Charlie Robison @ Billy Bob's Texas

[taygull]

Here are a few shots of Charlie Robison @ Billy Bob's a couple of weekends ago. Charlie is one of the top "Texas Artist" who has also done well nationally.



He has had some pretty big hits, along with some very successful videos on CMT. His first album was a combo with Jack Ingram and Pat Green.



On a side note he is married to one of the Dixie Chicks.



#1 Backstage all of the bands will sign the wall, someone with the staff draws the logo. It was really neat to see all the bands and the signatures.









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[Jake]

Great stuff man! Very clean and sharp.

[taygull]

Originally Posted by thejakestir

Great stuff man! Very clean and sharp.

Thanks.....I need to get away from shooting so many country acts so I can get more "passion" and "wild" stuff.....problem is I just don't like the other music that much.

[SGPhoto]

Chris,
Great shots.. Mind me asking what equipment you were using on these?

Since I have shot at Billy Bob's before I can totally understand how hard it is to get such Crisp Clear images. Also was this on the main stage? If so how did you swing that gig???

Great stuff.

Stephen Gibson

[taygull]

Originally Posted by SGPhoto

Chris,
Great shots.. Mind me asking what equipment you were using on these?

Since I have shot at Billy Bob's before I can totally understand how hard it is to get such Crisp Clear images. Also was this on the main stage? If so how did you swing that gig???

Great stuff.

Stephen Gibson

Stephen,

I shoot mostly with my 1D Mark IIn and the 24mm-70mm f/2.8L and my 5D with the 70mm-200mm f/2.8L. Most of these were with the 1D Mark IIn.

These were on the main stage, I shoot for Frisco Style Magazine and have been making contacts in the music industry for awhile.

I will also be shooting Jack Ingram on New Years Eve.

It took awhile to learn to get crisp shots as I have a technique I use for most of my concert shoots. I took about 600 shots at this show.

Thanks! It was a fun shoot.

[taygull]

Stephen,

Here is a link that I find very important when viewing others photos. If you install the Opanda and then right click on an image you can view the EXIF information. Depending on you the shooter does the post processing the data may or may not be in them. I process them as to leave the data in so that you will be able to see the information. The only time it seems to loose some of it is when I do some post processing with multiple layers the flattening process will sometimes loose some of the camera data.

http://www.opanda.com/en/iexif/index.html

[Jake]

Originally Posted by taygull

http://www.opanda.com/en/iexif/index.html

I love that! I've been using it for a while and can't live without it.

That said, all the pics posted in this thread have lost the important info.

[taygull]

I'm not sure why these lost the camera info, that is the first time that has happened.

[TJPhotoGuy]

AMazingly, although I've come close a couple of times, i've never been there. I hear it's a great place.

Wow@the Styx signature! that's kewl. Wonder what ever happened to those guys... the guy that does the karaoke for the place we frequent does one hell of a styx rendition of 'blue collar man'.

[gregt1310]

Originally Posted by taygull

It took awhile to learn to get crisp shots as I have a technique I use for most of my concert shoots. I took about 600 shots at this show.

Thanks! It was a fun shoot.

Great shots! Care to share this technique??

Thanks

[taygull]

The biggest "secret" to getting sharp performing arts shots is you need to try and capture the subject when they are not moving....well duh you say.

Well to determine when a person is going to stop moving can be difficult. Even a person "in motion" will stop moving.

The best example is when a person jumps into the air there is that moment when they change direction (start to come down) that movement has pretty much stopped, mostly the head and torso as I don't worry about extremities being sharp in this type of photography.

With that in mind you must have a fast camera and fast glass. The next IMO you must do is shoot in burst mode. Burst mode will allow you to capture that moment when movement stops. I shoot one shot focus recompose and then blast away as I try and predict the movement of the performer.

The reason burst mode is important is the "middle" shots will not have as much camera shake as the first and last picture in the set. If you think about just pressing the shutter up and down this creates tension in finger/hand/forearm. There is a brief moment when you push a shutter and hold it that you can really reduce your overall movement. The other important thing is to make sure you exhale and at the point you finish the exhale is when you "pull the trigger". Remember you can not control subject movement so you must control your movement, then shoot burst mode and if everything lines up you will get very sharp images.

You will get quite a few images that look the same but then you can cull based on emotion or the shot you were able to grab.

The next thing is to make sure you have a very good process for sharpening your images "AFTER" they have been resized for web. The biggest mistake I see for "web presentation" is most photographers will use USM and then resize, save and host. You must re-sharpen the image once you resize.

I also would really suggest a good noise remover like Noise Ninja, It is a must to get clean sharp images. You do not need to use a bunch but a little bit really helps.

I hope this helps explain most of what I do....

[taygull]

Originally Posted by TJPhotoGuy

AMazingly, although I've come close a couple of times, i've never been there. I hear it's a great place.

Wow@the Styx signature! that's kewl. Wonder what ever happened to those guys... the guy that does the karaoke for the place we frequent does one hell of a styx rendition of 'blue collar man'.

TJ,

All of the Styx guys are not together but Tommy Shaw does play with them. They will be at Billy Bob's next month.

[Abel]

wowzas.... great work... that place looks awesome!

[taygull]

Thanks Abel.

Billy Bob's is a great place....I'll try and get some "venue" shots next weekend when I shoot Jack Ingram. For years it was (maybe still is) the largest "Honky Tonk" in the world.

[metagore]

Amazing! Thanks for sharing the techniques you use to catch such sharp images under concert lights.