Gig Photography - Technicalities

In my last post about the explosion of gig photography in the last few years, I gave my list of ways to avoid being hated by the rest of the audience. An important skill, I'm sure you'll agree.

This time, I'll go through some ways that I like to ensure that the pictures I take come out well and don't look like rubbish. I'll also give a brief overview of my gig photo gear, and why I like it.

There are a few common problems with gig photos. Each of them has a solution, but most people just let the camera pick the settings and hope for the best. At some gigs this can work really well, because the lights are bright, and consistently so. But at many gigs this simply doesn't work at all. The list of common problems, as I see them, is as follows:

1. Underexposure - The pictures are too dark
2. Slow shutter - The band is blurry due to moving around too much
3. Position and zoom - The band is tiny
4. Rapidly changing lighting - Shots are unpredictable

1. Underexposure

This would be Anvil, if you
could see them ...

Underexposure is a common problem in live music venues. The house lights are off, the stage lights are unpredictable, and the camera's built in metering just can't cope with it. There are a few ways to deal with it.

Before I go on, and referring back to my previous post, I'd just like to point out that using flash is *not* a solution. It's annoying, and it usually won't work unless you're right at the front. And if you are, you risk annoying the band.

With that off my chest, here are a few ideas. First off, raise the ISO. I referred to this in my last post, too. It really does work. Pushing it up from ISO 800 (usually the highest a compact camera will go to automatically) to ISO 1600 will double the brightness of the pictures. Even when I use my dSLR with a fast lens I use ISO 1600 because it allows me more control, and gives some leeway.

Secondly, try boosting the exposure compensation. Even the £15 Praktica compact I have for a laugh can do this. Most cameras let you increase or decrease exposure by up to 2 "stops". This means up to 4x brighter than the camera thinks it should be. I can definitely help, although it might cause the shutter speed to slow down. This might lead to blurring due to movement.

2. Slow shutter

Purified In Blood? More
like Purified In Blur.

Slow shutter speeds will cause the movements of people on stage to blur, often turning otherwise clear features to mush. This can result in pictures that, while properly exposed and bright, are indecipherable.

The best way to combat this is by using a high ISO, as mentioned before. Once that's set, you may still be at the whim of your camera if you're still using automatic mode. Switch it, instead, to S (shutter priority) or Tv (time value) mode. This lets you specifically set how long the shutter can stay open, and the camera has to honour that setting. But how long is long enough?

• 1/30th of a second is good for "dramatic pose" moments, and may be the fastest you can manage with slow lenses. More than a tiny amount of movement would be badly blurred.
• 1/60th of a second is the lowest shutter speed that can be safely hand-held without introducing blurring due to shaking hands. You would get more clear shots of the band at this speed and is a little more forgiving.
• 1/125th of a second is what I usually use, because it's quick enough to get a clear shot, but gives some slight blur for very fast movement so it doesn't look like the band has been somehow frozen in mid-air. On slower compact cameras, this might result in images that are too dark because it can't compensate with a wider aperture.
• 1/250th of a second should allow you to get freeze-frame moments with no blurring at all, but you'll need a very fast lens and very bright lights to get this.

3. Position and zoom

Lacuna Coil look very tiny.

There's nothing worse than getting what looks like an epic shot of the whole stage, only to look at it later and realise the band are 8 pixels tall and completely unrecognisable. Getting close is a basic rule of photography, and settling for a huge picture with a tiny person in the middle is hardly worth bothering with. Fortunately there are two main ways to deal with it.

First, you could buy a camera with a good zoom on it. Consumer level cameras with 15x or even 30x zoom at the high end are available, if you have the cash to splash. Although by the time you're spending enough to get 30x zoom you might as well buy a dSLR. But a good zoom, especially one with image stabilisation and a fast lens, is the best way to get the picture you want if you're stuck way at the back.

