Bands and concert photos, Bottom Liner asked for a thread title change

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > Creative Convention > The Dorkroom > Bands and concert photos, Bottom Liner asked for a thread title change

Zoowick: Apr 9, 2007; Making fifteen year old girls looks like whores since 2006

Awesome info, this is something I have been wanting to get more into. I'm sure I'll have some questions as I make some attempts at marketing for this sort of thing.

# ¿ Mar 6, 2009 06:29

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# ¿ Apr 29, 2024 08:06

Zoowick: Apr 9, 2007; Making fifteen year old girls looks like whores since 2006

I went digging for some of my old band work. Figured I'd post a few here.

I love doing these, when I take the groom and groomsmen at weddings for pics I always act like it's a band promo shoot.

# ¿ Mar 8, 2009 22:10

Zoowick: Apr 9, 2007; Making fifteen year old girls looks like whores since 2006

Bottom Liner posted:

I do the exact same thing with weddings. People always say my groomsmen pictures are better than my bridesmaids, and I tell it's because they aren't as willing to have fun with it.

I'll post some of my favorites and examples and stuff tonight, as well as answer your questions phootnote.

I definitely want to see some of your rockstarish wedding shots, I'll post some of mine later as well.

# ¿ Mar 8, 2009 22:45

Zoowick: Apr 9, 2007; Making fifteen year old girls looks like whores since 2006

rockcity posted:

Awesome, I'm glad someone finally made this thread. I've been shooting concerts for about 5 years now. I moved this summer and have since slowed down just because I haven't gotten into the scene down here in Orlando and established myself. I've still only done one promo shoot, but I loved the photo that came out of it and so did the band along with everyone who's seen it. I plan to buy an AB800 this summer and start doing some promo stuff again. There is an awesome young photographer around here by the name of Gage Young who does some amazing band promo photos and somehow he's only 18. I want to do some assisting for him to get a good idea of how to best use my lighting options and get a grasp on the whole posing groups.

As for my background, I started when I was 17 shooting some local shows until I got lucky and scored a photo pass to shoot AFI. That was the show that got me addicted. I worked by butt off after that and got a job working with the Michigan Daily at U of M and that got me into pretty much any show I ever wanted to cover, from little 100 person shows at dive bars to shooting Justin Timberlake, Christina Aguilera, Aerosmith, you name it. I've always had my own website, Rock City Photography, it sucks and I haven't updated it in ages with new photos. I graduated a year ago so since then I've only shot for my site or a metal web-show/zine called Metal Injection

I can honestly say this is the best hobby I could ever imagine. I make very little money off of any of it, but free shows more than makes up for it to me. I haven't paid to go to a concert in about 4 years and for a while there I was doing at least one a week. It's led me to meet a lot of awesome people in the music industry be it bands, managers or just employees at the venues. The more you become close with those people, the better your photos get. It helps to be friendly to all of them. Getting to know the staff will get you good tips about the venue and maybe get the lighting guy to not suck so much. Getting to know band managers can get you on the side stage or even sitting next to the drummer (I like that spot) and getting to know the bands can lead to awesome posed photos mid-song.

This is getting me excited for my boy Craig to make it down here for his shows on Thursday and Friday so I can do some shooting again, even though it's just acoustic stuff.

Edit: I will leave you with probably my favorite concert photo I've ever taken from a few years back.

That is one bad-rear end photo.

# ¿ Mar 11, 2009 05:12

Zoowick: Apr 9, 2007; Making fifteen year old girls looks like whores since 2006

I finally got to do another promo shoot. I wish I had more of these.

# ¿ Apr 6, 2009 17:57

Zoowick: Apr 9, 2007; Making fifteen year old girls looks like whores since 2006

HPL posted:

How do you keep the lighting so even? I find there's ALWAYS one guy in the group with skin so white it's blow-out city when lighting for the group as a whole. Maybe I need to start doing promos for Reggae bands or something.

I HIGHLY recommend http://www.onelightworkshop.com/DVD_Ordering.html Zack Arias's One Light DVD. A ton of technical stuff but done in a hands-on way. I learned a lot of my lighting stuff from this DVD.

# ¿ Apr 6, 2009 19:10

Zoowick: Apr 9, 2007; Making fifteen year old girls looks like whores since 2006

pwn posted:

Seconded. Inverse square law

Yup, that info alone helped me even out my lighting.

# ¿ Apr 6, 2009 20:51

Zoowick: Apr 9, 2007; Making fifteen year old girls looks like whores since 2006

Had another band in today. I am working on trying to get hooked into a local venue to get some bigger names. We'll see what happens.

# ¿ Apr 9, 2009 01:13

Zoowick: Apr 9, 2007; Making fifteen year old girls looks like whores since 2006

HPL posted:

Love your choice of settings. Some of the photos are overprocessed, but I know that's the client's preference, not yours.

I could swear I saw the inside of that clock tower in someone's PAD photo.

I use the tower every so often, I'm sure I've poster tower pics there before.

# ¿ Apr 9, 2009 04:29

Zoowick: Apr 9, 2007; Making fifteen year old girls looks like whores since 2006

evil_bunnY posted:

He posts shots of that thing pretty often. You have to admit, it's a pretty rad location.

I put together a video of the studio, building and some video of inside the clock tower.

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1374420144#/video/video.php?v=1051564089261&ref=mf

# ¿ Apr 10, 2009 21:18

Zoowick: Apr 9, 2007; Making fifteen year old girls looks like whores since 2006

Nihiliste posted:

See, now that's an unfair advantage.

Question though - would you charge the fees you do if you didn't have access to a studio?

I do mostly location work except in the winter so I probably would. I know there are strictly location photographers that charge premium prices. If you're good (or at least your clients think you are) and know how to market yourself you can charge whatever you want.

# ¿ Apr 11, 2009 05:00

Zoowick: Apr 9, 2007; Making fifteen year old girls looks like whores since 2006

Bottom Liner posted:

Hey zoo, just a quick tip that would help a lot of those photos. When you process like that blue jeans really standout in the photo, so I usually drop the blue saturation a bit to get the jeans looking back to normal-ish. Give it a try on the crazier ones, I'm sure you'll like the difference.

After I read that it's all I see now, thanks for ruining my pictures for me. Thanks for the tip

# ¿ Apr 11, 2009 05:01

Zoowick: Apr 9, 2007; Making fifteen year old girls looks like whores since 2006

Knux posted:

Shooting bands is all about making friends with bands and having them spread your name. If you take awesome shots of a band they will refer every other band they play with where they got their photos. Myspace is an amazing place for a band photographer to make some cash. Just make everyone that uses your promos throw you in their top 8 and just wait.

Click for big:

Set Up

I used to over post-process my shots but have since toned down into a generally 'normal' looking style.

Live used to be my thing but I havn't been shooting that nearly as much as I used to.

Beautiful lighting. I love these and I love the fact the you write up your lighting set-ups. It's people like you that make other photographers better. Thanks

# ¿ Apr 13, 2009 05:15

Zoowick: Apr 9, 2007; Making fifteen year old girls looks like whores since 2006

I shot my first live show last night and hated it. Definitely not my thing. I was contacted last minute and asked if I wanted to shoot so I gave it a try. The opening act was "The big take over"

Followed by Jefferson Starship.

Some backstage hangin' out shots.

RAW saved these images. I don't usually shoot RAW but stuff like this it's almost a must.

# ¿ Apr 17, 2009 15:21

Zoowick: Apr 9, 2007; Making fifteen year old girls looks like whores since 2006

HPL posted:

So exactly what about it did you not like? I'm just curious as a guy that started in concerts and is expanding into portraits whereas you're the opposite. Was it the lack of control over the environment? Your shots turned out about as good as anyone could ask for.

And yeah, now you see why we're all baffled when you say that you shoot JPG all the time.

The lack of control. I feel uncomfortable in that kind of environment as well. I'm not much of a schmoozer so I end up in a lot of awkward conversations. I just felt like I couldn't be my normal artistic self, to much going on.

# ¿ Apr 17, 2009 16:16

Zoowick: Apr 9, 2007; Making fifteen year old girls looks like whores since 2006

Had another promo session today. I wish I could do these full time.

# ¿ May 1, 2009 04:14

Zoowick: Apr 9, 2007; Making fifteen year old girls looks like whores since 2006

Another band promo. They wanted the guitarist getting the poo poo kicked out of him.

# ¿ Aug 20, 2009 16:19

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# ¿ Apr 29, 2024 08:06

Zoowick: Apr 9, 2007; Making fifteen year old girls looks like whores since 2006

rockcity posted:

Not bad, but they look like bastardized versions of Joey L's photo shoot with protest the hero.

You got it. Huge fan of his.

# ¿ Aug 20, 2009 16:57

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > Creative Convention > The Dorkroom > Bands and concert photos, Bottom Liner asked for a thread title change