After a full day of electric performances, Katy Perry, Paramore, Say Anything, and Gym Class Heroes closed down Warped Tour with killer sets and just a little drama.
Katy Perry
Pop darling Katy Perry rocked an upbeat set, playing a coral pink Gibson SG to match her pink hoop ear rings. Perry performed songs off her 2008 release One of the Boys, including “Ur So Gay” and her #1 Billboard Hot 100 single, “I Kissed A Girl.”
Paramore
Fan favorites Paramore, playing on the Route 66 stage, delivered one of the most highly anticipated sets of the St. Louis date on their debut for the 2008 tour. Hayley Williams and band ripped through an explosive set that had the massive crowd begging for more.
Say Anything
Pop punk rockers Say Anything threw down a ferocious, high-energy set, with lead singer Max Bemis performing at the edge of the stage and in constant motion throughout the performance.
Gym Class Heroes
Travis McCoy and friends closed down the day in rock star style with a fierce, short set that saw the most intense crowd action of the day. As one of the very last performances, Gym Class Heroes drew a huge audience and played to a pit primed for combustion, with crowd surfing coming fast and furious toward the stage.
Photographer’s Notes:
This day was an absolute blast, even if these last four shows had me running to different stages almost immediately after the first three songs of each shoot.
The 6:30, 6:45, and 7:00 set times for Angels and Airwaves, Katy Perry, and Paramore, respectively, in particular had me doing a little jogging to make the start of each set.
Unlike the earlier sets, as the sun lowered in the sky, the Route 66 stage received a dose of full sunlight on wide half, while the other was still bathed in open shade, which made exposure more of an interesting challenge. By Gym Class Heroes’ set, however, the sun had lowered enough to neutralize this lighting issue.
End Notes:
I’m looking forward to next year’s Warped Tour. Again, a huge thanks goes out to Bethany for helping coordinate everything.
The backstage shots are coming up next, so stay tuned for those. In the meantime, you can also check out the first set of live shots with Jack’s Mannequin, The Academy Is…, Against Me!, and Angels and Airwaves.
This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 8th, 2008 at 10:29 pm and is filed under Music Photography and tagged with 2008, gym class heroes, images, Katy Perry, live, paramore, photos, Say Anything, warped tour. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
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Great shots. Just want to ask if it’s possible to take those same shots and quality photos with a D300 and a kit lens 18-135mm?
Hey Robert. Generally speaking, since this was an outdoor shoot with plenty of light, and I was often stopping down to f/4 or so, I think the 18-135mm should be be fine.
The slower aperture is going to lower your shutter speeds a little, but other than that, the range should be nice. The D300 is without question capable.
The highest ISO I used was ISO 1600 for Say Anything, since it was later in the day and their set was a little more shady than others.
Well, what can I say? You’ve done it again! Awesome shots, you’re making my job of commenting very difficult… You could at least once post a bad picture so I don’t have to congratulate you every time :P
Keep it up Todd!
Hey Celso, thanks very much. I’ll see what I can do about throwing in some sub-par shots. There are plenty of B-sides from every shoot.
Love the 14-24mm shots! Did you use the 70-200mm lens at all?
Hey Bryan, thanks. I did use the 70-200mm, just not too much for these last bands. I snapped just a few shots of Katy Perry with the telephoto, but for the rest of the bands I used the Nikon 24-70 and 14-24.
Those B-Sides are part of the process… Without them a guy wouldn’t have nothing from where to learn. (I like to learn from my own mistakes)
Hey you could put some of them in your future book as an example of what not to do! :P
Best Regards!
Remember: what one doesn’t show is just important, if not more so, than what one does show.
Photography is an art of subtraction, after all.
Hey Todd,
I love the second to last shot of Hayley with her hair up. I think the superwides of Say Anything were great too! Did you get my email?
Btw, I used the D300 and 17-55 last night and it totally kicked butt. I think its a great combo!
Hey Keith, thanks for the pick! Just a lucky catch of some of the insane onstage action that is Paramore.
Max Bemis of Say Anything was a great subject, too. Lots of time up on the monitors, as you can see.
The D300 and 17-55 should be a perfect combo, especially paired with the 80-200mm. Those two lenses should give you all the coverage you need for most events.
Remember: what one doesn’t show is just important, if not more so, than what one does show.
Photography is an art of subtraction, after all.
My point exactly, I do think that one gets more and more perfectionist with his own work as he becomes a better photographer… At least the more I learn, the less I like what I’m getting from my camera… It makes me work harder for better results!
Hey Celso, I agree that there are shifts in one’s taste as photographer as our eyes and skills develop, but I think it can go both ways, gravitating toward the hyper-technical or perfectionist slant, but also becoming looser in some ways as well.
With digital, it’s very easy to focus on the technical aspects for critical sharpness, composition, etc, but I think it’s important to recognize the serendipity of image making, too, and that the most compelling images are not necessarily the most technically perfect executions.
[...] Warped Tour: Katy Perry, Paramore, Say Anything, Gym Class Heroes [...]
Todd,
When trying to get a photopass for a music festival, like Vans Warped tour, Edgefest, Virgin Music Festival etc..do you have to contact each group in the festival for multiple photo passes, or do you just contact the people running the entire event? Wasn’t sure how that worked. There are alot of festivals in Toronto and i was hoping to get a photopass for some.
Thanks, Jen.
for the warped tour, do the acts on the main stages have a 3 song limit?
Hey Ray, all the stages I shot had the three song limit.