What do I use for a concert ?

Hello !

I'm invited as photographer to a concert in Brussels during November. I was wondering on equipement to take.
I'm going to take my Minolta X500. I have 28, 35, 50 and 135mm. Sure, I'll take the 50mm f1.4. I thought f3.5 (135mm) isn't really luminous... Do you recommend to take it or find the version who open at f2.8 ? Maybe find a 85mm ?

But the bulk of my question is based on processing : someone said Hp5+@800iso in Xtol 1+1 17 min. I'll maybe find a second Minolta camera to use 1600 iso. What film do you advise ?

Thank you !

What kind of concert, how loud will the music and ambient noise be, what ambient light do you expect (overall amount of light and contrast), and what will be your working distance.... and will you be permitted a tripod or monopod....

You'll get totally different answers for a classical concert than you'd get for, say, a rock concert.

Have you any idea what the actual lighting will be like? That's the crux of the matter in shooting performances as the light level will vary wildly between different venues and shows and frequently can plummet into nothingness. If at all possible, get into the venue before you need to shoot so you can get some readings and feeling for the light.

My general experience with event photography is that f2.8 is just a starting point and ISO 800 wildly optimistic for anything indoors that includes movement.

Ok, it's a disco concert, so much light, and much contrasts. I saw a video from the group, it's a lot of colours in the light. A lot of contrasts and light.
I can take a tripod, but I prefer take a monopod, beter to move, and I can go on the scene.

XP-2 push processed in C41 chemistry shoot at 800 or 1600 EI, very good sharpness, tonality and grain.

You need to shoot far more film than you'd assume lighting switches as you shoot. I'm usually lucky as I often know the lighting engineers and we talk before a concert or specific band and plan certain parts.

No tripod, no flash, hand hold wide open, get in close USE EAR PLUGS (cotton wool works fine) a 135 maybe a little long, I used a 70-210 f2.8 Vivitar S1 usually at between 70 and about 105 mm. If you can beg, borrow or steal a fast zoom that's by far the best option.

Ian

I'll see with them, but I don't believe that they do another concert before november, so I'll can't test any films. If I show you a video, can you say me aproximative waht process ?

PS : but I'll try the films than I'll choice, but it will not be in a concert conditions.

analogic.man said:

I'll see with them, but I don't believe that they do another concert before november, so I'll can't test any films. If I show you a video, can you say me aproximative waht process ?

Click to expand...

I probably could. When I shoot concerts it's often 3/4 per week, and I also shoot HDV, but I burnt out am semi retired . Well that's my excuse

The truth is I'm lazy, I was the ONLY photographer (with a half decent camera) at the Wonder Stuff's first ever Stourbridge Concert 2 years ago and no one else has seen the images . . . . . and they are OK

Ian

Ok, this is their Myspace page. It's some videos, I think...
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=335053951

If it's a small club, I'd take the 28, 50, and maybe 85. Larger venue where you don't have front of stage access, or a massive stage, you might want the longer lenses. I've found the larger the stage/venue, the more consistent and stronger the lighting is.

As far as film, when I was shooting more concerts, I took a bunch of Tri-X and a bunch of TMAX 3200. The Tri-X I shot at 400 (once) and 1250 in Diafine. At really dark shows, I used the TMAX at 1600 or 3200 if need be and developed in XTOL. At the smaller clubs I was shooting, I shot a lot wide open, and relied on the TMAX quite a bit.

Ian Grant said:

USE EAR PLUGS (cotton wool works fine)

Click to expand...

Cotton wool does work to reduce sound pressure levels but if you like the band and want to hear them properly but at reduced level, get a set of ER 20 ear plugs.


Steve (part time live sound engineer!).

I've been playing about with Tri-X rated at 1600 ISO developed in XTOL 1:1 as suggested by Tony Egan lately. I'm really pleased with the results. In HC-110 the highlights were too hot. Like Ian said, handheld wide open. Here's a shot I took of Kelly Joe Phelps at a local club lately. There's a bit of banding from the scanner so ignore that.

I shot at a couple of concerts (pop,rock). The first time i was very close to the band.
Last time (eleven days ago) i was very far.
If you send a blank email to fausto.testa@tiscali.it i'll send you a couple of pictures with the two differenct conditions.
Ciao

You could do worse than look at http://liveon35mm.wordpress.com/ - there are a number of tips throughout the site, and some good pictures/text too...

Specifically (in this instance) Here's the "tips from the pit"

Jarvman said:

I've been playing about with Tri-X rated at 1600 ISO developed in XTOL 1:1 as suggested by Tony Egan lately. I'm really pleased with the results. In HC-110 the highlights were too hot. Like Ian said, handheld wide open. Here's a shot I took of Kelly Joe Phelps at a local club lately. There's a bit of banding from the scanner so ignore that.

