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07/17/2005 06:52:02 PM · #76 |
Alright, I've been taking a few here and there.
Here is a drunken karoke guy at a coffee shop:
Here's this band that was playing downtown, lucky for my camera in the daytime. :-)
   
I didn't bother editing them too strongly
:-) |
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07/18/2005 05:02:09 AM · #77 |
Good work guys. Anni, I really like the composition of your Dancing Queen photo, all the colour and shapes work really well.
Joey, did you still find the lighting difficult shooting during the day?
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07/18/2005 05:34:28 PM · #78 |
| thanks Flex for you comment. I found an artical..thought you all might like it Gig Photography Artical |
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07/18/2005 05:53:13 PM · #79 |
Hi guys, I'm so sorry I've not posted in a few days, I've been really busy.
I've just been celebrating this evening though, as I spoke to the UK entertainment editor of Getty Images who likes my photography, and is going to send me a contract to be a contributor! So, I have someone who will use my Womad photos, and hopefully loads more opportunities. He was pretty harsh... my photos are 'nice', but I'm being compared to some of the best photographers in the business and I have my foot in the door. He did particularly like my gig photography, but thought I didn't have enough candid photos of celebrities. He said that he would normally tell people to stop harassing him, but my photos redeemed themselves!
I spoke to the news editor of Getty a few days ago, and he really liked my stuff but wouldn't take me seriously because I was on the phone to him and not in Leeds taking photos of breaking news about the London bombers. He had a point... I'm not ready to be a 24/7 news photographer so I'm concentrating on entertainment/music.
Anyway, well done folks for getting out and about and some great photos there. I'll comment tommorow when I'm a bit more sober! I'll also try and respond to all my pms/emails tomorrow.
Take care guys,
Bob |
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07/18/2005 06:09:15 PM · #80 |
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07/18/2005 06:10:25 PM · #81 |
That's great! BIG congrats Bob!
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07/18/2005 09:52:14 PM · #82 |
wow! that's super great news Bob! Congrats. Glad u're our mentor.
here are some pix from a recent concert
 
[thumb]205978[/thumb]
Message edited by author 2005-07-18 21:53:52. |
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07/19/2005 04:18:41 AM · #83 |
Bob & the crew,
can you guys share the settings u all kused ofr your shots. Especially the low light/small venue shots.
I'm curious as to how you got such sharp shots, Bob, with a low shutter speed. I've found, in my vastly inexperienced 'career' in shooting small venues that I get a lot of blur with speeds of less than 50.
THe 2 bands that I have shot most often are hard rock & hip hop so there is a lot of fast movements that I find hard to capture without a faster speed, using mostly 60.
I really dislike the high iso tho I have used up to 800 myself. the grain is just unbearable to me. I have tried to bounce light off the ceiling/walls & I still cant manage to get a decently exposed shot.
I thin knext time I will for sure use the 50mm 1.8 & see what happens, altho I imagine I will loose a bit of sharpness bc of it.
What do you guys think? Can't wait to go out & shoot! |
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07/19/2005 04:20:26 AM · #84 |
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07/19/2005 05:56:54 AM · #85 |
Originally posted by Rooster:
Bob & the crew,
can you guys share the settings u all kused ofr your shots. Especially the low light/small venue shots.
I'm curious as to how you got such sharp shots, Bob, with a low shutter speed. I've found, in my vastly inexperienced 'career' in shooting small venues that I get a lot of blur with speeds of less than 50.
THe 2 bands that I have shot most often are hard rock & hip hop so there is a lot of fast movements that I find hard to capture without a faster speed, using mostly 60.
I really dislike the high iso tho I have used up to 800 myself. the grain is just unbearable to me. I have tried to bounce light off the ceiling/walls & I still cant manage to get a decently exposed shot.
I thin knext time I will for sure use the 50mm 1.8 & see what happens, altho I imagine I will loose a bit of sharpness bc of it.
What do you guys think? Can't wait to go out & shoot! |
Hey rooster, there are some pretty cool things I read in the artical I posted about getting the correct exposure. I think the one thing that I read that I am going to try is to spot meter on the face/skintones. This would ensure that you are getting the correct exposure on the face and not the clothes, lighting, or shadows that you might get with other meter readings..I also find the high ISO very annoying. I haven't yet tried the 1600 ISO in a venue..but from what Bob has been saying and everything that I have been reading seems 800-1600 is pretty standard, exspecialy in the places where flash is not allowed.
On my photos I took this weekend I started out with ISO 1600 but thought I would try my normal 200. Thought that I got much better results with the 200. I got some great results on 200 with 1/80 f.3.8, but again it was not a normal venue it was a big tent with no lighting but just the sun shining through different coloured panels.
i know this prob won't help you at the moment this is just the experience I have been having with exposure/ISO
xx
Anni
P.S
I am renting a 70-200 f2.8 for my big gig in aug. cost will be like £29($50). Cheaper than I thought. WOOHOO!! |
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07/19/2005 06:06:43 AM · #86 |
Congrats to you Bob. Hope you are succesful, I am sure you will be.
