, the ball head firmly cinched down, and my extra-long homemade remote shutter release. I'd point the camera in the general direction of what I wanted, tighten the ball head, raise the monopod over my head (we're talking a possible height of 12' or so here, higher if I hold it above my head), and use the remote shutter release to take the pictures.
In actual use, I fear that I suffered from that old photography bugaboo, Dorkus Paranoiaus. I tell you, few things make you self-conscious like holding a big monopod up in the air. I do think that the idea has merit, but I need to work on my resistance to feeling self-conscious. In all, I was left with only one photo that made my online gallery. In this case, I was using my Zenitar 16mm, with the idea that the wide focal length would make it easy to get whatever I was shooting in frame, and the huge focus range would make focusing a non-issue. The problem is that it ended up making the subjects too small in the frame. Next time, I think I'll go with another lens and shoot multiple shots and hope for the best.
My favorite street performer shots ended up being from Epcot, just using my 50-200mm to get relatively close to the performer's faces, rather than just longer full-body shots that often aren't as interesting. This is "Romeo & Edna" IIRC.
Oh, I can't forget this CM, not so much a street performer but I'm very happy with the shot, taken as he was warming up the crowd before SpectroMagic. This was definitely a fast-lens only situation as it's very dark - this was ISO 1600, F1.7, 1/90th second.
). Here's a shot I got of Dorma Nesmond acting her heart out at the Disney/MGM Studios:
