black and white images "Chicks", Christmas Night, Espy, St Kilda

I'd appreciate any comments on the above photos. Trying to learn to

take meaningful photos of local Melbourne bands.

Cheers

Dave

i can tell you some of the things i've learned to do when shooting musical performers. full profile is better if you want to catch someone at the mike--an exception would be the punk rocker you shot. his facial expression is so extreme that the mike doesn't get in the way. it took me roughly one thousand photos (really) to figure this out. being at the side of the stage also gives you access to full facial views of band members when they turn to communicate with one another, which is when they can be the most animated. mikes are off to the side instead of between you and the performer, and you'll find that there's another dimension from that angle which is both literal and figurative. the literal dimension is that you see much greater movement as the players move up and back from their mikes--from the audience you don't see this as much--and it gives you many more options for composition, which is the figurative dimension. in fact it can be overwhelming with a really kinetic band.

even from the side you can still run into the problem you had with this shot, which is that the lighting was so different on your two subjects that the one on the left is overexposed and the one on the right is underexposed. actually, i don't think that's a problem if i feel i've caught an important moment in the performance. in other words, i think it's more important to record what is fleeting and magic about music than it is to be technically correct. in this photo, had you caught the singer interacting with the guitarist, even if her face had been turned away from us and not visible, it would've been more interesting, and the hot spots on her head and clothes would've been less of a distraction.

my guess is that you may have more interesting pictures on that roll than you realize. getting technically correct candids of musical performers onstage is next to impossible. in addition, imho flash just isn't kosher unless you're shooting for the local paper and will be departing momentarily. it ruins the mood and distracts the performers at anything but very large shows. so with available light, there are a lot of limitations to deal with, and therefore the real challenge is in the editing.

also, a wide angle lens is a good thing.