More Live Photos

[AcadieLibre]

Well since I have been absent I thought I would throw up a recent image for some critique. Shot in Toronto at the El Macambo several weeks ago. The singer is Barbara Mamabolo. Every time I go AWOL I come back the place is just hopping, nice to see. Anyway here is the image, soon I will try and post some photos that are not related to music, thats if I can recall how to shoot something not in low light and not moving.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3147/3011000797_657140264a.jpg

[EJC]

Beautiful shot! The lighting nicely brightens from the photo bottom to her cheek and nose which brings the eye to the catch light in Barbara's eye. Contrast is perfect.

Thanks for sharing it!

EJC

[Marko]

I agree - this lowlight shot is nicely captured!

[Ben H]

Very nice! Could you describe how you captured this shot? Were you using flash, no flash, a low aperture lens and/or a high ISO etc? Did you have to do noise reduction?

[AcadieLibre]

Well when I shoot bands I adjust the aperture and shutter speed depending on the stage lights. It takes me about a song to figure out the lighting persons method then I adjust for the lighting sequences. I try and keep my ISO as low as possible.

The only post processing done was the conversion to B&W. I adjust constantly all my settings, I would have to look up the metadata on that photo because I just know what my meter reading needs to be to get a certain shots, so as the show goes the ISO, Shutter Speed and Aperture setting are always changing. I never use a flash, I have a 580 ex and I think it was mounted on my camera once just to try it out. Now with the 50D I am going to have to get used to the better low light shooting it has over the 40D this was shot with. If you want I can look up the metadata for you. I recently moved to Lightroom 2 and added two more external drives and changed everything around and I made a mess of my file system so I would have to go looking for it.

I saw you asked a similar question on another photo, I apologize, I go to reply then someone or something comes up and I forget to post ... old age seems to be kicking in ....

[Ben H]

Thanks - I'm basically interested because I'd like to improve my low light abilities, so it's useful to know what's working for other people. These shots you've posted are impressive as you've retained the natural feel, the atmosphere of the place, and still have a sharp subject without blur. I take it these are hand-held shots?

I'm using a 450D so the low light performance in terms of ISO/noise should be broadly similar. I don't have any fast lenses yet - I'm going to pick up a 50mm 1.8 at some point, so the lenses are a weak point for me when low light shooting.

So, yeah, I'm not really a numbers-freak, I'm just curious as to roughly where you are shooting in terms of ISO and lenses etc - so if you could dig out the rough details, that would be cool. Basically, I'd be pleased to get low-light shots that come closer to yours, and I'm not anywhere near there yet... ;)

[AcadieLibre]

Roughly between 1000 and 1600 but mostly in the 1600 and at times I have gone 3200 I think is my cameras H. I use mostly 2.8 lenses to shoot in these environments I find them fast enough for how I shoot.

Yes hand held. I have faster prime lenses but I don't like the inability not to have zoom feature just too important to me. I find primes are far to limiting but if you are just starting out on a budget prime is the obvious way to go. With a prime 50mm at 1.4 you should be shooting no higher than 1600 and more likely 800 to 1250 range.

That being said all clubs are different, so you just need to adjust for them. It is easier to learn where your meter needs to be for what you expect. My fingers never stop moving, I change every setting on the fly while I am shooting and my eye never leaves the viewer, learning to make quick and fast changes is important.

Knowing how over or under exposed you need to be is the best way for figure what you need. If I want to catch some one in movement like the drummer your going to more than likely use your highest ISO setting so the shutter speed can be as fast as his hands move.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3061/3018578357_9acb4227d7.jpg

[Ben H]

Roughly between 1000 and 1600 but mostly in the 1600 and at times I have gone 3200 I think is my cameras H. I use mostly 2.8 lenses to shoot in these environments I find them fast enough for how I shoot.

Ok thanks. Yeah, I've been doing 800 but I'm kinda scared to go to 1600 on my camera for noise reasons. It's just one of those things where I'm going to have to experiment and find the places where I know where the acceptable and unacceptable limits are on my gear, what I can get away with and what I can't.

Thanks for the info though, very useful.

[AcadieLibre]

Sometimes you have no choice in using your higher ISO settings, just get a noise reduction plugin or program. I have on occasion found it invaluable. I have found I rarely use it, but sometimes you have a shot and it is really good but the noise is to high, so run it through the noise reduction and it fixes it for the most part, not as good as a clear low ISO shot but some clubs are so dark you have no choice but to use your cameras max ISO.