Shooting a "gig" indoors question

For better or worse, I just offered to photograph my friends band this weekend when they play in the city (San Francisco). I just bought a camera this week, a Canon Digital Rebel Xsi, with the kit lens 18-55, this is my first DSLR moving up from a point and shoot SD800. Typically they play in very dark smallish type bars, and are a 4person band. I am just looking for some input on settings here. I know I can't get away with NOT using a flash, so what would be ideal? I don't want to wash out all the darkness with the flash at the same time. I can stand anywhere from 10-20 feet from the stage I am sure. I guess I am looking for ideal settings, aperture, ISO, and shutter speed for this. I know I don't have the best setup for this type of shooting...but honestly, I have seen their myspace page... :) All their photos were taken using my friends $150 point and shoot, so I can't do much worse!

Thanks for any advice or tips!

Josh

My advice:

Get real close, shoot wide open, ISO400 or 800, Wide angle is your friend, and use ambient light. Don't worry about the dark areas, expose for the light areas.

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Originally Posted by Sushigaijin

My advice:

Get real close, shoot wide open, ISO400 or 800, Wide angle is your friend, and use ambient light. Don't worry about the dark areas, expose for the light areas.

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Thanks. So you are suggesting not to use the flash at all than? That would be great if I could get away with that, we will see

First things that comes to mind for me is to buy a 50mm f/1.8 lens or a 430EX flash, but I don't know if you want to spend any more money. Without spending more money, I would suggest you try dragging the shutter in addition to the other advice. Set your camera's built-in flash to "Rear Curtain" or "Second Curtain" synch. (I can't remember what it's called on a Canon.) Then manually set your shutter speed to somewhere around 1/4 second so the subject is blurry, then the flash goes off at the end of the exposure to freeze your subject. You'll have to play with the aperture and ISO to get the right amount of exposure depending on the lighting. And play with the shutter speed to get different amounts of blur. Definitely try this before the concert. I wouldn't rely on this technique for the entire show, but it can produce some neat shots if you're forced to use the flash.

Paul

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Originally Posted by photophorous

First things that comes to mind for me is to buy a 50mm f/1.8 lens or a 430EX flash, but I don't know if you want to spend any more money. Without spending more money, I would suggest you try dragging the shutter in addition to the other advice. Set your camera's built-in flash to "Rear Curtain" or "Second Curtain" synch. (I can't remember what it's called on a Canon.) Then manually set your shutter speed to somewhere around 1/4 second so the subject is blurry, then the flash goes off at the end of the exposure to freeze your subject. You'll have to play with the aperture and ISO to get the right amount of exposure depending on the lighting. And play with the shutter speed to get different amounts of blur. Definitely try this before the concert. I wouldn't rely on this technique for the entire show, but it can produce some neat shots if you're forced to use the flash.

Paul

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Thanks for the input. I will try to figure out what that flash mode is on the camera and go from there. Definately sounds like I need to play with this quite a bit before Saturday, lots to try out and experiment with.

Thanks

Personally, I don't have much input on settings and such, but, the main thing I shoot is bands, and in the smaller clubs it's kind of difficult, but that's what makes it fun!

Good luck with it!

Also, what band is it, if you don't mind me asking.

You have a big advantage here with the XSi's stabilized lens. You'll need to shoot at or very close to the widest aperture (3.5-4.0 or more depending on your zoom), probably ISO800. See what kind of shutter speeds that gets you. Keep in mind that while the IS will stabilize YOU, it will not stop motion blur on the stage, so shutter speeds will still have to be reasonable if you don't want completely blurs - I'd try to keep them 1/30 and up - high is better in terms of stopping the action.

ISO1600 is also available, but I wouldn't use it unless you really can't get the shutter speeds up. It does alright on this ISO, but it's pretty grainy.

A 50mm f/1.8 is an excellent idea. The flash, maybe useful if you shoot stuff like this often; other wise, it's a lot of cash to throw down. And the 50mm will be able to shoot in the ambient light just fine, so you don't really need flash.

I prefer shots with ambient light, not flash.
So I bought the 50mm f/1.8.

You can see I'm not that good with it yet :)

Wombat, I really like that last photo!

Good job.

awesome photos! ok that was 2 people mentioning that I should get that lens, so I just ordered one on Amazon. $85 seems well worth it!

Thanks guys!

Sometimes you get lucky with the light - that's why I left it till last :)

Good call Josh, the 50mm F/1.8 is one of the optically best lenses AND best buys on the planet. It's a must-have no matter what you shoot. Just check out the several 50mm threads on this forum and you'll see why. Good luck and let us know how it works out!

The 50 1.8 will suit you great. Don't be afraid to go up to ISO 1600 or 3200. I pretty much never go below 1600, with a good exposure the noise isn't an issue at all. Even at 3200 the problem is much more the banding you get than any noise.

Good luck.

My 50mm 1.8 arrived today, very excited.

It also came with a Tiffen 52mm UV protector for free. Do you advise using this when shooting in low light areas indoors? Or should I leave it off? Where would be a good place to use it? UV I am thinking maybe outdoors.

Thanks

Just think of the UV filter as a spare lens cap. A lot of people just put the filter on and forget the cap to protect the lens, it doens't do much more than that. It can cause halos and flare sometimes, so just watch out for that.

UV filters don't do anything. Your best bet is to leave it on if you think the lens is worth protecting, especially since you got it for free.

Josh, if you absolutely must use a flash, get a 430EX, try dialing down the output to anywhere from -1 to -2, and use some kind of pocket modifier (the Lumiquest Big Bounce worked amazingly well for me when I shot in these situations - very soft, natural-looking light for a flash). And maybe use a CTO gel over the flash head.

Cranking down the shutter is often a good idea, as well.

And if you can (in the future), for the love of God, get an off-camera cord or an STE-2.

Of course, unless the lighting is really awful, I'd probably sooner crank up the ISO to 1600 and shoot au naturale.

I finally got to use my camera a little bit. Been so busy at work haven't had many chances too! Anyway here are a few shots from my friends "gig" this weekend. One thing that was out of my control was the banners, exit signs and video games. It was a bar inside a bowling alley, not the greatest of locations :)