Help/opinion

Could anyone please lend me some quick advice and/or insight on this? I’m trying to better myself at low light film photography. I don’t need my images to be “perfect”, but how can I make sure these whites aren’t so blown out next time? I feel silly because I can’t figure out what to do, so thanks in advance.

Photo details:

35mm lens, shot at F16 1/60

HP5 400 pushed to 1600

Home developed

Question one that pops up: Why are you pushing your film if you are shooting at f16? Push processing doesn't really increase film speed and it inherently increases contrast. This is one reason that your highlights appear blown. Of course, I can't tell if they are actually blown from this image. What is your end product? A wet black and white print? Are you scanning the film and printing from the digital image? Where in your process can you "work" the image?

Stage lighting can be incredibly difficult to work with. Particularly in small clubs where lights are considered an expense not part of the show.

Now, on top of that . . . I like the image quite a bit the way that it is . . .

In the days of averaging meters, much indoor photography was hard to get right.

(Even more, the light level was often below the meter minimum.)

Often enough, some light sources will be in-frame, and the meter will

include them in the average.

There used to be charts that gave suggested, and often close enough, values for a

variety of available light situations.

Spot metering on the person should work well, though.

Or, (often not easy) incident light reading at the position

of the subject, or close enough.

You might be able to lower the contrast in printing or scanning.

Negative films have a high overexposure latitude (though as noted

above, less when pushed). It might be that there is more that you aren't

getting in the scan or print. I presume the background is black no

matter what you do.

'Pushing' film doesn't actually change its speed. The 'toe' of the H&D curve stays firmly planted right at the box-speed point and all that happens is that the contrast is increased - i.e the highlights get denser and more difficult to print or scan. That's exactly what has happened here.

The spotlit subject is already contrasty. So if you want detail in the highlights, just use the film at box speed and develop normally (as recommended by the makers - who obviously know nothing about their own products according to some users!) - while increasing the exposure.

If the light conditions don't allow you to do that, then choose a natively faster film, up to 1600 ISO.

And if that still isn't fast enough or you don't like the grain, shooting digital is the easy and obvious choice for this kind of work.

Question one that pops up: Why are you pushing your film if you are shooting at f16? Push processing doesn't really increase film speed and it inherently increases contrast. This is one reason that your highlights appear blown. Of course, I can't tell if they are actually blown from this image. What is your end product? A wet black and white print? Are you scanning the film and printing from the digital image? Where in your process can you "work" the image?

 

Stage lighting can be incredibly difficult to work with. Particularly in small clubs where lights are considered an expense not part of the show.

 

Now, on top of that . . . I like the image quite a bit the way that it is . . .

Thanks for the compliment! I only plan to post these online. The reason why I shot at F16 is because I wanted everything more in focus & I’m just experimenting with pushing

'Pushing' film doesn't actually change its speed. The 'toe' of the H&D curve stays firmly planted right at the box-speed point and all that happens is that the contrast is increased - i.e the highlights get denser and more difficult to print or scan. That's exactly what has happened here.

 

The spotlit subject is already contrasty. So if you want detail in the highlights, just use the film at box speed and develop normally (as recommended by the makers - who obviously know nothing about their own products according to some users!) - while increasing the exposure.

If the light conditions don't allow you to do that, then choose a natively faster film, up to 1600 ISO.

 

And if that still isn't fast enough or you don't like the grain, shooting digital is the easy and obvious choice for this kind of work.

Shooting digital is never an option for me; I strictly prefer film but thanks for your advice. Also, the snide comment was totally unnecessary and unhelpful.

In the days of averaging meters, much indoor photography was hard to get right.

(Even more, the light level was often below the meter minimum.)

Often enough, some light sources will be in-frame, and the meter will

include them in the average.

 

There used to be charts that gave suggested, and often close enough, values for a

variety of available light situations.

 

Spot metering on the person should work well, though.

 

Or, (often not easy) incident light reading at the position

of the subject, or close enough.

 

You might be able to lower the contrast in printing or scanning.

Negative films have a high overexposure latitude (though as noted

above, less when pushed). It might be that there is more that you aren't

getting in the scan or print. I presume the background is black no

matter what you do.

Thanks for the tips! I will use them

Alex, you don't need f/16 to get everything in focus for a picture like this. There's almost no depth. The subject is almost entirely in one plane. Using your 35mm lens from several feet away, you could shoot almost wide open and still get everything in focus. The wider aperture would also permit a higher shutter speed, which would produce a sharper picture.

