It’s been a few weeks since my last entry, but I’m happy to say that they’ve been incredibly busy and I have plenty to share with you.
I’ve had a variety of shoots over the last month, and each of them has come with their own challenges and unique requirements. As a result, I thought I would focus this entry on one particular job which was a little different from your standard photography assignments……a theatrical concert.
In early September, I was commissioned by Big Bands Live to shoot a Freddie Mercury Tribute show being performed by local group, ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’. You may have seen the star of the show, Thomas Crane, on ‘Australia’s Got Talent’ earlier this year. Joining Thomas and the Band was classical opera Singer Fiona Mariah, also of AGT fame.
The job had a particular set of challenges. Including:
1. Positioning - The show is presented as half-concert, half-theatrical performance. Therefore I was not going to be able to freely wander the stage to capture the shots I was after. Furthermore, as the bulk of the audience would be seated in a conventional theatre setting, I did not want to disturb the audience or impede anyone’s view by running up and down the aisles.
2. Live Performance – With the show being live, I only have one take to get the shots I want. I had access to the sound check, but the only time to get photos with full lighting and costumes would be during the main show. Much like a wedding, you only get one chance to get many of the shots, so understanding the schedule and finding the key moments to capture was imperative.
3. Lighting - We all know that a photographer’s best friend and often-worst enemy is ‘light’. Obviously a dark theatre, with concert lighting and overly saturated spotlights was going to be in the biggest challenge of the shoot. In addition to those conditions, I would be shooting without a flash, as once again, my goal was to go completely unnoticed by the audience.
In addition to all of that, I also had to capture some video of the performances as well as photo’s of the audience during intermission and after the show. This was going to have to be a very well planned and executed assignment.
I arrived at the theatre at 4:30 p.m as agreed with the client. The show wasn’t due to start until 8:00 p.m and it was expected the audience would start taking their seats from 7:30 p.m. This gave me three hours to prepare, test and plan the entire shoot.
I then took some time to explore the theatre. I wanted to find some key places to shoot from. After exploring every nook and cranny of the theatre, I was satisfied with each location and had taken a few test shots with my kit and a variety of lenses so that I knew what would work best for each location. I was also mindful that lighting conditions would vary from location to location.
At this point, the band was ready to jump into a few songs for sound check. I took the opportunity to grab a few snaps of the band and grab a few more ‘artistic’ shots that I knew I wouldn’t be able to get once the audience was seated. I was able to move freely around the stage and get an idea of the personality of each performer as I was reintroduced to them through the lens of my camera. I spent additional time on Tom’s face to try and better understand how his gestures and movement would translate best on a still image. I also used this time to really play with various settings so that I had an idea of what I would use once the live performance started.
By 6:30 the band was done and ready to have a break and then get ready for the show. I chose to leave them to relax during this time and took the opportunity to wander the theatre and grab some photo’s that I thought might add to the overall story of the night. When it comes to each assignment, I like to take the view that I am telling a story. Each assignment has a unique venue, unique subjects and unique look that the client is looking for. With that in mind, I always try to find an opportunity to capture images from around the location that I feel might add to final collection of images that chronicle the event. It’s also nice to break up the images so that not every photo seems to be a portrait or have the focus draw to a group or individual.
By 7:30pm, I was back stage with the band and was lucky enough to relax with them for a little while and get a feel for their personalities. While my focus would be on the front man, Tom, I wanted to get plenty of shots of each member of the group and taking the time to get to know them a little bit certain helps when it comes to shooting each subject.
At this stage, I was preparing for the entire night. I had my back up camera (Canon 500D) in the stage left wings. My primary camera (Canon 5D MKII) hanging from my shoulder, fitted with a Canon 70-200 F/2.8 L IS II USM and my secondary lenses in my bag in the stage right wings. I also had a tripod setup at the back of the theatre with a digital camcorder attached for some secondary footage of the entire show.
At 8pm, I wished the performers good luck and took my position at the front of the auditorium. I wanted to capture the first few songs from just in front of the stage. This would allow me to get a few great snaps at the start of the show and then escape to the back of the theatre with minimal disruption to the audience. The show kicked off and everyone was on it from the get go. Tom’s voice was incredible as he filled the theatre with a pitch-perfect imitation of Freddie Mercury’s greatest hits.
After the first few songs, I moved to the back of the auditorium and then took the long way round so that I could relocate to the wings of the stage. This provided a great location to get right in on the action, while not disturbing the audience or the performers. It was at this stage that I really found myself having to adapt as a photographer.
