Something 'Weird' in Optio M30 Pix!?!

I went to a concert Thursday night and Maria, my brother, and his

wife all came along. I tried to dumb a K10D down because I know

that many concerts ban "Professional" cameras. With FA 50 f/1.4

attached, and battery grip removed (and a 2x TC in my pocket), we

stuffed the camera in maria's purse.<p>

As we are waiting in line, there is a guy that is outside saying

stuff like, "No Alcohol, No Outside Food or Beverages, No Pocket

Knives or other items that could be used as weapons..."<p>

"Oops!" I said to Maria, "I have a pocket knife!" I waited for

the bouncer to look away, and I chucked the knife into the

bushes. Some behind me thought that was hilarious, and I

explained that it cost me less than $.50 and I had about 30 more,

so it wasn't worth worring about. The guy behind me said it will

probably still be there after the show, and he was right.<p>

The bouncer continued, "No Cameras With Lenses..."<p>

What does that mean?!? I'm guessing that implies no

<i>interchangable</i> lenses, but I figured we'd take our

chances. This really was a small venue, so taking the camera

back to the car if deemed "Professional" or a "Camera With Lens"

wasn't that big of a deal.<p>

The guy that checked Maria in saw the K10 and told her it had to

go, but when he re-checked her, he said nothing about the Optio

M30 in her purse.<p>

Not being very familiar with the camera, I played with it a bit

before the show started to make sure I could find what I was

looking for. When the performance started, I noticed that I was

clearly seeing something "weird" in the picures...<p>

<hr>

<img src="http://71.158.200.250/miscimages/weird/al001.jpg"><br>

End of <i>You're Pitiful</i>. "Weird" Al must have been wearing

10 shirts that he was stripping off through the performance of

this song.<p>

<hr>

<img src="http://71.158.200.250/miscimages/weird/al002.jpg"><br>

<i>Amish Paradise</i>. The show had lots of costume changes

during which the video screens (background) showed 'Al TV' clips...<p>

<hr>

<img src="http://71.158.200.250/miscimages/weird/al003.jpg"><br>

<i>Amish Paradise</i> is the anthem to some

friends of ours who are so fascinated with the Amish they launched the

<a href="http://www.geocities.com/amishgimp/amish.htm"

target="new">Amish Website</a> about the same time as the single

was released (most of the "wedding" and "Yoder" pix on the Amish

site were provided by me).<p>

<hr>

<img src="http://71.158.200.250/miscimages/weird/al004.jpg"><br>

Digital zoom kinda sucks. I tried to avoid it as much as

possible.<p>

<hr>

<img src="http://71.158.200.250/miscimages/weird/al005.jpg"><br>

Smells like "Weird" Al Yankovic. Lots of back lighting was a

challenge with the M30 only giving me -2.0 EV for all shots.<p>

<hr>

I've never shot video with the Optio before, so I wasn't sure how

much battery and memory it would chew up. I only had the 1 gig

card in camera, and my battery was showing 2 of 3 bars down, so I

was trying to save resources. I was shutting the camera down

during the Al TV segments, which required resetting the -2 EV

compensation every time. At least the 'no-flash' setting would

stick through the power cycles. In hind sight, I wish I had shot

more video, but I just didn't know what to expect, and I had a

hard enough time holding the camera still and trying not to laugh

too hard through the video I did shoot.With the last bar of the

battery on yellow, I shot this video of Al's encore number: <a

href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kF0NBjAvHgM"

target="new"><i>Albuquerque</i></a>.<br>

I've been a fan of Weird Al ever since I saw the "Fat" video back when I was...younger than I am now. My wife can't stand him, but I think he's hilarious; his lyrics are pretty smart and the videos he shoots always have me in stitches.

I think the photos look as good as they can do with a P&S. I was pissed off I didn't take mine to The Cure concert I went to recently as they had some great light arrangements. I have an Optio S60, by the way, and have never shot video with it. But the EC comp settings are sticky...although I think there is an option menu where you can choose what settings you want to be sticky and which ones you don't.

Weird Al is great, I'd love to see one of his shows. A whole bunch of his videos are viewable on youtube. I have Optio A30, I think it also would allow you to make EC sticky.

I brought it to Mark Knopfler a couple of weeks ago but even in a relatively small Central Park Summer Stage venue I decided we were too far away for it to be worthwhile so just listened to the music instead. Some nimrod with a Digital Rebel and 70-300 near me kept firing away with internal flash (flash specifically forbidden) turned on. Can't imagine the flash helped those pictures due to distance and possibly the effect that its use had on his AE program but it sure succeeded in annoying me and probably Mark as well. If I'd thought I could get away with it maybe I would have brought D-SLR but at that venue, having camera disallowed could have been a huge inconvenience.

Careful, Maria would KILL for Knopfler tix...<p>

The nice thing about stage lights is that you really don't need flash or high ISO in most cases. I was shooting 200-800

most of the time, and only tried the flash while Al was walking through the crowd. Maybe I'll add a crowd shot and a

<i>Fat</i> for Mis tonight...

Now that you guys have said something, I think i recall the ability to set which settings "stick" during a power-down. I'm

pretty sure I went in and made the flash settings "sticky".

I'll think about looking into that tonight. It's terribly inconvenient, what w/ the camera in my purse here at my feet and all....