I also agree that pushing the film wasn't necessary in this case. The black background is deceptive. The subject is actually brightly lit. But only a spotmeter (or a very good guess) would get you the correct exposure.

It's a good try, though. You're not far off. You can probably recover some highlight detail in her face by "burning-in" when exposing the print.

how can I make sure these whites aren’t so blown out next time?

• Push processing increases contrast.
  

Why bother with it, to shoot a concert at f16? - really no offense meant and of course not knowing your camera... - I am not keen to manually focus a wide open 35mm lens on an average SLR either. Looking at the DOF scale of my Jupiter: f16 means DOF from 1m to infinity. - Do you really need that much, to get a gal into zone focus? Why not f5.6 at box speed and a less daring 1/125 sec? - DOF from 1 to 3m should be still "plenty" and even enough for zone focusing, in case you used some compact camera.

Best way to shoot concerts is to arrive early enough (before the show), take an incident reading on the stage, negotiate over more light with the stage tech and use that measurement to avoid extreme overexposure of highlighted body parts. The alternative is spot metering on a face. To me that seems worth bringing a quite bulky hand held meter with special attachment, just to make sure something integral built into a middle aged camera doesn't get fooled too much by light sources in the corner of my frame (and only God knows what tiny external metering cells somewhere on your camera might be picking up and refering to). - With comparably minimal equipment I'd try to do something like your shot by metering for the face through a 135mm on my 2nd body and using that result on the other with the wide lens. (<- lens + 2nd camera can be way cheaper than a hand held meter.)

There used to be charts that gave suggested, and often close enough, values for a

variety of available light situations.

Positively thinking: There is a thing called "experience". You've been to that club, you are recalling your settings and seeing results. So you have the base to shoot a next gig over there differently. - The 3rd should come out perfect.

I agree with

I like the image quite a bit the way that it is . . .

I’m just experimenting with pushing

Did you use a developer recommended for this or something different? I'm recalling 45min in Microphen 1+3 (which might have been a "creative" solution, avoiding way too much contrast, by exhausting the soup).

The reason why I shot at F16 is because I wanted everything more in focus

Can only agree with the other posters

f4 would have been plenty for that shot, a few feet of depth of field behind the guitarist and a few feet in front. It's a different matter if you're shooting a whole band with a drummer in the background, bass guitarist and organist behind the singer etc, in which case f8 should be ok. f16 restricts your flexibility for the use of fast shutter speeds to prevent blurring from either camera shake, subject movement, or both.

How did you meter the scene ? An averaging hand-held meter or inbuilt camera meter will generally meter for all the dark shadow areas indoors more than the few highlights, which inevitably get blown out. That's why a spot meter trained on the guitarist's face would be more preferable to averaging readings. Without a spot meter, dropping the "average" exposure one stop is a rule of thumb you could use. Of course you could also do some bracketing, same scene at two or three different exposures, memorize the f stops, and check the negs once the film is processed.

This one has a simple chart.

I suppose things have changed some, but not all that much.

Some old favorites are floodlit tourist attraction buildings, like the capitol or white house.

Fireworks are also popular.

Spotlights have been arc lamps for many years, and might have changed a little, but not a lot.

And if it is important, bracket around the suggested exposure.

Alex, you don't need f/16 to get everything in focus for a picture like this. There's almost no depth. The subject is almost entirely in one plane. Using your 35mm lens from several feet away, you could shoot almost wide open and still get everything in focus. The wider aperture would also permit a higher shutter speed, which would produce a sharper picture.

 

I also agree that pushing the film wasn't necessary in this case. The black background is deceptive. The subject is actually brightly lit. But only a spotmeter (or a very good guess) would get you the correct exposure.

 

It's a good try, though. You're not far off. You can probably recover some highlight detail in her face by "burning-in" when exposing the print.

Actually the subject was in darkness except for 1 dim red light. The rest of the band was standing right next to her in the dark and you could barely make out anyone’s features, and the drummer was in total darkness. I like to be up close to the stage when I photograph, not far away, but I’ll try opening the aperture all the way and using a faster shutter speed. Thanks

• Push processing increases contrast.
  