Anni, where are you renting the lens from (I am also in UK), always good to know these things.
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07/19/2005 06:12:43 AM · #87 |
umm it is a place up in scotland. //www.hireacamera.com/
still looking around but I think I am going to go with this place... |
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07/19/2005 06:37:25 AM · #88 |
| Okay, I'm going to reply to each post in turn during today until I'm up to date! Thanks for your patience guys! |
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07/19/2005 06:51:09 AM · #89 |
Not bad, but I'm going to address some issues that will make them even better the next time!
Onboard flash should be avoided wherever possible. In your shots, you can see the shadows caused by the flash especially around the chin/neck area. This shouts amateur. Can you afford an external flash? It doesn't have to be fancy, a cheap one from ebay will do, as long as it will use a PC sync cord which will connect to an adaptor on your hotshoe. Or one that goes on your hotshoe as long as it can swivel and bounce.
The composition is competent but unimaginative. Going in tight has worked well here, but I would like you to practice using this type of composition:
  (God, those look awful on this monitor!)
Basically, place your performer on the edge of the frame looking into it. Make it your mission to get as many shots like this as possible so you get away from the tendency to centre your subject.
Also, think about getting further away from your subject, maybe using your 75-300mm for head shots as your dof will be much more shallow which is what you want in portrait shots, the background is less distracting. Also, the flash will fallout more quickly to your background. The best shots can be where the background is completely black. I suspect that lens is your best quality lens and is the most flattering to people. |
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07/19/2005 06:57:27 AM · #90 |
Rooster, exactly the same advice to you! Your people are either bang in the middle (this is pretty much always never the best place for people in a photo) or looking OUT of the frame. Put people on the edge looking in. The photos are also really dark... did you use flash? It looks like the sort of gig where nobody would have minded flash. The lighting rig doesn't look amazing so I don't think that flash would have taken a lot of the mood out.
Hope you don't mind me being a little harsh, but I know you'll get great shots soon! |
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07/19/2005 07:02:59 AM · #91 |
Originally posted by Anni:
Well here are a few photos from the days events....
xx
AnniThe Days Events
Can't Help but think they are very noisy! Damn and I really tried too! |
Anni, I LOVE your shots. I can't fault you especially with a 2 year old in tow. The colours and compositions are just superb. Well done for finding that opportunity. The compositions are imaginatively carried out. Noise is obviously a big issue here though, have you tried NeatImage on any of them? I think this will have to be the topic of the next tutorial! |
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07/19/2005 07:38:05 AM · #92 |
A few quick comments...
all the shots have backgrounds which are way too busy, making them feel like snapshots. Sometimes this can't be helped, but I'll usually make a strong effort to move myself about, stand on things or get as close as possible to make every element in the background work for me as part of the composition instead of accidental. The impression I get in these photos is that not enough awareness was placed on composiion of the background. Especially performace4resized.jpg... a background line should never go through a person's neck, I find it's almost as bad as trees that grow from people's heads. As mentioned a few times already today, I think the compositions would work much better if the performers were really tight against the edge of the frame. I think everybody should practice this!
What would have happened if you'd tracked down the concert organiser and asked if you could quickly get on stage with the performers unobtrusively at the side?
Always ask yourself what is going to make your shots special! Why will they be better than someone else with a camera who happens to be there? |
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07/19/2005 08:07:38 AM · #93 |
yes bob I tried neat image and the noise reduction plug-in in photoshop. I can't get things quite right. With gig photography I know that most publications want nice crisp photos with the exceptions of a few rock publications that like slow sync flash and what not (sure you will get into all that)and with neat image and noise reduction all I get is images that look more than soft focus. I think that my mistake in most of these was I pushed the ISO too high..I did get some good shots at 200 like I mentioned to rooster, they were good but maybe a bit too much shadow. Think I could have hung around ISO 600-800 and that would have been best.
CAN NOT WAIT FOR THE NEXT TUTORIAL!!! noise is my biggest enemy
Good part about it all is that I am learning so I won't kick myself too hard.
Well Done to everyone else that has been out happy snappy!
Message edited by author 2005-07-19 08:12:01. |
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07/19/2005 09:27:03 AM · #94 |
Hi Rooster,
similar critique to before. I would have been tempted here to use your 200mm F2.8, it's hard to tell but I think there was some decent lighting here that you needed to make more of. Did you use flash? I can see some pretty strong shadows cast by a light source very near you. Either bounce the light or try some diffusers (I've not had any experience with these myself, but many pros use them). And let in loads more ambient light. The compositions in general need to be much more striking, at the moment they're a little too 'snapshot'.
