Rocking a sold out house, it was great to see Train again in top form – I’d last photographed the pop band on an outdoor performance last summer, and I was looking forward to see the band’s stage production at the Pageant.
Photographer’s Notes:
I have a bit of a love-hate relationship with spotlights at clubs like the Pageant. On the one hand, they’re spotlights, which generally means plenty of light to keep ISOs low and shutter speeds at a reasonable 1/200 or faster.
On the downside, the relative exposure of the spotlights is so much brighter than any modest background effect from the house rigging that the bright key lights often create a very harsh and sterile look. To combat this, a little timing and editing goes a long way.
And so, even something as wonderful as spotlights can become bittersweet in concert photography. Of course, to anyone shooting in basement dives with dim red cans, this probably sounds like a wonderful problem to have. Just goes to show that it’s all relative.
Question, comments? Let ‘em rip.
This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 6th, 2010 at 11:01 pm and is filed under Music Photography and tagged with 2010, band, Jimmy Stafford, live, music photography, pageant, Patrick Monahan, performance, rock, Scott Underwood, st. louis, tour, train. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
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Hey Nathan,
Thanks for the comment, I really appreciate it. You’re so close on this – it was at 15mm. The perspective distortion is pretty intense at these focal lengths.
You used the zoom or the fish? If it were me, I’d say fishy, as I’d normally rack that zoom wide till it hit the stop – at 14mm, but I often get ‘weird” focal lengths when shooting with zooms myself.. so… could be :D
Hey Nathan,
This was with the 14-24mm f/2.8 – Like you, I normally rack it out to 14mm if I’m going big, but I must have stopped just shy of the full glory of 14mm.
I don’t have a fisheye, though I can certainly see the use for such a lens after shooting with the 14-24mm for the last few years.
Yeah, awesome first image. Love it! (Others are great too, but I had to comment on the bold 900px lead image!)
Hey Garrett,
Thanks for weighing in on the lead image, I really appreciate it. I guess as a twitter reply I just received put it, “It’s 2010, 598×900 is nothing.”
So true!
Very nice set, Todd. As a budding photographer who has identity crisis (don’t know which niche should I dive into), you inspired me to add Concert Photography to the mix! Checking you out every single day – awesome photos every time, man.
Hey Marvin,
Thanks for the kind words, very glad if any of my work serves as an inspiration. Good luck with your photography!
This 900px tall lead image from Train is probably unwise. And yet, there it is. http://bit.ly/ct47ix
Very nice…BTW, I would KILL for spotlights! I live in a red cave. :)
Hey Kevin,
I know, having spotlights are a high class problem. I shouldn’t complain.
Todd nice set – shot them last fall – thought they were great subjects!…tho we had less harsh spots – more ambient but Pat was under the weather…so it was tricky not giving that away in the shots…
Love the big lead image!