Last Saturday night I was on hand to photograph not one but two wonderful artists at Sound Bites Grill in Sedona, Arizona.
Part of my job there is to capture the musicians live on stage and create artwork for the Sound Bites Grill ‘Wall of Fame’. The other part of my gig is to create ‘straight’ photography images to help in promotion and things like press releases for when the artist returns for a future performance.
Here’s a description from his web site where you can check out his music. (I particularly like ‘Everlasting Desire’!) “Propulsive, melodic rock guitar in the hands of Grant Ferguson is a powerful reminder of the instrument’s glory days. Influenced by some of the great axe masters: Jeff Beck, Gary Moore, The Edge and others, Ferguson is pushing his all-instrumental sound toward a new rock vision.”
Grant Ferguson makin’ some beautiful sounds flow from his guitar. – Camera Lumix GX8
Live on stage at Sound Bites – Camera Lumix GH4
Grant captured with the new Lumix GX8. All images used the Lumix 35-100mm f2.8 lens
Following Grant’s set there was a break and we heard from Blues guitarist Leroy Miller.
A little about Leroy from his web site. Check his music (Try Over You from the self titled album) “Los Angeles blues sensation Leroy Miller has worked on countless recordings for music’s brightest stars like John Mayer, Macy Gray and Smash Mouth. Leroy has toured all over the world as a supporting act for bands such as Aerosmith and the Dave Mathews Band.”
Leroy Miller got the crowd up and dancing with his high energy rock guitar. Camera GX8
Leroy Miller – Camera Lumix GH4
Leroy Miller wailin’ it! Camera GH4
In putting the images together I make conversions to black and white for all of the press images. This guarantees the best look when printed on a press. If someone just converts a color image to grayscale the reproduction of the detail can get lost especially in newspaper reproduction. I often use Google’s NIK Silver FX Pro 2 for making the conversions. It gives me lots of options to make the Black & White have tones from light to dark without getting muddy or flat.
On this shoot I tried out the new Lumix GX8 for the first time under LED stage lights to see how it held up to the dark shadow areas and the lack of full spectrum in the stage lighting. I was impressed. While I would replace my GH4 camera with the GX8 I wouldn’t hesitate to use it as a back-up or grab it in a pinch. The quality of the images wouldn’t suffer one bit.
Yours in Creative Photography, Bob
PS – I’ll show the Grant and Leroy’s ‘Wall of Fame’ images in a couple days.
Last night I was at my local and the Lumix GX8 with a 20mm f1.7 lens was in my hand. Played with some presets. Shot RAW and jpeg.
And, since I wasn’t really thinking I never moved away from the 1.7 f stop. But, it’s pretty amazing what you can do in post to save an image. Just to make it a little tougher I used one of the saved jpegs with a deep BW setting to work with.
The first image is straight out of camera.
This is SOOC with a deep contrast BW setting from the camera
I opened the above jpeg in Adobe Camera Raw by highlighting the image in Adobe Bridge and pushing CMD R MAC, (CTRL R PC) This gives you all the controls or ACR although it doesn’t give you access to the RAW info of the file it allows you to use the adjustment tools.
In this case I added a good dose of clarity to add a bit of tooth to the image, opened up the shadows, knocked down the highlights and opened up the shadows just a bit with a curves bump. Both have an interesting feel but I feel the second one with just a touch more punch worked better.
I believe you need to look around before you can see. And, you need to spend time seeing before you can create a vision with your photography. This is a post about an exercise I did and ask people to do to expand their vision. There are many variations on forcing yourself to study an area until you’ve come close to exhausting the photographic possibilities. In this case the ‘assignment’ was to photograph this subject without moving more than 5 feet in any direction for a minimum of 30 minutes to an hour.
Having a capable camera with you at all times helps to define your vision. The low profile and light weight of the micro 4/3rds system makes it easy for me to be more creative. In this case various Lumix lenses and the Lumix GX8 were used in the capture…
Here are contact sheets from the shoot followed by some of my favorites from the shoot…
Contact sheet one images are SOOC (straight out of Camera)
Contact sheet 2
Contact sheet 3… There were about 4 plus contact sheets all together but you get the idea!
