Concert Photography - What I learned on My First Try

It was 9:30am on a Wednesday when my plane lurched into the air.  I had two hours of uninterrupted time to think.  The flight from Charlotte to Toronto always surprises me with it's brevity.  OK, time to get down to business.  How the heck am I going to shoot concert photos.  What are my shooting conditions going to be like?

And so that's how my day started, on May the 23rd, as I made my way to see the big CD Release Party for the Year of the Monkey 68 project that my friend Ron had been working on for two years.   I just couldn't miss this party.  Plus, heck, I really wanted to try my hand at shooting concert photos.  Since I was "with the band," I knew this was going to give me a rare opportunity to get right up to the stage and do whatever the heck I wanted. 

As the clouds passed by underneath, I put together a list of challenges that I would have to deal with:

• low-light shooting conditions
• extreme backlighting
• ever-changing lighting conditions
• ever-changing light color
• unpredictable subject movement
• inability to see exposure settings well with crowd and lighting issues
• lack of time to think much about exposure issues after the concert starts

Hmm, this is definitely not an environment I had any experience with.   I was going to have to learn quickly.  It dawned on me that my best chance at getting good photos was to allow myself to be free of exposure concerns and just spend my time finding the best compositions.  To do this meant that I had to automate the exposure as much as possible.  After careful consideration, here were my decisions:

• Set the ISO to 1600.  The 5D has amazing low-light quality and this was one instance where I was going to need it.  To capture a moving subject, I needed a higher shutter speed to avoid motion blur.   A high ISO was my only option.
  
• Set the metering mode to "center-weighted".  This is a great metering mode for backlit subjects.
• Leave the 24-105mm lens in the bag and shoot the whole concert with the 85mm f1.2 lens --  I decided that I wanted to separate the individuals I was shooting from the background on a small stage, and only the way to do this was with the shallow depth-of-field offered by the 85mm lens.  It would also make things simple for me as far as composition, because I would have only one focal length, I would have to move myself around to change the look of the images.  Since I had free reign to do so, I decided this was a good option.
• Set the exposure dial to Aperture Priority mode and try to keep the aperture around f2.2-f3.5.  This will give me sufficient depth of field and terrific sharpness, while softly blurring the background.
• Set the shooting mode to "continuous" so that I could rapid fire images when I needed to. 
• Remove the UV filter.  With all of these lights coming from all these angles, the UV filter would definitely cause a flare or ghosting problem. 
• Put all the extra CF cards and batteries in my jeans pockets, so that I wouldn't have to lug my bag around with me or miss a critical moment because I had to chase down my camera bag and make these changes. 

As my plane touched down in Toronto, I was feeling pretty confident about shooting at the concert that night.  I'd pretty much left myself only a couple of issues that would have to be dealt with on the spot.  These were:

• white balance
• exposure compensation

Well, luck was shining on me this day.  After spending 40 minutes in an alley shooting some portrait photos, I hung out in the club and listened to the band doing their sound check.  The lucky part was that the lighting guys were also doing their thing, so I had a full 30 minute practice session with my camera.  I shot photos of the singers under the same type of lighting conditions I would see later that evening.  This practice was helpful in a number of ways.

First, it confirmed that I would definitely need 1600 ISO to get the shutter speeds I wanted at the f.2.2-f3.5 settings I was after.  Second, I realized (yet again) that nothing looks more beautiful than a portrait style photo with the 85mm lens.  Third, I was amazed at just how well the center-weighted metering handled the backlight.  It wasn't perfect, but was easily corrected with EV adjustments.   Fourth, I realized that the many colored lights were going to make accurate white balance an impossibility.

Lucky for me, there was a 4-camera video crew at the show setting up to create a DVD of the event.  Knowing how friendly Canadians tend to be, I just wandered right over and asked them in my ignorant southern drawl "do y'all have to set white balance for these cameras?"  Minutes later, I had one of them holding up a huge white card blasted with rays from a big tungsten concert light they had brought with them for just this purpose.  Problem solved.  My white balance was set for the evening.  Thank you video crew.

Now I only had two things to think about while shooting.  Composition and EV compensation.  Heck, it's time for a beer, I can do those things with one hand tied behind my back.

