Whats the best metering mode to shoot concerts?

[socaldiorio]

This is something I struggle with. I'd like to hear, if it's possible from a pro, who does this for a living.

I'd like to know what meter mode you chose and why.

I'm talking about a concert with professional lighting; where it's high contrast lighting. I'm talking something like Britney Spears, One Direction, drop kick murphys, hatebreed.

Thanks.

 

[robbins.photo]

I would think spot metering would be your best bet, considering that you'd be dealing with a lot of various light sources most of which would be high contrast. Center weighted or matrix would probably get thrown off pretty easily.

 

[kathyt]

I spot meter when shooting things like concerts.

 

[hirejn]

Not many people do this for a living because there's almost no living to be made at it. More important than metering is white balance. I would use daylight because then different colors would render appropriately compared to daylight, and any daylight balanced lights will be correct. If you go auto, the camera may be thrown off by lack of white in the scene. But auto is better than trying to dial in something other than daylight. The lighting changes too quickly. I recommend manual exposure. Get a reading on a consistent or normal area and lock it in. If the lighting changes from there, it'll look natural. For example, if you meter for the normal area like where the band members are, and then there's a pyrotechnic flash, the band members will be properly exposed but the flash will be brighter, as it should be. If you go auto, the camera may underexpose because of the pyrotechnics, and the exposure will change constantly with the lighting.

 

[kchoi]

In a concert, I usually use spot metering to make sure I have good exposure on the presenter's face.
White balance I choose to be auto because I can go home adjust in Lightroom.
Concert is a fast topic which mean you miss that image if you cannot press the shutter at that time. So, I think the most important is to make a correct exposure.

 

[Steve5D]

I use spot metering set my white balance to tungsten...

 

[Big Mike]

Not many people do this for a living because there's almost no living to be made at it. More important than metering is white balance. I would use daylight because then different colors would render appropriately compared to daylight, and any daylight balanced lights will be correct. If you go auto, the camera may be thrown off by lack of white in the scene. But auto is better than trying to dial in something other than daylight. The lighting changes too quickly. I recommend manual exposure. Get a reading on a consistent or normal area and lock it in. If the lighting changes from there, it'll look natural. For example, if you meter for the normal area like where the band members are, and then there's a pyrotechnic flash, the band members will be properly exposed but the flash will be brighter, as it should be. If you go auto, the camera may underexpose because of the pyrotechnics, and the exposure will change constantly with the lighting.

I agree with the advice here. Something like concerts are both very tricky and surprisingly easy. It's tricky because almost any metering mode is going to be a problem. The background is almost always going to be much darker than the performer, which would throw off any metering mode that includes the background. So the thinking is that you use spot metering to meter just the performer, but spot metering is dangerous because the second it slips off the performer (or to brighter/darker parts of them) your exposure would be all over the place.

So the best thing to do IMO, is to shoot in manual mode. You could try spot metering to get you started, but once you fine tune the exposure to where you want it to be...then you probably won't have to think about exposure or metering. If the lighting gets darker or brighter, that is part of the show and can be reflected in the photos.

But shooting in any of the automatic modes, while trying to rely on spot metering to get the right exposure....is going to be troublesome and give you wildly inconsistent photos.

 

[Rosshole]

I agree with Big Mike... you are indoors, and even with the different stage lighting doing it's thing, the ambient light is going to remain pretty constant. Find a good mix of exposure settings vs. focal length, set in manual and shoot away!