by successfulbob | black & white, commercial photography, fine art musician portrait, graphic design, Lumix GX7, Lumix Lounge, musician photography, people photography, photography, photography education
If you follow my blog and life you’ll see that I’m a music fan. Photographing live music is something that I have been devoting myself to and adding in creating art for the musicians. When something like the Old Town Center for the Arts annual Blues Fest comes along I am in hog heaven. It gives me a chance to photograph and practice new techniques.
Tommy Dukes, Arizona Blues Hall of Fame member. Artistic Photoshop work from blues fest performance. Original capture with Lumix GX7 35-100.. 2.8 lens. Impressive Art filter. Layers and textures add to final art mix.
Did I say it gives me a chance to practice? I believe practicing is as important to photographers as it is to musicians, athletes or anyone else who needs to have the skill of working under pressure. Changing settings, working in new lighting (and often challenging) conditions is something you need to be able to work with almost without thinking so you can capture the essence of a performer. In this case I was playing with some of the presets in the camera and finding some cool looks. In order for you to access the camera pre-sets after downloading you need to capture the images as jpegs. For safety sake and to have all the info presented to the camera you can save as RAW plus jpeg.
Tommy was quite animated and his shirt added to the life of the performance. Capture with Impressive Art filter then layers of texture added to foreground and background.
Then I self assign creation of CD covers, music and musician art and share the ideas with the artists and their marketing people. This has led to being hired to do the work I enjoy. Hmm. Practice. Self assignments. Sharing. Marketing. People often ask me how I get the images I do and the work I want to do. Re-read the last paragraph again and you’ve got he answer. When are you starting your next personal project?
Pretty much straight out of the GX7 camera using the monochrome art setting. Pretty clean black and white!
Straight out of camera with the Impressive Art setting on the Lumix GX7
Yours in Photography, Bob
by successfulbob | commercial photography, fine art musician portrait, Lumix GX7, Lumix Lounge, musician photography, people photography, photography
One of the jobs I really enjoy involves taking the art techniques I’ve been developing and using them for my commercial clients. These have been created for the Sound Bites Grill Wall of Fame. Musicians are photographed live during their performances and then I create 8×10’s for display at the restaurant. It’s an increasing challenge (which I love!) to have a slightly different look for each artist. Here are a drummer, guitarist and keyboard player as part of the latest installment…
Jazz Guitarist, composer and Recording Engineer Peter Sprague of Road Work Ahead
at Sound Bites Grill Show Lounge
Road Work Ahead Keyboard Player, composer and arranger Bill Mays jams
at the Sound Bites Grill Jazz Fest Jam in Sedona
Jim Plank, drummer and percussionist for Road Work Ahead plays on the
Sound Bites Show Lounge stage at the Jazz Jam in March.
Images were captured with the Panasonic Lumix GX7 using the 35-100 (70-200 35mm equivalent) 2.8 lens ISO 2500. This is a great combo for getting intimate images without getting too close to the stage. For some of the captures in the future I might bump the ISO up another notch to get just a bit more shutter speed when the performers are moving.
One of the most important parts of my job is to not be obtrusive when capturing performers. I am very conscious of the guests and not disturbing their enjoyment at performances. The GX7 and lens combo is small and helps me remain low key but strangely enough looks pro enough to get inquiries all the time about what type of camera I’m working with.
After the show images are downloaded. Musicians are separated from the background using Adobe Photoshop’s various selection techniques and placed on their own layer. At that point I can start the art part… Adding shadows, textures, blending modes and lighting effects that were not on the stage.
Yours in Photography, Bob
by successfulbob | commercial photography, event, photography
Continuing coverage of the Sedona International Film Festival still on Saturday… Opening day festivities include eight movies, ribbon cutting, and opening day party.
A packed house at the Sedona International Film Festival at Sedona Performing Arts Center with performer ‘Paolo’ warming up the house for the movie Redwood Highway.
Entertainer Paolo on stage at Sedona Perfoming Arts Center during SIFF
Let’s get this thing off the ground!! SIFF Board at official ribbon cutting to kick
off the Sedona International Film Festival.
The kick-off party for SIFF was held at Sound Bites Grill a the Hyatt Pinon Point in Sedona.
