Shooting at a concert hall

[Luvwine]

I was at a concert hall tonight rehearsing for a show that I am performing in. While there, I decided to get a little practice with my new toy, er, camera (there are other parts of the show I am not involved in and all the higher ups were fine with me taking some pics). It is a classical concert for Christmas (orchestra) and also involves a number of dancers. I was shooting primarily from the audience. I have not really reviewed all the shots yet so I may have some decent ones, but I noticed that on quick review on the camera, many seemed a bit overexpcsed. I shot in primarily Av but also did some in program mode and noted the same thing. Any suggestions as to what the best bet is to get good shots from the audience when dealing with stage lighting? It seemed odd as I had to juice up the ISO pretty high to get acceptable shutter speed. I tried several different lenses and, not surprisingly, the 50 mm 1.4 seemed to handle the lighting situation best. Any thoughts?

Best,

Steve O.

[Olegis]

Steve, do not trust the camera LCD - it lies all the time. Preview the images with histogram - it's by far the best tool you have to judge the exposure of your images. For example - my 10D shows the images brighter than they really are, so even clearly underexposed ones look good on the LCD monitor.

Shooting concerts can be tricky sometimes, as the lighting is very difficult - one second it's pretty dim and another second the stage explodes with bright lights. I find the manual mode to be the best for these kind of situations - set the ISO to get decent shutter speeds (1/250s should be enough if you hold your 200mm lens VERY steady), meter the schene and determine the best combination of shutter speed and aperture - as I said, the shutter speeds should be fast enough for you to stop the action and to prevent the motion blur, and the aperture should be set accordingly.

For the photographs in the following galleries I used (most of the time) my 10D at ISO1600 and my 70-200 f/2.8L at 200mm and f/2.8 to get 1/250s speeds :

http://www.pbase.com/olegis/rita__live_in_caesaria&page=all
http://www.pbase.com/olegis/playandmusic2&page=all
http://www.pbase.com/olegis/street_theatre&page=all

Also - post your images that we can see them, it's much easier to help when the pictures are available for reviewing.

[dhbailey]

I have noticed from my moon shots (not the same as stage productions, I admit) that I have to tell my camera to go ahead and take the picture the way I tell it to, even though things are flashing to tell me it won't be a good picture.

What I think I have discovered is that if you have a single bright spot (say a dancer's face) in an otherwise fairly dark setting (the backdrop at the back of the stage) the camera's metering system will try to average everything which results in an overexposed bright spot.

Make the aperture smaller than your camera thinks or set the shutter speed faster than your camera suggests and you can get great shots in high-contrast settings.

But one thing is clear -- your camera isn't a human and can't always tell which aspect of the picture you really want exposed properly so sometimes you have to tell it to go contrary to how it is programmed.

[Andy_T]

I think DHBailey is right.

If the results turn out overexposed on your monitor, why not use EV-1 next time for concert shots in dark surroundings.

When I take night shots (in manual mode) on my G2, I always go for -2 to -1 EV in the exposure indicator.

Best regards,
Andy

[jgbeam]

When I shoot dancers onstage I use Tv mode with 1/125 or faster. Usually need to underexpose by one full stop to keep highlights in check. Here's an example from West side Story:

1D MkII, 24-70L @ 70mm, ISO 1250, f8, 1/125, EV -1

http://70.85.10.106/loc21/a9a8c__W6I7262web.jpg

There is some motion, which I don't find objectionable, and I could have bumped the speed up, but I find 1/125 works for most dances. For ballet, I use faster shutter speeds because blurring usually doesn't look good in ballet.

Jim

[drisley]

Olegis, I'm surprised they let you in with a camera.
Most concerts around here don't allow cameras.
BTW, awesome photos too :shock:

[Luvwine]

I think I know what I did wrong, but I am not sure. I am just guessing, but I noted that on the basic mode, the sharpness, contrast, and saturation were all +1 so I did the same thing on mode two. When I reviewed the pictures under the EOS viewer Utility, they were all bumped up +2 in "exposure compensation" so that may have been why they were all overexposed. I did take a few pics in action mode just to experiment and these came out better. If I can figure out how (or if someone wants to tell me!) , I will try to post a couple of pics later. THe odd thing is that in Photoshop, the "exposure bias"for all shots is listed as 0. Maybe I just messed something else really basic up and don't understand yet.

