Settings for Live Music photography

[sam_justice]

I've been looking at a lot live music photos recently and one thing has bugged me (being a beginner). The thing that boggles me is how do you get such a sharp image with (presumably) quite a high fstop (and I'm not just talking about the artists, also the backgrounds appear incredibly sharp) I was just wondering what lens/settings you guys use/would use in a situation like that.

I'm thinking a prime lens would be a good idea for the length the aperture can go to?

Correct me if wrong!

 

[Misfitlimp]

I've been looking at a lot live music photos recently and one thing has bugged me (being a beginner). The thing that boggles me is how do you get such a sharp image with (presumably) quite a high fstop (and I'm not just talking about the artists, also the backgrounds appear incredibly sharp) I was just wondering what lens/settings you guys use/would use in a situation like that.

I'm thinking a prime lens would be a good idea for the length the aperture can go to?

Correct me if wrong!

I was wondering the same thing.

 

[swmocity]

2.8 lens or faster

 

[FitzTML]

DOF is narrower the closer you are. A fast telephoto is the likely culprit. Do you have a link to any of the work you like?

 

[NateS]

I've been looking at a lot live music photos recently and one thing has bugged me (being a beginner). The thing that boggles me is how do you get such a sharp image with (presumably) quite a high fstop (and I'm not just talking about the artists, also the backgrounds appear incredibly sharp) I was just wondering what lens/settings you guys use/would use in a situation like that.

I'm thinking a prime lens would be a good idea for the length the aperture can go to?

Correct me if wrong!

You don't want a high fstop, you want a low fstop (large aperture). I would definitely shoot primes if I had a desire to do a lot of this style shooting. I'd probably be looking at the following setup

Nikon 35mm f1.8, Sigma 50mm f1.4 HSM (or Nikon's f1.8 if a tight budget), and Nikon 85mm f1.4 (or the f1.8 if on a tight budget).

I think you'd be fine probably with just the 50mm and 85mm since you are going to want to leave a little space between you and the band anyway.

I don't think f2.8 is going to be quite enough for low lighting band shots. I'd want at least f1.8 and plan to use a fairly high iso even at those apertures.

 

[gsgary]

Manual exposure, ISO3200 when i need (most of the time) lenses 300mmF2.8L,200mmF2.8L, 50mmF1.4 and never use flash
this shot
50mmF1.4,ISO3200, F6.3, 1/100

200mmF2.8L, ISO3200, F5, 1/640

 

[sam_justice]

Manual exposure, ISO3200 when i need (most of the time) lenses 300mmF2.8L,200mmF2.8L, 50mmF1.4 and never use flash
this shot
50mmF1.4,ISO3200, F6.3, 1/100

200mmF2.8L, ISO3200, F5, 1/640

Wow that's far less noise than I was expecting for such a high iso.

 

[gsgary]

Manual exposure, ISO3200 when i need (most of the time) lenses 300mmF2.8L,200mmF2.8L, 50mmF1.4 and never use flash
this shot
50mmF1.4,ISO3200, F6.3, 1/100

200mmF2.8L, ISO3200, F5, 1/640

Wow that's far less noise than I was expecting for such a high iso.

It's down to exposure, they look better in print

 

[snaggle]

You also have to remember that most stages are very small. A large bar stage is 20'X15' so you dont have lots of background to blur.

 

[Bigmojo]

I shoot lots of live music. DSLR's offer suprising low light performance these days. I use a 5d mkII and am happy to push to even 3200 if I have to. (I dont like to go too high because I found that if I have pushed the ISO and theire is a lot of black in the image, this is where the noise shows up the most.

However, If I get a shot thats a bit noisy because i had to push the ISO I use imagenomic's noiseware professional photoshop plug in, which I have found particularly useful. Its their cheapest plug in iirc
http://www.imagenomic.com/nwpg.aspx

it strips away noise like you wouldn't believe and I've turned results from my Powershot G10 round with this which I've had to take in if I dont have a press pass.