Notes

As I mentioned in my previous post, the lighting and setup for this show made shooting quite the challenge. I was forced to stick to the side of the stage for much of Brontide’s set, hence the preponderance of shots of guitarist Timothy Hancock. Drummer William Bowerman (ex-I Was A Cub Scout) and bassist Nathan Fairweather sadly got little in the way of look-ins for this shoot. As for the shots themselves, I stuck with a similar formula to my Rolo Tomassi shots, but, following a bit of prodding from my friend Craig, I decided this time to embrace the grain/noise in the shots, and left them much as they appear straight out of the camera.

As ever, click for larger views, and check out the full gallery at the bottom of the post.

Notes

I have a very strange relationship with Rolo Tomassi. I’ve shot them far more times than any other band, but very rarely am I happy with my shots of them. I can’t explain it, but as a massive fan of theirs, it frustrates me that I haven’t yet faithfully represented the full technicolour marvel that their live show is with my shots.

To an extent, I have similar feelings towards this show – the lighting at Night & Day cafe is so unhelpful for a photographer, and with flash units not behaving properly, I had to cut my losses and go down the black and white route to make the best of the situation. Throwing caution to the wind, I decided to crank the ISO on my camera to 6,400 (and occasinally 12,800) in order to keep shutter speeds down to about 1/100th of a second. Thankfully, the noise reduction tools found in Lightroom 3 really came through with these shots, and excessive noise isn’t presenting itself too badly with these shots.

As ever, it was a pleasure to shoot for the Tomassi crew – I rarely miss a chance to catch them on tour when possible, and recommend you do the same (their tour with Dillinger Escape Plan this autumn is going to be off the chain!)

Click any of the above shots for a larger view, or check out more shots in the gallery below!

Click the photo for a larger view and to read the accompanying article.

Notes

PABH playing live on home turf is a show that no one should miss if they get the chance, and as crazy as their Manchester show was earlier in the week, this show was fully insane – I twice got my camera kicked out of my hand during their set. Another thing that really struck me (sorry about the pun) was the great feeling of celebration that was present through the whole evening – the packed out Brude full of support and love for the Horses guys, and they repayed that in full with an utter blinder of a set.

Shooting-wise, I used two off camera flashes to provide a bit of fill/bounce – the Brude is otherwise ridiculously dark to shoot in. At least one of the flashes is visible in the shots above (one was stage left, and the other stage right). Otherwise, I stuck mostly to my 15mm fisheye and 30mm Sigma for this show – wide angles rule!

As ever, it was a real pleasure to shoot for the PABH guys – I love getting the chance to catch them live, and I’m stoked to be seeing them on a bigger stage soon, supporting Muse – it should be ace! For now, though, check out more shots in the gallery below, and feel free to comment if you like the pics.

Notes

The guys from Big Mr Doom hadn’t given too many specifics in advance about what they wanted out of this shoot, so we started off just sitting in the pub chatting over our various ideas. We decided on two particular styles, the first of which resulted in the composite image at the top of this post – the guys stood still (ish) for a few minutes, whilst I took tight shots of details of their clothing/hands etc. These images were then all overlayed on a wide shot featuring both bandmembers from the waist up. The second “urban” look was shot under railway arches not far from Leeds city centre. We wanted a fairly dark look overall, so decided against flash usage, and just used what existing light there was. Prime lenses were the order of the day for this shoot, with most of the images relying on apertures of f2 or larger.

As ever, click for larger views, or check out more images in the gallery below.

Notes

This was my first time shooting at Santiago’s, and I really wasn’t sure what to expect in the slightest. Upon arrival, I first saw the tiny venue, then gave the room a once over, utterly failing to find any white space to bounce flash off of. In times like that, my natural instinct is to stick to basics and shoot with on camera flash. I fired up through a stofen diffuser (to soften the light a bit), and got involved with my widest-angle lenses. Almost all of these shots were taken on my new Canon 16-35L lens, which came in mega-handy in this case.

As for the look of the shots, I wanted to give them a kind of DIY feel, so figured high-contrast, high-grain black and white would be suitably crusty for these guys. Next time I shoot here, I might give bounced flash a bit of a go, and whack the ISO right up on the camera – grain ahoy!

As ever, click any of the shots above for a larger view, or check out more pictures in the gallary below.

My buddies Jon and Sarah put on one of the coolest weddings I’ve ever been to, and were keen to get some shots put in the local paper, for the next issue. As such, we had a quick shoot with the band, and I rushed a few edits through so they’ll make the print deadline. I’ll keep you posted if I can get my hands on a tearsheet! Don’t forget to click the shots for larger views and to experience the full blood-curdling monstrosity of it all! Brains, brains, brains.

Check out more shots below the cut!

Notes

I kept this shoot pretty straight, as there were strict rules in place forbidding the use of flash. As such, I was relying on the concert photographer’s bread and butter – high ISO, wide open aperture, and fingers crossed! The lighting was predominantly from behind the band, so I tried to shoot for a silhouette-style look. Thankfully, the colours used in the lighting scheme were much more varied than the standard red wash throughout, so this provided a fair variety of looks. I dimed the saturation a little in post, but otherwise the shots here are pretty much untreated.

As ever, click any of the above shots for a larger view, or have a look through the gallery below for more shots!

Living in Leeds brings many pleasures, few greater than stopping by Opposite cafe for a hot cup of goodness. I got called in for a favour recently, to take some shots of the coffee-making process in action for an upcoming magazine article on the cafe. With the promise of a free brew in exchange, who was I to turn down the offer!

Notes

This shoot was a real pleasure, as it was so much more relaxed than my typical scene of shooting metal shows. Opposite is based in a big glass-topped plaza, so natural light was in abundance, so I could shoot at really comfortable speeds with no trouble at all.

These shots should be in print before too long – I’ll keep you updated when I know more!

As ever, click for large views, or check out more shots in the gallery below.

Notes

Having shot Haste The Day at this venue before, I had a good idea of what look I was going for with these shots. I placed wireless flashes on either side of the stage, and occasionally used a hand held unit to provide a bit of front-lighting to even things out a bit. As ever, introducing more flashes into the mix makes shooting way more unpredictable/tricky, but I dialled in some solid levels without too much trouble. The starbursts seen when shooting across the stage may be a little cheesy, but I’ll take that over shooting without flash in a venue like this any day.

As ever, click any of the above shots for a larger view, or check out more shots in the gallery below!