Below were a few of the images I worked up from the session followed by a Time-Lapse of the shoot.
Black and white turned this into a very graphic feel and tells the story of ‘Place’
Aerial view with fish eye lens
Mood piece with some NIK Color Pro 4 FX. Dreamy…
Then it was on to the story of the Knights.
Many other images were captured during the ‘assignment’ but these were the ones I thought I’d share.
Time-lapse showing the shoot shot with Lumix FZ1000 mounted on tripod capturing an image every three seconds. Processed in camera to MP4. Very cool feature!
A symphony of sound awakened me this morning as the birds around my home greeted the new day.
Bird song ebbed and swelled in concert as the different species shouted love songs to their mates – or ran off invaders. There was so much going on it was hard to tell exactly…
But I digress.
The avian songs were the inspiration for today’s Sunday Photo/Art Quote as I was reminded that music informs the art of photography. I have been trying to get more ‘notes’ AKA nuances into my images. We have the musicality of notes in the form of light and shadow. The staff that we write upon consists of shadows. The bones of an image so to speak. These bones are overlaid by color in different hues and saturation. Accents can be added by dodging, burning and selectively sharpening areas of an image. Some images have such good bones they can sing their song without the color added as shown by Ansel Adams who gives us today’s quote.
“The negative is the equivalent of the composer’s score, and the print the performance.” Ansel Adams
Ultimately as the birds inspired the subject and some of the words for today’s Photo Art Quote they also woke me up and I found myself moved to see what yonder light brings. I slipped on my boots and jeans, grabbed my camera and tripod along with a few accessories to see if there was music waiting to be shared.
And now it’s off to the digital darkroom to see if I can come up with a decent performance from the score I created this morning.
Yours in Creative Photography, Bob
Ansel Adams in 1930 had been training to become a concert pianist while considering a career as a photographer. He decided, after seeing the photographs by Paul Strand, that “the camera, not the piano, would shape [his] destiny.” His mother and aunt both pleaded, “Do not give up the piano! The camera cannot express the human soul!” To which Adams replied, “The camera cannot, but the photographer can.”
Wizard Academy in Austin Texas is a place of creative learning, whimsy and full of visual delight! I was there last week and enjoyed working and learning in this target rich environment!
Detail from a metal sculpture near Engelbrecht House on the Wizard Academy campus.
Spiral staircase from the Library down to the presentation room in the Tower at Wizard Academy
Detail from a Don Quixote carving in the lower art gallery in the Tower.
The Wizard Academy has an extensive collection of art devoted to the Don. Paintings, lithographs, metal and wood sculptures in all shapes sizes and mediums of which you might think. Think adventures, tilting at windmills and all that entails. It is definitely not a place for those who are traditional thinkers! It makes you stretch…
For infrared conversion of my cameras I use LifePixel. Infrared allows you to put an older camera to use and opens up a new time time of day for productive image creation.
Fotopro tripods are well worth checking out. You can learn about the ones I use and recommend by clicking on the Fotopro Tripods link at the top of this page. If you want to see what other tripods might fit your needs check out the Fotopro.com website. Check back with me before you buy as a Fotopro Ambassador I’m able to get you discounted pricing including complementary continental USA shipping for my followers that you won’t find through retail outlets.
Learn Photoshop in a fun environment. Aaron Nace applies the right amount of fun with easy to understand and follow tutorials. Actions and brushes are included with lessons!
Lightning, waterdroplets, sound, time-lapse, HDR sequences, smiles and much more control for your camera!
Cameras Get Smarter -
A High Speed Smart Camera Remote
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Platypod has become a great resource for being creative in getting your camera gear easily into unusual places. As an Platypod Pro I get to work/play with the gear even before it comes out. Head over to Platypod, subscribe to the newsletter and you will get special discounts reserved only for subscribers.
