Band photography

Still disagree, I want a low F-Stop lens. Zoom lenses do not deliver
this. I've worked in packed pubs where you have to push your way
through a mosh to get the shot you want. I see too many photographers
standing in one spot and shooting lazy.

I even got my future father in law sacked from a TV station because he
would try and shoot from a single spot and not move around. It made it
hell to edit his video footage.

Move your arse around. Look at different angles and in a dark
environment, use a fixed lens. Zoom lenses have their place, but not
in a dark band environment.

 

And you need to keep away from the audience, where possible.

I went to a gig a couple of weeks back, which started off mainly
acoustic. The first two tracks were ruined by the constant
"click-whirr" of shutters and winders, until we had a quiet word and
the bloke moved on.

 

If you want a lens that's faster than 2.8f then you can't have anything
bigger than 85mm. Unless you're in a little pub and you don't care about
being right in the artists' faces, and in the way of the audience, then
you can't use a short focal lens.

If, however, you want to be professional in your work and don't want to
be directly in the artists' faces or obscuring the audience's view (who,
unlike the photog, have paid to be there that night) then little lenses
are, except in a few cases, going to be useless.

As for your specific lens comment:
'I used to have a F1.2 lens' - great, a 24mm lens at a gig, that's going
to be versatile...
'got some great shots.' - when you're using a lens that's so short you
don't need to focus or worry about lens shake, I'm not surprised you got
some sharp images.

Utter bollocks. 2.8f is more than fast enough for the vast majority of
situations.

Right, so you're blaming the lens for someone's laziness and
incompetence.

You seem to have brought a huge amount of personal baggage to a simple
discussion, which is resulting in you giving appallingly bad advice to a
complete novice.

In other words, be a photographer.

Still utter bollocks, or can't you move with a zoom lens, can't you take
shots from different angles with a zoom lens?

As someone who did live photography for magazines for a number of years,
I found the focal length I used the most was 200mm. When I wanted to go
wider I rarely went shorter than 100mm. If I'd had nothing bigger than
85mm, or worse still, less than 50mm, I would never have been
commissioned for a second job because no matter how much I moved around
and no matter how imaginative the angles were, the simple fact would be
all the images would look exactly the same - unless I decided to get up
on the stage and shoot right in the artist face, which I'm sure would've
gone down really well with the bands and security...

A photographer's job is to record what happens, not be a part of it.

--
Veggie Dave
http://www.iq18films.co.uk

"To assert that the earth revolves around the sun is as erroneous as to claim
that Jesus was not born of a virgin." Cardinal Bellarmine

 

Good points, but I expect to be wearing earplugs and the audience won't be
hearing anything but what the speakers are ejecting.

 

Don't worry about it Dave. He's been in my killfile for a few months now.

I have zooms and I have primes, I'll be taking it all with me.

 

Do you think we should tell him what Dave does for a living?

 

In which case, take a 'camera bitch' with you. It's always good to know
someone you trust is physically guarding your kit.

--
Veggie Dave
http://www.iq18films.co.uk

"To assert that the earth revolves around the sun is as erroneous as to claim
that Jesus was not born of a virgin." Cardinal Bellarmine

 

petrolcan wrote:

Yep, quite enjoying it though I find it hard at f1.4 so think I'd need
a lot more practice, f2.0+ Im fine

I know, win some lose some, I'd forgotton to put a reserve on and
thought about withdrawing the auction a day before but felt cunty for
doing so, so thought I'd leave it. :-(

--
Donnie
"**** the world, it's time to fight back"

Lambretta Series 2 186cc "The Shitter"
Lambretta LD 175cc "The Chopper"
Honda CB500R "Look out, Donnie's about!"

 

This is Usenet. It won't make any difference.

 

Actually I thought Dave didn't do it for a living any more

 

Winders? Are we back in the 80's?

 

I think they may be referring to producing professional images rather
than working specifically as a photog, which I mentioned in my first
reply I don't do at the moment.

--
Veggie Dave
http://www.iq18films.co.uk

"To assert that the earth revolves around the sun is as erroneous as to claim
that Jesus was not born of a virgin." Cardinal Bellarmine

 

ISTR you can clean them to earn an honest bob.

 

No problems with your arguments. You work differently to me then. So
be it. I just found using fixed lenses in low light environments much
more flexible, if you were able to work around that, more power to
you.

 

As opposed to what I have been doing for a living for over 30 years?
Don't assume.

 

'Exceptionally rare' - he's not joking! Only 30 ever made.

From what little info I can find, it's got very poor performance when
wide open, problems with colour aberration, bugger all contrast, and a
depth of field that's literally 20cm when wide open.

I don't think you could find a worse lens to use for live photography.

There are a few people who have them who've commented on them online,
and they all seem to say the same thing - they all forgot they had it as
they never used it due to it being such a poor lens.

The only lenses I know of that are that sort of size and less than 2.8f
are the lenses we use on films. Panavision make a [email protected] and a
[email protected] but I don't know anyone who's actually used those two
specific lanes - although as you can't buy them it's a little moot.

The very best lenses available to film makers (who aren't shooting on
IMAX, anyway) only go as wide as T1.9 but are rarely used below T2.8 due
to performance drop off. If they were available to buy, a simple 50mm
would be something like £8000.

Oh, and as for them being T-stop rather than F-stop, these lenses don't
have stepped aperture rings, which can mean you end up using bizarre
apertures like T2.8 and a half.

--
Veggie Dave
http://www.iq18films.co.uk

"To assert that the earth revolves around the sun is as erroneous as to claim
that Jesus was not born of a virgin." Cardinal Bellarmine

 

Nothing remotely close to his F1.2, though.

--
Veggie Dave
http://www.iq18films.co.uk

"To assert that the earth revolves around the sun is as erroneous as to claim
that Jesus was not born of a virgin." Cardinal Bellarmine

 

Canon do a 200mm 1.8, or at least they used to.

 

Are you sure you're not thinking of their 200mm 2.8f lens?

AFAIK, Canon don't do anything bigger than 85mm at 1.8f.

--
Veggie Dave
http://www.iq18films.co.uk

"To assert that the earth revolves around the sun is as erroneous as to claim
that Jesus was not born of a virgin." Cardinal Bellarmine

 

You're right as the 200mm has been discontinued.