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General
- It is going to be terribly dark in most venues with wild lighting, if at all.
- Test to see how the camera recovers underexposed material well before the shoot. If it can, shoot faster & underexpose.
- Check with sound/light guy before show to turn on lights for a check. Request more/different if it's not working for you. Don't get a green faced lead singer.
- Ask if you can drop the height of mike stands just a little if it doesn't distract band members. It will help out tremendously.
- Ask the band/sound/light guy if there are any dangerous places to be on or around the stage. Ask if it's possible to hop on stage or walk around back to get some backlit shots. You don't want to accidentally unplug something.
Digital shooting & camera settings
- Shoot RAW. You'll have to underexpose so you need RAW to get the data back.
- Shoot Flourescent WB. It will cut the green skin tones out best.
- Start at ISO 1600 with primes and go from there.
Shutter speed
- Shoot 1/30-50 for 50mm, 1/60-1/90 for 85mm. 1/15- 1/30 won't cut it @ 85mm. You will get 1 out of 8 shots vaguely good when under 2:1 lens length:shutter speed.
- If you band members move around a lot, you must shoot faster. 1/60 or they'll blur. It's going to be underexposed but that's what RAW is for.
- Blurry motion is cool for some shots. Not for all.
- Change the shutter speed to faster. Even if you think it's too dark. Over-all blurry images are worthless.
- Use the fastest lenses possible. Primes. Slow zooms in dark venues are worthless.
- Shoot at the maximum speed possible. 85mm @ 1/30 is going to be blurry for most shots so don't do it. Shoot 1/60-80 @ 85mm and underexpose 1-1.5 stops. RAW will recover the dark data. RAW cannot recover blurry from shooting too slow.
Lens selection
- Except for a funky shot or two, wide angle isn't that useful because you can't get close enough.
- The band members' movements will blur shooting ~1/30 anyway and if they're so far away, the crop/blow up will look rough anyway. Non-moving band members are okay for 1/30 but any motion will require 1/60.
- Once or twice the wide will come in handy but ~90% of my shots are with 50mm or longer.
Lighting
- If you have funky green one one side of the face and warm amber on the other, shoot from the warm amber side. Green fill lighting is interesting. Green key lighting is not.
- If you want eye sparkle with flash, shoot at TTL -2.5 to -3.0 or shoot in Manual 1/32 power. Virtually any flash will ruin the mood anyway, so there better be good reason to use it. Even at the above settings, it won't help you out to open shadows.
- If you choose to use flash for eye sparkle, realize 100+ flash pops in a band member's face will become distracting and annoying.
- That being said, a few flash pops from the side at real low power are nice. Funny, huh?
Focus
- Don't use closest focus mode because it seems to choose things in the background like milk crates, elbows and walls instead of your subject.
- On the D200, use the center single focus point, recompose & shoot, especially at off-angles. This is where a D2Xs comes in handy as every focus point is cross. Choose the face focus unless the subject really is something else
- Check focus every two or three shots. Many times the focus point isn't where you think it should be.
- Check the focus on wide angle shots. A lit background will tend to lock into focus more often than the band members. Pre-focus on something easy, check focus, go manual and then shoot.
Composition
- If your singer is right handed and holding a mike, shooting from their left side is a more open shot. But, if the singer's left side is green, shoot from the other side because no one wants to look green.
- Don't have mike stands directly in front of members all the time. They're annoying.
- The longer lenses will get more interesting shots than the wide angle. Shoot wide angle from journalist angles, arial or ground-up. Try to get a crowd shot with the wide, either from overhead in the crowd or from behind the band to remind them of their view.
- Add some Dutch angle shots (tilt the camera).
Equipment checklist (HAVE ON YOU)
- Spare CF card
- Spare battery
- Ear plugs
- Lenses
- Camera
- Wallet w/ID & money
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