Near the Lake, take three
So, as mentioned previously, I shot Moose and the High Tops last night at Near the Lake Cafe, a regular haunt for them in Staffordville, CT. And, as you may have gathered from the title of this post, it was my third time shooting there.
The lighting there is inexcusably bad. It's not completely dark, but the stage lighting consists of three floodlights shining down from stage front, effectively toplighting the frontline and leaving Tommy in shadow. Adding to the complication, the floodlight pointed at Jim was not only out but GONE. No bulb in the socket, and by the time I noticed the band was set up and no way were they going to be able to fix it short of a jetpack, which I'm pretty sure this bar doesn't have. Oh, and there's a low ceiling right in front of the band, so their light kits are useless in this venue and weren't even set up. But, I knew about all this (except that one spotlight being gone) going into it, so I was ready for the bad lighting.
So, the lessons I learned tonight:
- If I'm going to take my tripod along in hopes of steady motion-blur practice, I must ALWAYS make sure the quickplate for the tripod is either attached to the tripod, or attached to a camera that I actually bring with me to the bar, as it does me no good to have it safe at home in Sunderland, MA.
- Putting two sheets of vellum over a kit flash does help, but only if you're not standing close to the subject. They will still be blown out if you aren't halfway across the bar from them.
- It's easier to scamper INTO a precarious perch while holding a camera than it is to scamper OUT of one.
- When singing lead, I must put my mouth directly on the microphone, more than I perhaps want to.
- If I put two fingers over the edges of the flash, I can control the light enough to eliminate blowouts at close range, but that's more art than science, and more luck than art. Too close together, and I get no light and/or a reddish cast from my fingers being full of blood. Too far apart and they might as well not be there. But get them just so, and success!
- Doctoring the flash fixes exposure but not depth. The pics are still mostly 2D.
- That really high bit in "Gimme shelter" (Waaaaaaaaaar, children! It's just a shot away, it's just a SHOT AWAAAAYYYYY) is, in fact, NOT out of my voice range.
- Moose's dad likes Carly Simon! Who knew?
- Aiming a kit-flash photo at something dark located NEXT to the focus of the picture (like, a dark green wall, or speaker cabinet) puts the photo's composition off-kilter, but saves you from blowing out the subject and makes it croppable into something nice. Just make sure to widen the angle for good cropping.
- My CF card holds 148 images before filling up, despite its claims of only holding 124.
- I still can't pass through wood as though it's immaterial. Ow.
- I really like whatever beer I was drinking last night, but since I didn't buy it and Jim had forgotten what it was before he got back to the table with it, I may never find out.
- 25 degrees is NOT WARM. My new pajamas, however, are fuzzy and warm and covered with SPACE!
I think that might be all. I'm dumping the camera now so watch for pics in the next few days.
Edit: I have also learned that when I switch the camera to one of the basic modes, instead of the manual modes I normally use, the pictures save in JPG instead of RAW, and go back to RAW when I go back to a manual mode, without my doing anything. Neat!
The lighting there is inexcusably bad. It's not completely dark, but the stage lighting consists of three floodlights shining down from stage front, effectively toplighting the frontline and leaving Tommy in shadow. Adding to the complication, the floodlight pointed at Jim was not only out but GONE. No bulb in the socket, and by the time I noticed the band was set up and no way were they going to be able to fix it short of a jetpack, which I'm pretty sure this bar doesn't have. Oh, and there's a low ceiling right in front of the band, so their light kits are useless in this venue and weren't even set up. But, I knew about all this (except that one spotlight being gone) going into it, so I was ready for the bad lighting.
So, the lessons I learned tonight:
- If I'm going to take my tripod along in hopes of steady motion-blur practice, I must ALWAYS make sure the quickplate for the tripod is either attached to the tripod, or attached to a camera that I actually bring with me to the bar, as it does me no good to have it safe at home in Sunderland, MA.
- Putting two sheets of vellum over a kit flash does help, but only if you're not standing close to the subject. They will still be blown out if you aren't halfway across the bar from them.
- It's easier to scamper INTO a precarious perch while holding a camera than it is to scamper OUT of one.
- When singing lead, I must put my mouth directly on the microphone, more than I perhaps want to.
- If I put two fingers over the edges of the flash, I can control the light enough to eliminate blowouts at close range, but that's more art than science, and more luck than art. Too close together, and I get no light and/or a reddish cast from my fingers being full of blood. Too far apart and they might as well not be there. But get them just so, and success!
- Doctoring the flash fixes exposure but not depth. The pics are still mostly 2D.
- That really high bit in "Gimme shelter" (Waaaaaaaaaar, children! It's just a shot away, it's just a SHOT AWAAAAYYYYY) is, in fact, NOT out of my voice range.
- Moose's dad likes Carly Simon! Who knew?
- Aiming a kit-flash photo at something dark located NEXT to the focus of the picture (like, a dark green wall, or speaker cabinet) puts the photo's composition off-kilter, but saves you from blowing out the subject and makes it croppable into something nice. Just make sure to widen the angle for good cropping.
- My CF card holds 148 images before filling up, despite its claims of only holding 124.
- I still can't pass through wood as though it's immaterial. Ow.
- I really like whatever beer I was drinking last night, but since I didn't buy it and Jim had forgotten what it was before he got back to the table with it, I may never find out.
- 25 degrees is NOT WARM. My new pajamas, however, are fuzzy and warm and covered with SPACE!
I think that might be all. I'm dumping the camera now so watch for pics in the next few days.
Edit: I have also learned that when I switch the camera to one of the basic modes, instead of the manual modes I normally use, the pictures save in JPG instead of RAW, and go back to RAW when I go back to a manual mode, without my doing anything. Neat!