But what if you're not stuck way at the back, but can actually get closer? That's the second tip. Get closer. Get close enough to fill the frame with the picture you want, instead of settling for tiny images. Get right to the front if you can, although the official photographers, moshers and other people might not like it. Refer to the previous post about keeping out of the way.

4. Rapidly changing lighting

Delain are hidden behind that
unfortunately timed strobe.

This is a repeat of a suggestion I made in my last post. Rapidly changing lighting might mean that what looks great on your little screen turns out rubbish because that vital spotlight goes off just at the wrong moment, or comes on and makes everything go white. That's the nature of the beast, and you have to live with it.

Continuous shooting is the answer. In difficult lighting conditions like those, I use 3 shot continuous shooting, because the chances are that one of them will come good. I don't tend to bother reviewing the pictures in situ, because even a slightly off picture can turn out awesome, and I can generally tell if something went badly wrong and take another.

That concludes my technical tips on getting the most of out whatever camera you take along. With a little practice, good pictures should be easier, and you won't have to spend half the gig staring at the back of the camera instead of at the band.

My cameras of choice

Anathema playing O2 Academy, Sheffield
Canon EOS500D with EF 50mm f/1.8

I have two cameras I use for gig photography. The first, my dSLR, is a Canon EOS500D. A lovely camera, to be sure. Consumer level digital SLR, usually with a 50mm f/1.8 lens stuck to the front of it. No zoom, but I have feet so I can walk. I also have a 28-135mm zoom lens, but it's bloody massive so no good for the "discrete" aspect of gigs.

Unfortunately, I'm frequently banned from taking that camera to gigs. Lots of copyright laws, over-active litigation lawyers and jumpy doormen have resulted in my being escorted off the premises. Not great fun, I have to say. This is apparently because it's deemed to be a "professional" camera because the lenses come off. Be warned.

Delain playing Manchester Academy.
Fuji Finepix S5700.

Instead, I take my Fuji Finepix S5700. It's a compact, 7 megapixel consumer camera, but looks for all the world like a tiny dSLR. It's a great gig camera for many reasons. I upgraded to it from the Finepix S5100, which is also amazing if you can but find one. Some of the reasons the S5700 is so good are:

• 10x zoom, so you can get close to the action even if you're right at the back.
• Electronic viewfinder, so you can do literally everything (including accessing menus and reviewing photos) without ever turning the rear screen on.
• f/3.5 constant aperture across the zoom range. Not the fastest (the S5100 opens to f/2.8 at its widest zoom), but most zooms (even the 28-135mm on my dSLR) get slower the closer you zoom. Not this one. I've never known a compact with this feature before, and it's a lifesaver. dSLR lenses that do this can run into the hundreds (if not thousands) of pounds.
• Great ISO 1600 performance. Still noisy compared to your even low-end dSLRs, but compared to pocket-sized cameras it's still more than acceptable. And once they pictures are scaled down to internet sizes it's all but invisible.
• Full manual control, with Aperture and Shutter priority modes if you want them.
• Takes AA batteries. Never worry about the battery pack running out; just carry a 4 pack of AAs in your pocket.
• Several continuous shooting modes, including exposure bracketing, top 3, bottom 3 and full continuous shooting.
• No shutter lag. You press the button, it takes the picture. Most compact cameras have a noticeable delay between pressing the button and anything actually happening, resulting in perfectly timed shots being ruined because the subject has moved by the time the camera responds.

Quite a decent list of features. And to top it off, they can be had from eBay for about £50. The flash is a little unreliable (mine is completely broken) but for gigs that really doesn't matter. Note that I did try to "upgrade" to the apparently superior Finepix S1600. It has 15x zoom and 50% more megapixels. It's also rubbish, with a shutter lag so bad (> 0.5 second) that by the time it actually takes the picture, chances are the subject is long gone. Stick with the S5xxx range.

That pretty much tops off my list of "gig photography tips". I hope some are useful and result in some good pictures that don't ruin the whole gig experience.