Stage shots

[Loriann]

Hey guys..

Just wondering how you guys take amazing stage shots? We find it hard because of the stage lighting to get a great pic. We have cannon rebelxt.

Any help would be great!! Thanks:):):)

Lori-Ann

[LarryN]

Hey guys..

Just wondering how you guys take amazing stage shots? We find it hard because of the stage lighting to get a great pic. We have cannon rebelxt.

Any help would be great!! Thanks:):):)

Lori-Ann

A powerful flash comes in handy for getting photos properly exposed. Most built in flashes (including those built in to DSlrs) are not powerful enough for stage photography and result in alot of under exposed images. I would recommend getting a flash with a guide number of 140 plus. Sunpack and Metz make excellent flashes for event photography.

Another way of getting a good image is to use a fast lens like a 80-200mm f2.8 lens. The only problem is that those lenses are expensive. You are better off getting a powerful flash.

Larry

[John Stutz]

I've never shot a fitness event, but I got my start in pohtography shooting tons of sports in poorly lit arenas, far dimmer than most any fitness stage. Unfortunately for me at the time, flashes or strobes weren't allowed, but there's ways to deal with that.

Being the master of disaster when it comes to flashes, I avoid them at all costs. However, Larry's advice above is most likely 100% correct. But if a more powerful flash is not in the budget, I can give you a few tips to improve your odds of getting a better pic, though it may not approach the best quality you'd get by adding in that flash.

Without seeing any of your shots, I'm going to guess they're a bit orange and very frequently blurry. Not out of focus, but blurry from motion. These would be the most typical problems you'll encounter shooting indoors.

Your main goal is to attain proper exposure. If you shoot with your camera on program mode, you're at the mercy of your camera to resolve all of your options. You have 3 settings that you can adjust, but your camera will only manage 2 of these on program mode, and it most likely cannot properly guess which one is most important.

You want to get as much light in as possible, so that necessitates shooting with maximum aperature (small f/numbers). Shooting any less than wide open is like trying to put out a fire with a garden hose when you have a fire hose at your disposal. If you're not comfortable shooting on M (manual), choose A (aperature priority) where you tell your camera what aperature to use and let it figure out which shutter speed to use. On P (program) it'll settle on an unhappy medium, which is why you end up with motion blur. Small aperatures (i.e. f/16) translate into slower shutter speeds. Whereas if you choose the largest aperature (i.e. f/2.8), you'll get the fastest shutter speed possible. Note that the largest aperature will vary from lens to lens. Big, expensive lenses come with wider aperatures.

If your image is still blurry, you can adjust your ISO higher. This requires less light to get a proper exposure, meaning faster shutter speeds, meaning less motion blur. But your tradeoff is quality. Higher ISO means lower quality. Ideally you want to be at ISO 100 or 125. Generally speaking, anything above 400 will be dissatisfying.

Lastly, if your image is orange, you need to adjust your white balance to account for the temperature of the stage lights. Every set of lights will be different, so you can try each setting until you find one that works and gives you more natural color. Your eyes do this automatically, whereas film and digital images are extremely sensitive to the various colors (temperatures) of light. If you shoot in raw mode, you can adjust temperature later in photoshop or other image processing software. If you shoot JPG, you probably want to get it correct when the image is snapped.

To sum up, get a very powerful flash and learn how to use it. This assumes you're sitting close enough to the stage to make it useful. Short of that, use the widest aperature possible, the lowest ISO you can get away with, and set your shutter speed to give you proper exposure. And set your white balance to give you natural color. You should see a remarkable improvement in your images!!

One last note... get to your next show early and play with your camera settings until you get your photos exposed correctly. The great thing about digital is that you can see the image instantly. If it's not correct, change one of your settings until it gets closer to what you want. Ask someone nearby for help if you're stuck. Once you get it right, you can comfortably shoot the entire show on the same setting.

[Scott]

Thanks John, you just covered a big concern i have had! Usually my stage photos turn out orangey color and motion shows like you say.

[John Stutz]

I must be psychic!!