Estaban & Teresa Joy stop in for a few songs at Sound Bites Grill during opening Sedona Film Fest opening party!
PS Regular performances starting March 1st!
Sir Harrison & his band perform with dancers at Sound Bites Grill.
End day one at the festival. More tomorrow!
Yours in Photography, Bob
by successfulbob | commercial photography, Lumix GX7, photography, photography education, photography gear
Serendipity. That’s a lovely word. It’s musical in sound. And can add musical notes to your photography and it comes around more often if you keep your camera close at hand all the time.
Having dinner at Sound Bites Grill in Sedona last night and came across this snifter sitting on the bar with beautiful light all around so I fired off a few frames. Love the colors. Enjoy the soft background. This would make a great illustration for a newspaper or magazine article about bars, cocktails or many other subjects. I am always looking for things like this for my stock files but also just to study light, shape, form and how the camera sees so if I need to create something like this for a bar or restaurant advertising image in the future I’ll have it in my arsenal.
‘Snifter on bar’ was captured with a Lumix GX7 and the f2.8 35mm to 100mm at 89mm iso 800 at f2.8 at 1/10 sec. The camera was sitting on the bar for support to keep the slow shutter speed from blurring the image. My GX7 is with me most of the time… And with the Think Tank small pouch on my belt I’ve got plenty of lenses too.
by successfulbob | black & white, commercial photography, photography, photography education
UNCOMFORTABLE!
That’s how most people describe their foray in being in front of a camera. I believe that three quarters or more of my job is to get people to open up their real personality… And the only way to do that is to coach people through the experience and have them feel good.
I can do that. I know, because when I was working on a nude art calendar to raise money for the Sedona Arts Center people were SO comfortable that halfway through many sessions I would have to remind them to cover up while we were reviewing images.
Alberto Salas wanted a quick solid business portrait for use by the marketing team for Wells Fargo. He came with very specific instructions on the file format and cropping. But within that I think I caught the sparkle in his eye and by taking a slightly higher camera angle made him look friendly and approachable. The person in the photograph is looking up at the viewer making the viewer be above in a more powerful position. Think about camera angles when trying to sell what your subject wants to say. If you want to portray more powerful, strong personality take a lower angle so the person in the photo is looking slightly down at the viewer. Remember it doesn’t take much…
Alberto walked in the door, I set up the lighting, got him comfortable with conversation, created his portrait, retouched the image and burned the files to disk. And, he was done in about one half hour.
I choose a modified split lighting pattern. Note the shadow side of Alberto’s face. Shadow creates form and depth and what is usually missing from a non-professional executive portrait.
I highly recommend that you do the black and white conversion so someone is not tempted to push the grey-scale button that causes the loss of contrast in the image.
by successfulbob | black & white, commercial photography, Lumix GX7, Lumix Lounge, musician photography, photography, photography education, success education
He was wailing on the guitar.
Strangely enough it was in front of the stucco wall in back of my house. Light reflected from the red rock gravel underfoot. I kept cheering him on and on!! A crowd of one exciting the performer in him until I knew we had the intense performance look we wanted for the back of his latest guitar CD cover…
Robin Miller with his new CD Electric Atmosphere a collection of guitar music. He signed the insert with the same image, “Bob, Thank you for your awesome talent.” Robin Miller – Here’s a link to check out his music. Very cool!
But wait. This job was secured because I now have a camera that accompanies me almost all the time… I ran into Robin at work playing his music at Tlaquepaque Village (yeah it took me a long time to learn how to say that name too) In an offhand way he asked if I was available to create a musician portrait photo for his next CD. I quickly changed some settings on my Lumix GX7 camera… SQUARE CROP. ILLUSTRATIVE ART SETTING. ADJUST TO BLACK & WHITE. Fired off a few frames. Showed Robin the look I had in mind for him. A smile spread across his face from ear to ear and we agreed to shoot the final image back at my place. The rest as they say is history…
How many times have you been without a camera because it was too much of a PIA to carry around? Mine is my new constant companion because of the small size and quality of the file and glass… WAHOOOO!
Oh, and I just happened to have my camera with me to catch this shot of Robin with the finished CD…