I REALLY like your portrait shots of them though. |
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07/19/2005 09:54:22 AM · #95 |
Originally posted by Anni:
thanks Flex for you comment. I found an artical..thought you all might like it Gig Photography Artical |
Ah, I was going to save that article for another time! It seems to be the essential reading for those into gig photography on the net.
I agree with some points, disagree with others.
Part one is here: //photo.net/concerts/mirarchi/concer_1.htm
Here is a list of things I agree with:
. Give yourself some time to get established. Work with local papers. Hone your craft in local small venues.
. Get the Road Manager's name. I was cleared for a pass to shoot Judas Priest recently. The PR manager arranged it with the band manager. I got to the gig, the road manager had not been told and refused to give me a pass. If I'd had his name and mobile number in advance, I could have diffused this.
. Don't block any one person's view for too long, and you should be fine. I absolutely agree. I'm a nice guy!
. Buy a 70-200/2.8 or equivalent. Yep, I'm going to have to buy one myself in the next couple of weeks if I'm shooting for Getty at Womad! Sigma should be fine and not quite as bank breaking as Minolta/Nikon/Canon although it's nowhere near as sharp at 2.8.
. 1/125 does the trick most of the time. Totally agree. I made the mistake of shooting a gig once at mostly 1/90s. Ouch. I was lucky to have some useable images and I'm still kicking myself over that one as the photos were great apart from the slight blur. It was the one with Elton John and Lulu.
Here is a list of things I disagree with:
. What's the least amount of gear I can get away with? Unless you're professional, you can get away with whatever you have. In fact, the less you have, the more inventive you have to become which is a good thing! For many months, I only shot gigs with a 50mm 1.8 and a 75-300 f4.5-f5.5. For many months before that, I used a Panasonic FZ10.
. Spot metering. I used spot metering for quite a while, but now prefer to use completely manual. I'm pretty good at spotting lighting changes or movements from one part of the stage to the other and change the shutter speeds intuitively. It takes some time and experience to get to this stage, so use spot metering in the meantime! It was actually wildly flashing lights that caused me to go manual, metering is just not quick enough in rapidly flashing lights and I found it easier to estimate the average brightness that would give me the most amount of accurate exposures. Use spot metering in the meantime though! |
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07/19/2005 10:02:39 AM · #96 |
Originally posted by Rooster:
Bob & the crew,
can you guys share the settings u all kused ofr your shots. Especially the low light/small venue shots.
I'm curious as to how you got such sharp shots, Bob, with a low shutter speed. I've found, in my vastly inexperienced 'career' in shooting small venues that I get a lot of blur with speeds of less than 50.
THe 2 bands that I have shot most often are hard rock & hip hop so there is a lot of fast movements that I find hard to capture without a faster speed, using mostly 60.
I really dislike the high iso tho I have used up to 800 myself. the grain is just unbearable to me. I have tried to bounce light off the ceiling/walls & I still cant manage to get a decently exposed shot.
I thin knext time I will for sure use the 50mm 1.8 & see what happens, altho I imagine I will loose a bit of sharpness bc of it.
What do you guys think? Can't wait to go out & shoot! |
As I said in the last post, 1/125s is the minimum to use without flash. With flash, you can use anything you want! Obviously as the shutter speeds get longer, you'll start getting some motion trails so it's up to you to experiment and see what works for you. I find shutter speeds down to 1/30s work great with flash without becoming too blurry... the flash does a great job of freezing the action and the 1/30s with a reasonably high ISO lets the ambient lighting through. You'll need faster shutter speeds with flash though if you're at a 200-300mm focal length though.
I regularly shoot gigs with my 50mm F1.8, and they are very sharp. Just make sure you always focus on the eyes. Sometimes, if I have a very lively performer I place my camera on the auto-focus mode where it keeps track of a moving subject and change the auto-focus point from central to one on the edge. I then keep that point on the performer's eyes. If you use flash, you can close the aperture a bit and a 50mm lens is usually pretty good quality, especially for the price.
Again, we'll look at noise and NeatImage soon! |
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07/19/2005 10:07:25 AM · #97 |
Originally posted by Anni:
umm it is a place up in scotland. //www.hireacamera.com/
still looking around but I think I am going to go with this place... |
Looks great! Wish they had Minolta lenses :-(
Make sure you're insured for it when you get it! |
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07/19/2005 10:25:16 AM · #98 |
| oh I am not very happy at the moment...was checkin availability ofthe lens and I have to have 2 forms of ID to send and my frigg'n scanner is broken! just my luck that no on hires out lenses locally. Looks like I am going to be stuck with the 70-300 f4. Hey bob any way I can make this lens work. |
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07/19/2005 10:32:10 AM · #99 |
The 75-300mm lens works pretty well on my camera, but then the noise levels are much lower at ISO1600, and even ISO3200 is pretty useable.
You may just have to take photos which are high in noise.
You do have a camera though, why don't you just take a photo of your ID? |
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07/19/2005 11:22:14 AM · #100 |
| never thought about that..I will see if that will work. |
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