Note that while I'm a HUGE proponent of always shooting manual, in this case, I would recommend shooting in aperature priority mode in order to account for quick variances in lighting as you shoot towards various portions of the stage. The sides could be a stop darker than the middle and you probably don't want to make a manual shutter speed adjustment every time you click or pan from side to side. Definitely widest aperature, and try ISO 200 (or so). If you don't have any motion blur, try closer to ISO 100. If you see some motion, go back to ISO 200, or try ISO 400 if need be.

Please give us an update on how that works for you. "Before and after" images might be nice to see.

[mark000]

John is generally right about exposure, aperture and color, but NOT about ISO. Shutter speed, which trades off directly against ISO, is a MUCH more critical factor than film grain or digital noise when shooting indoors. ISO 100 is for sunlight.

To avoid noticeable blur from camera movement, the shutter speed should be about the reciprocal of the lens focal length in mm. For a 200mm telephoto that gives 1/200 second. (If you use much less than a 200mm lens, your photos will show a little athlete on a big stage.) To avoid blur from subject movement, the faster the shutter speed, the better.

Flash typically is much faster than even a fast shutter, so I will discuss flash and non flash situations separately.

I used a big flash at prejudging when shooting film, but not for evening shows, for which the person in the seat behind has paid more $$ and may object to being obstructed.

In the non flash situation, to get acceptable exposure with typical stage lighting at 1/200 sec shutter speed, you need ISO around 800. 800 ISO print films have offered very good grain, contrast and color since the early 1990s. Good digital cameras likewise do not noticably degrade an image at ISO 800, but shutter speeds slower than 1/200 tend to blur.

If you use flash, you need to elevate it above any heads in front of you, with a contraption such as stroboframe, otherwise most of the light from the flash will never reach the stage.

The faster the ISO, the less juice a flash will require, the faster they recycle, and the longer your batteries will last. If they fit your flash, Nickel Metal Hydride rechargable batteries offer a good combination of fast recycling, enough energy capacity for a lot of shots, and long usable lifetime, thus low cost. Even better for capacity and recycling time is an external power pack such as Quantum, but those are expensive, heavy and awkward.

The appropriate tradeoff of ISO with flash battery capacity depends on the specific equipment, how close you are to the performers, and how many shots you plan to take. Shooting a whole show may take over 1000 photos. I would start with ISO 800 with flash also, to minimize the risk of batteries dying. With experience you may find a better setting.

The color balance differs dramatically with flash compared to stage light alone. With film, color can be corrected when prints are made, but for digital cameras you should set the color balance either to flash or incandescent as appropriate.

[rpflex]

For the pros... on average, what settings do you use considering different conditions for prejudging and/or finals?

[jasons805]

If your using film and no flash I would have 400 or 1600 film(can be to grainy for most), 125 shutter speed, and an aperture under 5. And shoot when they hold poses. But I am guessing no film, so not a great help. Best to know how your camera works and what everything does then just use your best judgement. If a good photographer is at the show just ask for a little advice about your camera. It can be hard to tell someone what to do alot easier to show someone. My ramble

[rpflex]

Anyone else out there care to share f-stop, shutter speed, ASO, white balance settings and how they measure that???

[TomNine]

Anyone else out there care to share f-stop, shutter speed, ASO, white balance settings and how they measure that???
Robin, there is no one-size fits all for stage pics, as the above posts indicate there are just too many variables, camera to camera and venue to venue.

My camera sucks for stage photos, I'm not even sure why I bother. I just use either program mode (basically glorified automatic) or aperature priority, ISO 100 (or leave that auto too), and tend to get better results with white balance set to incandescent lighting. Unless i know I can get very close I don't bother with a flash. I trust the camera and my eye to measure lighting. Sometimes I get a pic worth sharing:

http://www.robinparker.us/gallery/RP1003.jpg

The main things are:

1. Prejudging is easier to shoot than the night show, though dramatic lighting at the finals can be a nice effect.

2. Show up early and get a good seat, close and towards the center, but not too many heads in the way.

3. Take lots of multiples and expect to throw half away.

[jasons805]

A lot of it just takes time to pick up. One of my cameras was made in 1969(pentax) the light meter has no batteries that are made for it any more. Over time you just sorta know what you need for dif lighting situations. I hope I am not saying what everyone already knows. Lower aperture(f-stop) say 2.8 or 1.4 you let a lot more light in but the focal range is very small and hard to keep moving things in focus. With stage stuff they are staying for the most part in the same place, so not a huge issue. A high number like 16 it will be hard to take a pic out of focus, but you need so much light not something you can do inside. You can use a gray card to white balance it is just basic gray cardboard you point your camera at it and it will give you a more accurate white balance/lighting info. Shutter speed also effects light as well as speed of course. A 1/60 shutter speed is one 60th of a SEC and lets more lite in because it is open longer, but the longer it is open the more blur you will get. A number like 1000 open 1/1000th of a sec will not work inside because it will cut to much light. Not sure if that helped or just repeated stuff.

