So you’re going to be working with limited light, and probably gonna have your lens wide open, you want to avoid camera shake, but still want some creative control over the way you shoot, and for me (and many others this means using shutter priority on the camera, with a shutter speed set to 1/160 and 1/125 second depending on the over all effect, amount of light present and type of shot you’re going for. 1/125 and lower, means you’ll either be using an IS/VR (image stabilization or vibration reduction) lens or you have a steady hand and you’re looking to get some motion blur from the artist (that’s motion blur from the guitarist moving his hand etc, the background or surrounding should not be blurred otherwise it’s camera shake 
).
You should always, always, ALWAYS, spend the time before you go into the auditorium, or before the bands come on stage checking your settings. You may only have 10 minutes to work, so to find out 6 minutes into the gig that you’ve been working at ISO 400, or lower (because you didn’t check it after the last studio shoot) is not fun. So, physically check everything, what’s my ISO?, Shutter priority selected? Spot or Partial Metering selected?? Spare (EMPTY!!) Memory Cards in your pocket?? These are the same things you’ll be checking every time before you go into a gig, so with that in mind, print your list out, laminate it, and keep it in your kit bag, it gives you a consistent list of checks every time, and if you have a small pen or marker in your bag (you do carry a pen with you right??) you can add anything else you think of at the gig, and make it a part of your list when you get back to the studio.
Lens hoods are another subject which causes contention amongst people. I think it’s essential unless you’re trying for a creative effect with flare. When the artist/band is on stage and the lights are changing and flashing, you’ll almost certainly be taking light from the side of you and chances are there will be some light pointing right at you. Some shots look great with lens flare, but personally, (like any effect) the overall impact is reduced if it’s present in absolutely every shot, but each to their own, personally I always use a lens hood to reduce flare unless I specifically want effects.
Memory cards are fiddly things, have a system for swapping them out, and have plenty with you, they’re cheap enough. Don’t wait until you have only a few shots left, try to plan for the change, between tunes or something. Again if the management only allows you a couple of tunes to shoot, then keep your largest card to hand for this, better to have lots of space left than have to change out cards in those few precious minutes you have. Have a system for changing out cards, I keep empty cards in my left pockets, and used or full in my right, so a card that comes out of the camera goes immediately into the right hand pocket, ensuring it doesn’t get reused. If you don’t have a time limit, then try and plan the change outs for between songs, or when you think things are going to be uninteresting (you already have shots of 3 guitar solos, maybe now is a good time to swap the card out??). Ony you know how many shots you take, so if you get to a gap between tunes and you have 25 frames left on your card, only you know if that’s enough to take you through the next number or if you need to change out now?
Feel free to move around for a different feel, and to help try and give the shoot some context around the band, are the band playing a famous auditorium or venue, like The Royal Albert Hall in London, think, is there anything you can work into any of the shots to tie that in?? As I’ve mentioned before get your bread and butter shots out of the way, and assuming you’re not going to get ousted after a couple of tunes, you’ll find that as the gig goes on, there will be a lot that you’ve already covered, leaving you time to experiment, artistic, special effects silhouettes, etc, this is a great time for being creative with stuff and learning on the job.
Just remember, one of the most important things is to have fun, and if you’ve prepared and thought about exactly what you want to do ahead of time, understand which shots you need to achieve your brief, checked your check card that you keep with you, once this is all taken care of, the technical side can take a back seat to your creative side, and you can let your creativity flow, and get lost in the event.
If you found these articles useful, please tell me, but more importantly tell others The next article is going to be on the very important subject of etiquette. Stay tuned!!
