I’ve been back shooting a bit in the music scene. Shot one of my all time favorite singers Saturday night At The Grand Theatre, Serena Ryder. I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve seen her perform and it never gets old. Her voice and her writing abilities are second to none in my opinion.
Photo of the Week #171
After 16 months of not shooting much, live music is starting to wind up once again as restrictions lift. Recently I shot at a festival in honour of Sound Check Entertainments’ 10th Anniversary.. I’ve been around for 6 of those years and last weekend I shot one of my favourite photographs. This is Josh Norad, an independent emerging artist who also happens to be a great guy. Josh was our closer on Saturday night and did an amazing job of it. I loved the image from the start but it had terrible colouring and I just couldn’t make it look right……hence, the black and white. After switching it, I discovered the image was made to be black and white, it works very well. It may even make it into my portfolio.
Photo of the Week #154
I have been a Lightroom user for many years as an editing app. In all that time, I’ve only used Photoshop for a couple of minor little things when needed. With all the down time since the pandemic began, I have worked on learning some of it. I just thought it would be fun to explore some of the artistic things that can be done. This photo is one of the subjects I played around with. Colin James
Photo of the Week #135
Sometimes my own favourite shots from shows aren’t what you might think. I like those big epic shots of the star of the show looking right at me, or passionate moments during a solo as much as the next guy. I also like those intimate details in concert photos, or low light shots where shadow area is more prominent. To me, shots with subtle lighting and tones are far superior. Without shadow, you don’t appreciate the subtlety of light. I used to spend all kinds of time trying to recover shadow details and the result is a flat muddy shadow area that just looks terrible. Let shadows be shadows and it looks so much better. This shot is Darren Savard from Dallas Smith’s band. I was at stage right at this time and happened to look over just as Darren came out onto that speaker for a solo. I quickly turned and grabbed a single frame and it turned out to be a favourite of that show. What makes it for me is that hand reaching out to him from the dark. It helps to balance the image.
Concert Photography: Three Songs at a Time
I was looking through some photos the other day and noticed my first concert photography attempt was in 2006 so it’s been about 13 years that I’ve been doing it in one way or another. It’s been a fun and interesting journey and I love every minute of it. I’ve worked hard and learned a lot over those years.
“First three songs, no flash” are the instructions you typically are given prior to the shoot. That’s all you get, after the third song we are escorted back out of the venue, that’s it. I often have to explain to people that I don’t even get to watch the show, but it’s true in many cases. An exception to this procedure is festivals. Bands often do away with restrictions at festival shows.
The image below is of Danielle Nicole Schnebelen of the Danielle Nicole Band. I had the opportunity to shoot this super talented person after a long time of following her music. Most photographers I know have a bucket list of sorts that they wish to shoot and Danielle was one of mine.
Danielle Nicole Schnebelen