[James]

[QUOTE=TomNine]My camera sucks for stage photos, I'm not even sure why I bother. I just use either program mode (basically glorified automatic) or aperature priority, ISO 100 (or leave that auto too), and tend to get better results with white balance set to incandescent lighting. Unless i know I can get very close I don't bother with a flash. I trust the camera and my eye to measure lighting. Sometimes I get a pic worth sharing:QUOTE]

i think Tom has the exact same camera that I used to have for stage shots and he is right however it is possible to get ok stage shots. It really needs a monopod to hold it still (for any camera for that matter) or they will be kinda blurry. I would use all the auto settings with no flash.

[rpflex]

Thanks for the tips, guys!

Tom, I'm certainly glad you bother and I hope you continue do do so because I think your stage shots are fantastic.

jasons805 and James: these tips certainly help. I suppose I'll just need to practise a lot and see what works best for my camera. Thankfully, we don't have to pay for film and processing anymore.

I have a feeling the monopod may be one of the most helpful tips... I'll have to put it on my list of "must-haves". I have the Konica Minolta 7D DSLR which has anti-shake built in, but with heavier lens and low light, it will probably be best to use the monopod.

[John Stutz]

Since monopods are against the rules at an NPC event (and probably others) here's something you might want to try. It's called the ropepod and I learned about it around 1989. I even made one, but never used it to the best of my knowledge. In theory it might work to help you steady the camera. It may be less useful for longer lenses though.

I searched the web and found one article on ropepod. It's good enough. Here it is (http://www.adorama.com/catalog.tpl?op=article_031504).

They certainly won't catch you carying one of these in. And unless they read this post, no one will even have a clue what the hell it is.

[JTx]

Thanks to everyone for all the information and suggestions. I don't shoot stage stuff much but I know it is a weak point. The info here gives me lots of things to experiment with!

[genex]

When Bill Comstock switched over to digital, he asked me this same question and I showed him what I used for settings etc and it's pretty basic for stage shots, but depends on how well lit the stage is and how close you are.

Generally I shoot with the 70-200 on ISO 400 at about 1/160-1/250 shutter speed and set the white balance to tungsten. Aperture ends up anywhere from 2.8-4.5 usually.

gene

[rpflex]

When Bill Comstock switched over to digital, he asked me this same question and I showed him what I used for settings etc and it's pretty basic for stage shots, but depends on how well lit the stage is and how close you are.

Generally I shoot with the 70-200 on ISO 400 at about 1/160-1/250 shutter speed and set the white balance to tungsten. Aperture ends up anywhere from 2.8-4.5 usually.

gene

Thanks Gene! That answers my question.

[George]

Thanks Gene! That answers my question.
Mostly everyone has given you great info. As for me...when I shoot contests I NEVER...well..almost never use a flash. Even with off the camera as opposed to on camera flash...you're probably too far from the stage for it to be very effective. I normally shoot at about 400 iso with a 24-70 2.8f lens...that is if I'm right up front....if not...I switch to a 70-200 2.8....My Nikon tele has a vibration setting to help steady the shots....depending on the lighting it goes anywhere from 2.8 to 4...again depending on the lighting. A lot of stage lighting will "fall off" on the ends...so if you use 2.8 on the ends...that's probably "too hot" for the middle of the stage...you'll need to adjust/click those as you're shooting.

Shooting fitness routines is a lot different. You'll need to shoot at a faster shutter speed to stop the blur...but that means that less light will get in...so you'll need to adjust your f stop and you're iso...This is where a flash...even from several rows back may help....I would however just not use the flash for regular posing and 1/4 turns....Also...many events don't allow flash...something to think about....