Click to expand...

I really like the result. How much time in the Xtol ?

It was 13 mins 25 seconds, courtesy of the massive dev chart. Thats a great link namke. Cheers!

Photography at any Concert is at the mercy of the lighting engineer. The support acts get poor sound & poor lighting, I've been there from all angles, including as head of a Record label.

Somewhere in the mix I wrote then lost my reply. Back in the 70's I began shooting Rock bands while at University for the UK NUS (National Union of Sudents) newspaper, and have been very active ever since although I semi-retired from around 1987/8 for around 10+ years.

Then I started again, same people, different bands & new talent I worked for & ran a record company, (long story) then went back to being myself.

But essentially for over 30 years I work with the many of same people.

30 years ago many small clubs/venues had NO lighting they relied onn the bands to take their own, and as a photographer you suffered with these bands, itb was the venues faults but the bands suffered.

Here's what happens when you process & uprate XP-1 @ 1600 EI in C41 chemistry, remarkable things happen with the colours



Vana, the vocalist, was close to Vangelis, she was the female vocalist on the Aphrodite's Child recordings, and later Vangelis albums, 30+ years later we are still friends

I've grabbed this image from Vana's own site, it's one of my scrap prints !!!!! (my copyright but she's scanned it) but it shows you how bad the lighting was in this particular club,


However even in apoor club you can get good images if the musicians work what lights are available.

This is the same club again XP1 @ 1600 EI.



This one is 10 years later with XP2/C41 & up-ratinmg to 1600 EI, there's no more grain in the actual prints this it's from the scan/resize



Here's the colour versions on Fuji push process 1600 E6 film. All images Spotmatic F or S1a.



or



All these were shot at small venues. move to a better venue with good lighting and it's a totally different ball game

Ian

Ian Grant said:

Photography at any Concert is at the mercy of the lighting engineer. The support acts get poor sound & poor lighting

Click to expand...

Not when I'm doing it. In my opinion, if a support act I am engineering for gets a bad sound, that is a reflection of my abilities.

When I am working for a sound company, every act gets the same treatment. There is no point purposefully giving a support act a bad sound and I would not do it. And I don't know any who would.

Also, the sound engineer (and the lighting) is there for primarily for the benefit of the audience and then for the band.


Steve.

Steve Smith said:

Not when I'm doing it. In my opinion, if a support act I am engineering for gets a bad sound, that is a reflection of my abilities.

When I am working for a sound company, every act gets the same treatment. There is no point purposefully giving a support act a bad sound and I would not do it. And I don't know any who would.

Also, the sound engineer (and the lighting) is there for primarily for the benefit of the audience and then for the band.

Steve.

Click to expand...

Often when a well known band plays a venue it's their engineers who handle the sound & lighting, and the local support act gets minimal attention.

But when it's a venues regular engineers then it can be quite different, although usually y engineer's put more effort into the headline band.

Ian

The usual situation is that a system is put in by a sound company and supplied with FOH and monitor engineers (if it's a big enough venue). The sound company's engineers will be prepared to engineer every band but if a band brings its own engineer, he will usually do that band's engineering.

It is not common practice for the headline band's engineer to also do the support band's sound.

I suppose for smaller venues it may be the case that the band has it's own system and engineer but typically for anything upwards of small theatre size venues, the sound will be sub-contracted out to a local company.

Note that I did say "not when I'm doing it" in my original reply. I am well aware that there are some terrible sound engineers in the business who should not be working. Generally though, they seem to show their incompetence just as much with the main band as they do with the support acts. These engineers are easy to find. They are the ones who think it is more important to show off the capabilities of their system by making the bass drum sound flap your clothing around than to actually give a good sound.

Most importantly, the contract is between the sound company and the promoter, not the band and the sound company works with the promoter to provide the best service they can to their ultimate customer - the audience.


Steve.

Oh, and I forgot to mention my own experience in this area - my flickr photostream has various shots; DJ shots usually taken with Delta 3200, no flash (fixed 1/60, f2 or above). Sometimes I've used slower film (including 100ASA slide film... but then I used a low-power flash too!)

Am I missing something here?

My film cameras do not capture the sound!

Please advise!

Steve

Sirius Glass said:

Am I missing something here?

My film cameras do not capture the sound!

Please advise!

Steve

Click to expand...

I was referring to lighting engineers, one venue I've used frequently, sometimes "name" bands bring their own engineers lighting & sound.

If a band thinks the sound's bad and they can't hear themselves through the fold-back they don't tend to perform as well That impacts on potential images.

Ian