Why bother with it, to shoot a concert at f16? - really no offense meant and of course not knowing your camera... - I am not keen to manually focus a wide open 35mm lens on an average SLR either. Looking at the DOF scale of my Jupiter: f16 means DOF from 1m to infinity. - Do you really need that much, to get a gal into zone focus? Why not f5.6 at box speed and a less daring 1/125 sec? - DOF from 1 to 3m should be still "plenty" and even enough for zone focusing, in case you used some compact camera.

 

Best way to shoot concerts is to arrive early enough (before the show), take an incident reading on the stage, negotiate over more light with the stage tech and use that measurement to avoid extreme overexposure of highlighted body parts. The alternative is spot metering on a face. To me that seems worth bringing a quite bulky hand held meter with special attachment, just to make sure something integral built into a middle aged camera doesn't get fooled too much by light sources in the corner of my frame (and only God knows what tiny external metering cells somewhere on your camera might be picking up and refering to). - With comparably minimal equipment I'd try to do something like your shot by metering for the face through a 135mm on my 2nd body and using that result on the other with the wide lens. (<- lens + 2nd camera can be way cheaper than a hand held meter.)

 

For me it feels hard to utilize them, especially now, years later, when lighting tech has changed drastically. Are there still Tungsten lit stages? - Didn't everybody change to LEDs?

Positively thinking: There is a thing called "experience". You've been to that club, you are recalling your settings and seeing results. So you have the base to shoot a next gig over there differently. - The 3rd should come out perfect.

 

I agree with

I like bold BW, your exposure is on her eyes, she seems recognizable but wrinkles aren't visible... I could imagine such a shot ending silk screened onto her next CD.

 

Did you use a developer recommended for this or something different? I'm recalling 45min in Microphen 1+3 (which might have been a "creative" solution, avoiding way too much contrast, by exhausting the soup).

When you’re shooting a local concert, there’s no such thing as asking the light tech at a dive bar to raise the 1 and only light that he has. It’s all rock n roll. Thanks for the advice though

Can only agree with the other posters

 

f4 would have been plenty for that shot, a few feet of depth of field behind the guitarist and a few feet in front. It's a different matter if you're shooting a whole band with a drummer in the background, bass guitarist and organist behind the singer etc, in which case f8 should be ok. f16 restricts your flexibility for the use of fast shutter speeds to prevent blurring from either camera shake, subject movement, or both.

 

How did you meter the scene ? An averaging hand-held meter or inbuilt camera meter will generally meter for all the dark shadow areas indoors more than the few highlights, which inevitably get blown out. That's why a spot meter trained on the guitarist's face would be more preferable to averaging readings. Without a spot meter, dropping the "average" exposure one stop is a rule of thumb you could use. Of course you could also do some bracketing, same scene at two or three different exposures, memorize the f stops, and check the negs once the film is processed.

I’ll definitely try this out, thanks

Also, the snide comment was totally unnecessary and unhelpful.

I'm at a loss to see what you found 'snide' in my post.

Pushing film doesn't increase its speed - scientific fact. The persistent myth that simply increasing development time does anything except increase contrast is what's really unhelpful and snide. As are those people that 'push' the myth. Pun entirely intended.

As for the suggestion to use digital: it's simply the best tool for this type of work. An artist wouldn't use charcoal or pastels to try and capture fine detail, nor use pen and ink for subtle gradations of tone. The right tool for the job.

Can only agree with the others, including that I like the shot as it is.

I shoot gigs with an 85 or 135mm lens, typically wide open or nearly so (so f2 or f3.5, maybe f5.6) and have no issue with depth of field.

Digital or film is rather irrelevant here, the choice of recording medium doesn't change the basic principles of photography.

 

(snip)

Digital or film is rather irrelevant here, the choice of recording medium doesn't change the basic principles of photography.

Well, not completely. With digital, you can change the ISO value easily, at any time, where in the film

case, you need to change film. You plan ahead with the appropriate film speed for the expected

subject.

Now, maybe the OP should go buy a roll of Delta 3200.

Alex, you don't need f/16 to get everything in focus for a picture like this. There's almost no depth.

The subject is almost entirely in one plane.

^ ^ ^ ^ ^

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What he said. Find yourself a classic portrait lens and maybe close it down a stop so you don't get vignetting (although wondering it THAT'S even an issue here). If you're shooting Nikon, the old 105mm 2.5 AI would be perfect. The ancient Soligor 135 F2 with a T-mount adapter would probably work for most other film SLR systems.