Thx for the info. Yes, now that you mention it, Tv mode does make more sense than Av for this application.......

Thanks for the thoughts:)

Best,

Steve O.

[Luvwine]

Ok, I just created a digital gallery on fotopic.net. I have only uploaded two images from yesterday's shooting, but they will hopefully suffice to show what I was talking about.

This image is one of the over exposed ones using Av priority.

http://gallery119299.fotopic.net/p9540280.html

Second one is using action mode (basic).

http://gallery119299.fotopic.net/p9540281.html


Please let me know if I did this wrong. This is my first time posting an image! They are large uncropped jpeg files and can be viewed full size on fotopic if that helps.

Thx for any thoughts!

Best,

[gtg]

the usual mistakes... u have provided the link to a HTML page rather than a image... So only a red X is appearing in the place of the image...

u shud right click on the picture in the fotopic and copy the exact .jpg file location and paste it within image tags...

[Luvwine]

Well, I tried every way I could think of to link to the .jpg file as suggested. I was able to get an image but it was so tiny as to be useless. Then when clicked on, I got the same tiny image! I just went ahead and changed it to a regular link. It links to a 1024 x 768 image but you can also view it at full size if you like (3504 x 2336).

Any guides to making the image appear in the post would be appreciated. Otherwise, thanks for any suggestions on settings to improve the picture taking. I can try again next weekend!

Best,

[tim]

Your links are fine now. The first shot is overexposed for some parts, and properly exposed for others. I don't know what to do about that myself. The second is fine, but the white ballance isn't quite right. This would be a pretty difficult photo to take, I look forward to reading the answers from the pros.

[jgbeam]

You will need to learn to read and interpret your histogram to get consistent results. The main thing is to keep the curve from crashing into the right side of the chart, which indicates highlight clipping. Your image display will also flash blown highlights. When this happens, you need to adjust exposure compensation accordingly. My West Side Story shot in my previous message does have a couple of blown highlights and I was shooting at -2/3 stop. A full stop down probably would have eliminated all the clipping. The image would have been darker but I would have been able to adjust for that in post processing. You just need to practice a little before you shoot the next event so you know the controls well enough to make adjustments without having to think too much about it. Also experiment with Tv and Av modes to find which works best. You will have more control than P or Action.

Jim

[lime]

Steve,
See my response to this thread, except about renting a lens.

http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=46147&highlight=

Happy Shooting!

[Luvwine]

Thanks all for the suggestions. I will let you know how it goes this weekend:).

Best,

[dhbailey]

Everything I've read indicates that it is better to underexpose and fix it in post processing because if it's overexposed there's nothing you can do to get the details back.

Another option would be to lower the ISO one stop if possible.

Good luck this weekend -- remember if you are shooting during the actual performance, you should wait for the end of the act so that the sound of your camera doesn't detract from those around you. Or move to a part of the hall where nobody will hear your camera sounds. I'm saying this as a musician, which is what I do for a living -- photography is just a hobby.

[Luvwine]

Don't worry, I will only take pictures during the rehearsal! I am singing in the performance (I was hired to be the baritone soloist for a piece based on the short story, "Polar Express." With the relatively loud noise from the camera, I would hate to distract from the performance. Now with a Leica, it might be different. ;)

FYI: Link to the concert: http://www.atlantasymphony.org/aso_concert_details.aspx?Event=162

Best,

[jgbeam]

Soloist with the Atlanta Symphony!! WOW!! That's BIG time! I have a few ASO recordings and they are all great. Never saw them live but did have the privilege of seeing Robert Shaw conduct the Hartford Symphony and Chorale in the Brahms Requiem in 1989.

What we really want to see is a photo of YOU during your solo. You've got to get somebody to take that shot. :D

Jim

[Luvwine]

Jim,

You are too kind. I did have the pleasure of singing in choirs for Robert Shaw for 10 years before he passed. I have many fond memories. The concert this weekend is with the ASO YOUTH Orchestra. I have had some paying gigs with the big ASO but very very few.... I have too many hobbies! !

Thx for the kind words.

Best,

Steve O.