During standard shoots, I generally find myself using a mix of full manual settings and aperture priority settings…..and even then I have the aid of at least one speedlite or studio lighting rig. Here, I had nothing. Aperture Priority was useless as it was too dark and the movement much to quick to capture anything of use. Manual settings were fairly straight forward to define, however because the lighting and stage blocking constantly changed, I found that no setting was perfect for more than a song or two. My main concern with constantly changing settings is that you don’t want to hand the client images that might be technically precise, but look completely different to each other. Therefore I had to use my best judgment and only adjust the settings slightly to ensure consistency in the images. Even at that point I realized that many of the photos would be discarded due to ill-timed movement or an unexpected lighting change.
As a photographer, I can safely say that the first 60 minutes of act one, were the most complex, most stressful and most rewarding 60 minutes of my photography career. By the end of the first act I was already exhausted and somewhat nervous of what the end result of the images would be. I took a moment to chat with the performers as they came off stage. I was surprised to hear that they had barely noticed me, even though at times a lens had been barely two metres from their face. Thomas even found a few minutes to chat with me about how the shoot was going and if he was giving me enough. I was absolutely humbled that he would not only take the time to see how things were going, but ask if there was anything he could do to help me. He is a true professional.
During intermission I nipped out to the foyer and grabbed a few photos of the audience in their groups. They all loved the first act of the show and a few even took the time to chat and ask more questions about Tom and the band. I did my best to answer and generally tried to build on the fun atmosphere that was already infectious throughout the theatre.
As second act began, I found myself once again wandering the wings and I was thrilled to see that the canvas at the rear of the stage was now being backlit by various bright colours. Tom and the band had also taken the opportunity for a costume change and were now in brighter colours too. As I’m sure you can understand, I was thrill about the changes and took off shooting.
The second act proved much easier. With improved lighting and costumes, as well as my experience from the first act, I was able to shoot quicker and cleaner for a good 45 minutes. I found that manual settings using an ISO range 200 – 500 was perfect for the environment and I was confident enough that I was able to shoot consistently without constantly reviewing my images.
For the final songs of the show, I made my way back down into the crowd, many of whom were now dancing at the front of the stage. A few even asked for a few photos, but minus a flash in the dark recesses of the theatre made it practically impossible to take a clean image. The show wrapped up and I quickly grabbed up my equipment and followed the band backstage and then out into the private theatre bar. Friends of the band were quick to join us and offer their congratulations and support, and of course I was on hand to make sure they could have a photo taken with Freddie and the band!
After plenty of fun photos with the audience, the band retired to the green room and I made my way back around the theatre for some closing shots and to grab the rest of my equipment. It was about 11:30 by this time and while 7 hours work is around your average wedding, the conditions and speed required to capture the performance were much more taxing. I was certainly ready for a break.
The editing process took a few days. I get asked about my workflow process quite often and I’m happy to share it here.
I start by importing all the images into Aperture (yes, I’m an Aperture man….for now at least). This can take some time as I often have 1,500+ photos arranged on a number of cards. After the import process has finished, I go through the entire collection and simply look for photo’s that aren’t worth keeping (i.e. images that neither the client nor myself would ever want to view). After the initial cull, I perform and export and I save these images as the clients master files. These masters will remain untouched and I will provide copies to the client if it’s in the contract.
The next cull I do is to start looking for the images I want to enhance. This is a time consuming process. I normally have upwards of 1000 images to sort through, and depending on the type of event, I like to try and get the number down to between 300-600 images (once again, dependent on the contract). These form the images that I will now spend a few days (and often nights) enhancing. They may only require minor touch-ups (skin smoothing, exposure adjustments etc) or I will go a little crazier if I’m looking for a more artistic result (colour alteration, vignetting, shadow highlights etc).
Finally I save the edited versions of the images in a new project folder called ‘Client Name – Final Edit’. I then apply borders to all the images and save those in a separate folder, and then I apply my company watermark to the images and perform a final save.
The edited copies with borders are uploaded on to my website (www.shutterspeeddesigns.com) and the copies with the watermark are normally used for promotion via social media (i.e. facebook, twitter, blogger etc). I use the watermarked images for these websites as the images are not usually protected.Finally, I produce a cut of all the images for the client on a dual layered DVD. I use dual layered discs as they provide me with twice as much space to store data. I finish of the disc with a custom disc label and diskette cover and ship out the images. I complete this entire process within 10 working days.
I am happy to report that Tom and the band were very happy with the final images and I have since worked with the group a number of times and will continue to do so.
As always, thanks for reading and catch you next time.