So, after a few beers, here's how it all went down.  I wandered from the balcony to right in front of the stage to get multiple angles of each singer as they performed.  I would adjust the EV up or down based on skin color/outfit to make sure the center-weighted metering was accurate.  Other than that, I wasn't having to think much at all about exposure settings.  I spent all of my time thinking about where to take the shots from.  I wanted to isolate the singers as much as possible, but not always.  I came away with a handful of shots that I am happy with.  Here are a couple, with the settings included.   (click on images for full-sized version)

1/250 sec, f3.5, -1/3EV

1/400 sec, f3.2, +-0EV

1/320 sec, f4.0, -2EV

1/125sec, f2.8, -1EV

1/320, f3.5, -1EV

1/160, f2.2, -1 2/3EV

Some of the things I learned from this outing that I would do differently:

• I would include more shots with a crowd in the foreground
• I would try to get more shots of the band members individually
• I would make sure to get multiple angles of every singer and band member

To see more from this photo shoot, you can visit my gallery HERE.  To hear some of the music from the CD visit the Year of the Monkey My Space Site.  To BUY the CD (complete with my photos on the front & back cover!) visit the Official YOTM Site. 

Comments

[Craig Persel]

My gosh ... you really nailed those shots. Technically superb and very well composed. Bravo.

[Eckhart Derschmidt]

You did a great job - these are some excellent concert shots. As for pop concerts, you have a good chance of having good lighting (being able to shoot with exposure times of about 1/400 at ISO 1600 is just perfect), which is most often not available in smaller clubs. In the jazz club where I often take some pictures, 1/60 at ISO 2000 is all you can get (at the best, often it is not more than 1/15) (well, fortunately jazz musicians usually do not move that much). Sometimes it is just not possible to get a good shot just because there is hardly any light available. Usually, I take a few shots and then set the camera to manual mode with an exposure/aperture that will produce good results. Exposure compensation is set to -0.7EV or -1EV depending on the light conditions. Shooting mode is set to continuous, which increases the chance to get sharp images (most the time it is not possible to use a tripod). A very specific problem of shooting in a small club is that the noise of the shutter can be a problem when the music is rather quiet. I pay attention not to disturb the other guests (and also the musicians) with excessive shooting, but not all photographers do. So when there are more people with DSLRs present at the concert, I normally only take a few shots. After all, its the music that is most important and not the pics made from the concert....

[Stu Egan]

I think they're great and perhaps the two things that struck me most were firstly the fact that you reaped the rewards from the preparation and thought beforehand (I think of photography as being reactive to what I see rather than being proactive and planning ahead, if that makes sense; perhaps I should change my outlook from time to time), and secondly the colour in the images is so good.

Is it fair to say that at some stage (possibly after the beer?!) your attitude to potential problems you flagged up - extreme backlighting, ever-changing lighting conditions and ever-changing light color - altered? Because it looks to me that you realised at some point they were things that wouldn't hold you back in terms of taking good photos but things you could use to your advantage in order to make the photos interesting.

Anyway - very interesting (and I've long described myself as technically-ignorant in photography and also generally zone out when faced by such admittedly-important stuff) and enjoyed the photos.

[Jeff Seltzer]

These are great! It's nice to see how you sucessfully participated in several components of this project - from CD art, portrait, events, and concert! That's really great! I think the concert shots are nicely done and technically well executed - the colors really pop. Perhpas next time you could explore some alternative techniques, e.g., motion blur, panning, or somethinge else to put your unique signature on the images, if you know what I mean?

[Chuck]

Not sure how I missed these comments up until now. I guess I'm not a expert blogger. Thanks all for your input, comments on this post. Eckhart makes some good points to consider for this type of photography. Be sure to read his comment.

Chuck

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Imagine my surprise when I woke up this morning and saw a photo posted in my Pbase PAD gallery. I must not be dead, just on hiatus. Oh well, back to blogging about photography. Next up...feedback from a pro.

[Tory Burch]

Imagine my surprise when I woke up this morning and saw a photo posted in my Pbase PAD gallery. I must not be dead, just on hiatus. Oh well, back to blogging about photography. Next up...feedback from a pro.

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I woke up this morning and saw a photo posted in my Pbase PAD gallery. I must not be dead, just on hiatus. Oh well, back to blogging about photography.

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