I have not been shooting the Dell for the blog as much lately although I'm still capturing the people who hang out. I'm careful about posting those images since I don't want someone to see or hear about their image in this blog before they see it in the studio. The musicians who come to the Jam are a different story. I have experimented a lot with lighting, using a flash at a manual setting of a quarter power hanging from the ceiling, sometimes two, adjusting the light with my camera f/stop. I have come to the point where I rarely use TTL except at events where the subject distance is constantly changing along with the lighting conditions. Manual lighting just gives you so much more freedom and allows much more drama.
I do periodically burn out a bit shooting the Jam, decide to quit for a while then start up again if someone really interesting is coming. That's the case with last Thursday. Two events caused me to show up with camera in hand. First the Chief Product Developer for Unified Color was coming along with the CEO and John Omvik VP Marketing all of whom are friends of mine. I had never meet the DPD for Unified, he is Russian and lives in Moscow. Well the gang showed up, everyone had fun and it turns out he plays the piano, loves jazz and is good at it. He didn't make the stage Thursday for the second reason I showed up, Johnny Ace. Johnny Ace is a local bass player with a pedigree of working with many of the greats in blues music. He is also known as a great showman, so I was asked to stop in.
Shooting the same or a similar subject over time gets boring. You have to take breaks shoot other subjects, come back with renewed energy and push your technique. That has been the evolution over the last year after writing about this being a project I wanted to take on. Actually, I'm surprised I have stuck with it as long as I have. I think the main reason is the fact I continue to see new possibilities, different approaches and that keeps the general interest going. Between this and other studio projects, shooting has become an everyday thing.
Enough of the chatter, shooting musicians is interesting and I have found the closer you get, the more interesting it becomes. I'm not talking physically, but with the camera. My preferred lens is the 70-200mm/2.8VRII, which allows me to shoot with some distance yet get close. It also provides some "cover" since people think flash and my camera has no flash, so they ignore me. You cannot get away with good photographs in a place like this with on camera flash, just too hard. I have made some work with on camera but it really is not a productive way to shoot. So here is a sample of the evening. First let's get close.
Next, let's use the light for effect.
Looking for individual expression to capture.
Let's get very very close
Back off a bit with the zoom, but still staying close for expression.
Finally pulling away for a band shot is tricky. It can't be a kitchen shot where you just snap something and light it up. Here is one I like from many I tried.
Now for the "Portrait" image, one that defines the person. Here is one I like for that purpose from the evening.
So there you have it, some views from my lens for the evening with some of my thinking. You might wonder why I process in black and white vs color. I tend to like black and white better, but it is image specific. When I shoot with a single light, from up high, I tend to shoot off angle and the light is harsh so it fits black and white better. Normally, I process in color first, then check out black and white to see what it looks like. Sometimes I shoot for black and white but even then, I double check to make sure color isn't better.
Camera Nikon D800E and lens Nikon 70-200mm/f2.8.
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