UofAid Fundraiser Concert @ The Pawn Shop, Edmonton, AB

[WMah]

Hey guys, been a while since I last picked up my camera (too busy w/ school). But finally was able to go out to shoot a few pix of an event a friend was organizing. I converted most of the pix to grayscale/duotone since the colored lighting (esp purple) seemed to bring out a lot of nasty noise. My reluctance to venture beyond 1000 pretty much resulted in a lot of lost keepers... I guess 1600 ISO w/ proper exposure > underexposed 800/1000 iso salvaged w/ adobe raw. Oh well, live and learn. Here are some pix that i was lucky to capture when there was sufficient light... or able to salvage w/ adobe raw. Rest of set is @ http://www.oh-snap.ca/UofAid 2008/album/index.html (http://www.oh-snap.ca/UofAid%202008/album/index.html) C&C appreciated

1)
http://www.oh-snap.ca/UofAid%202008/album/_MG_5700.jpg


2)
http://www.oh-snap.ca/UofAid%202008/album/_MG_5816.jpg

3)
http://www.oh-snap.ca/UofAid%202008/album/_MG_5821.jpg

4)http://www.oh-snap.ca/UofAid%202008/album/_MG_5877.jpg

5)
http://www.oh-snap.ca/UofAid%202008/album/_MG_5958.jpg

6)
http://www.oh-snap.ca/UofAid%202008/album/_MG_5963.jpg

7)
http://www.oh-snap.ca/UofAid%202008/album/_MG_6017.jpg

8)
http://www.oh-snap.ca/UofAid%202008/album/_MG_5723.jpg

[René Damkot]

I like #2, but would crop a bit closer probably. #4 is nice as well.
I think I see too much NR in some.

[WMah]

The funny thing was... i didn't touch noiseware for any of the pictures... the only noise reduction i really did was eliminate color noise by converting to grayscale my original captures were all pretty poorly exposed due to me being stubborn against venturing to 1600 iso. I noticed that when i was boosting and trying to recover the pics post process, it almost created some pasty patches where i guess the camera didn't record any detail... extremely apparent in the girl singer in 1) and the face of the singer in 4). i should've maybe added grain to try to cover it up :S

[johnstoy]

Some real nice shots... The mike is in the way on a couple... Cheers.

[WMah]

thx! yeah the mic stand is always in my way :( we should all petition for performers to all wear headsets :) anyway, i was also experimenting with flash early in the night to attempt to do that shutter drag technique to get some light trails and other effects. Bumped iso down to 200, on camera flash was on.... f stop @ 7.1 with shutter at 1/4 s. looking at my pictures on the lcd screen, they all looked as if it was any normal flash picture. no flashy light trails were apparent. Was sensitivity too low for the camera to pick up ambient light through 1/4s?

[René Damkot]

I noticed that when i was boosting and trying to recover the pics post process, it almost created some pasty patches where i guess the camera didn't record any detail...

Might be a clipping channel... How did you convert to B/W?

[WMah]

i just used the lazy method of image > mode > color > grayscale then created an adjustment layer mask for brightness and contrast and tweaked it to boost the contrast a bit

clipping channel eh? i'm not too familiar with that... i did notice that even before i converted to grayscale/resized the details on the face for some pix were "blotchy" after boostingthe exposure .66 and 1.00 in some instances. lots of my pics were very UE when the stage lights switched around etc... I was also stupid in not using 1600 iso :(

[René Damkot]

If you are using PS: Have a look at The Russell Brown Show (http://russellbrown.com/tips_tech.html).

He's got some nice tutorials and actions for different ways to convert to B&W. (both CS3 and CS2)

[WMah]

thx for the link!

[livewire-photography.com]

No.6 is real nice apart from the Mic in the way.
Cheers.

[datadump]

Nice work! what venue was that? (RATT?) some awesome energy captured. Love that shot with the Oilers Tshirt... go-oilers-go!!!

I saw the rest of the photos as well... i find you used way too much noise reduction in some shots in the link. Faces look plastic. When properly exposed, I find 30D does very well 1600 so don't be afraid:) I almost exclusively shot at 1600+ with my 30D in horrid lighting conditions like the venue you must have shot in..

[WMah]

it was at the pawn shop on whyte... and yeah... the plasticy effect wasn't generated w/ noise reduction but trying to salvage the pic thru raw by boosting exposure. the camera probalby didn't capture enough detail since the pics were poorly exposed and adjusting the exposure slider in RAW just made parts brighter in blotches :\