by successfulbob | commercial photography, Lumix GH4, Lumix Lounge, musician photography, people photography
Sound Bites Grill keeps bringing new acts to the Sedona area. The latest is Andrea Marie and the Magnolias Band from Austin, Texas. Andrea has one sweet yet powerful voice. You can check out their latest CD sound here.
Here’s the artwork for the Wall of Fame at Sound Bites.
You can follow and like the band on their FaceBook page.
The images to put this together were captured with a Lumix GH4 and the 35-100mm f2.8 Leica Lens. The GH4 has a great density range to capture the full range of tones even under LED lighting. ISO 3200 f2.8 approx 1/50 sec.
Yours in Creative Photography, Bob
by successfulbob | Lumix GH4, Lumix Lounge, musician photography, people photography, photography, photography education
RJ CAN WAIL!
Lots of high energy from the rockin’ blues band RJ Harman and Company! I told you I like to practice and play on my vacations. It gives me a chance to stretch and add to my bag of tricks with no pressure. Last night I went to the Blue Rooster in Sarasota to hear RJ and Company. Based in Orlando this harmonica driven band has toured all over the United States, played with many national touring acts and hold numerous titles from the International Blues Challenge.
RJ Harmon and Company live at the Blue Rooster in Sarasota, FL
Lumix GH4 with 35-100mm f2.8 VARIO lens 1/80 sec f2.8 3200 ISO
I had my trusty Lumix GH4 on hand for the festivities and it really helps to have the density range of the camera and the speed of the glass when photographing stage lighting. I used to have to shoot multiple images and blend them together in post but now with a few tweaks in Adobe Camera RAW I have details in the shadows and highlights are not blown out.
I also decided to have some fun with motion and the 12 FPS on the camera gets a nice series of images to create animated gifs.
Here’s the drummer and RJ with approximately 40 images stitched into gifs
Yours in Creative Photography, Bob
by successfulbob | fine art musician portrait, Lumix GH4, musician photography, photography
The ‘Wall of Fame’ grows at Sound Bites Grill in Sedona, Arizona.
Last week Eddie Diamond and the AZ Diamond Band put on quite a show and I was there with my Lumix GH4 to capture the action and create the art pieces. The GH4 works well for this kind of work. It has a pretty large dynamic range which is helpful when working with the LED stage lighting. The best way to capture the moment you are looking for is to anticipate the performer’s movements and shoot at the peak of action. Some performers best moments are fleeting so the high Frame Rate of 12 frames per second can be of great help. Here’s Eddie during the show of his Neal Diamond tribute…
Eddie Diamond ‘Wall of Fame’ image.
Using Adobe Photoshop, layers, textures, Blend Modes and masks is how I work the artistic portion of creating the images. There’s now around 70 WOF photos hanging at the restaurant. Each one has a different treatment and while they all have a similar artistic feel each is and original. I really enjoy this project because I have to stretch to keep coming up with new techniques and push to keep the looks different. Here’s the whole band…
Eddie Diamond Band
Each musician is photographed separately during the performance then selected and placed into the composition. The signature autographs are gathered before the performance, scanned, inverted and then placed in the photos. If we had to try and get the autographs after the design and printing of the images most would be blank.
Yours in Creative Photography, Bob
by successfulbob | commercial photography, fine art musician portrait, graphic design, musician photography, people photography, photography
Received a wonderful email today! Thought I’d share with you.
Hi Bob:
Just a quick note to let you know that Smokin’ Blues won Best Acoustic Blues Album 2014 at the BBMAs (Blues Blast magazine Awards) last week. I went to the ceremonies in Illinois and it was amazing. I played and got to meet a bunch of heavy people…
The mag is going to run a feature story on me and Smokin’ Blues – You can see it on line and I think it comes out this Thursday. If not, the following Thursday. Your art work is getting some major coverage – their website gets over 2,000,000 hits a month with subscriptions in the USA and over 90 countries.
Thank you so much for all of your support Bob. Best to Holly and also the crew…
mark
Mark T. Small – voted Best Acoustic Blues Album 2014 – Blues Blast Magazine (critics choice & peoples choice)
Solo Delta & Chicago Style Blues
www.marktsmall.com
“We are all faced with a series of great opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations.” – Charles Swindoll
Here’s the reason Mark sent the email. I named the album, designed his CD cover and marketing materials for Smokin’ Blues. So excited for Mark. He works so hard at his craft and it’s great to see him rewarded!
Smokin’ Blues CD album cover for Mark T Small buy the album here I think you’ll like it!
Yours in Creative Photography, Bob
by successfulbob | black & white, musician photography, people photography, photography, photography education, photoshop tutorial
If you send out press releases or images for ads that will be appearing in newspapers I highly recommend a few steps to ensure that you get good looking images when the paper goes to print.
Eric Miller image converted to black and white using the LAB mode in Photoshop with a curves bump.
Number one – Do not send a color image unless it is possible the image is going to be printed in color. Many times in the newspaper world since they are on deadline and shorthanded the conversion from a color image to black and white is to desaturate the image. Period. There is no consideration for the tones or where they fall or what colors are going to come forward. I highly recommend using a method I have made with a Photoshop Action.
Convert the file to LAB Color Mode In the Channels Palette Select the B Channel and Delete it. Then Select and Delete Channel Alpha 2. Convert the file to Greyscale Mode. Convert the file to RGB Mode. Add a Curves Adjustment Layer. Pull down on the 3/4 tone and up on the 1/4 tone in the Curves Dialog box adding contrast to the image.
This makes for a pretty clean BW and with the Curves Adjustment Layer you can make changes to the highlights and shadows if necessary before saving the file. If you would like this action already complete rather than building it yourself send me an email and I’ll get it to you.
The other thing that will help your image stand out in newsprint is to sharpen your image until it almost looks too crunchy on your screen and when printed with the spread of ink it will be sharp in print. If an image is not ‘over sharpened’ this way the spread of ink will make it look soft. Here’s what I do…
Flatten the image. Go to Filter > Sharpen > Unsharp Mask with these settings – Amount 500% Radius 1.7 Threshold 7. Your image will look frightening! Wait there’s more… Go to Edit > Fade Unsharp Mask Change the Mode to Luminousity and fade to 40% Opacity. Your image will look a bit sharp but will print beautifully on newsprint at these settings. Want that action? Email me.
Conversion and sharpening will make your images stand out from the rest…
Yours in Creative Photography, Bob
by successfulbob | Lumix GH4, Lumix Lounge, musician photography, photography, photography education, photography gear
Country music soundin’ GOOD!
Moot Davis Band had them on the dance floor at Sound Bites Grill in Sedona, Arizona last Wednesday night. Holly and I were there for dinner and the music and were not disappointed on either count…
Sometimes, in my mind, country music can get a little maudlin… I’m not one for crying in my beer so when they say a country music band is coming to town I’m not usually too thrilled. Well that thought jumped out of my head within the first couple songs once the band started to play. This is a really talented group of musicians. Moot has a great voice and the band has wonderful instrumentation occasionally leaning a little toward rock with Bill giving some great guitar licks.
We ended up staying until the last note faded away and had a great time.
Moot Davis Band photo created for the Sound Bites Grill ‘Wall of Fame’.
The individual images were captured with the Lumix GH4 and the 35-100mm f2.8 Vario Lens. I’m finding the stage photography is much easier with the GH4 especially with the LED stage lighting. The camera reaches into the shadows and keeps the highlights from blowing out when you use the shadow highlights curves setting to boost the shadows and hold down the highlights.
Each musician was layered into the image and multiple textures were added using blend modes to create the painterly feel…
Yours in Creative Photography, Bob
