Soft @ the Blender Theatre — 2007.11.16

Opening in support of VHS or Beta and Moving Units, Brooklyn-based Soft brought a mix of Britpop-inspired tunes that drew heavily from their 2007 release, Gone Faded. Flirting with shoegaze aesthetics in layers of swirling guitars, singer Johnny Reineck’s codeine vocals made a smooth start to the night, loosening up the audience for the dance party to come.

Shooting Notes:

With no pit at the Blender Theatre, I staked out a spot just house right of the mic stand and center monitors, which put me in prime position for photographing singer Johnny Reineck and bassist Dino Siampos.

While Reineck was a relatively static subject, with both hands fixed on the mic throughout the set, Siampos was a much more frenetic target in his space on stage, wheeling his instrument around and seeming to enjoy playing in one of the city’s finer venues.

Lighting:

Compared to the later sets by Moving Units and VHS or Beta, the house lighting for Soft was relatively simple, with warm frontlighting on Reineck throughout the set, and a fair amount of hot white backlighting mixed with blue and red washes from the back of the stage.

If anything, the abundant backlighting provided a challenge for flare and metering, especially in the instances of the bright white light blaring from the back of the stage.

Lenses:

Due to the relatively abundant light, I shot with the Nikon 17-55mm f/2.8 at maximum aperture for Soft’s entire set, and the range of the zoom left very little to be desired.

Exposure:

The f/2.8 aperture of the zoom was perfectly adequate for the light and I shot at shutter speeds between 1/80 and 1/160 at ISO 1600.

About the author: Todd Owyoung is an internationally published music photographer specializing in concert photography and band portraits. He also grills a mean steak.

Contact Todd for image licensing and assignments wherever the rock show lives. You can also get in touch with Todd via Twitter.

This entry was posted on Thursday, November 29th, 2007 at 8:52 am and is filed under Music Photography and tagged with 2007, blender, blender theatre, Chris Colley, concert photography, Dino Siampos, images, Johnny Reineck, moving units, november, nyc, photographs, photos, pictures, Sam Wheeler, soft, vhs or beta, Vincent Perini. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.