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A friend who is having his first gig with his band has asked me if I would take some photos. I was wondering if anyone could offer up any advice?
I have a Canon EOS 300D with 17-40L and 28-135IS lenses, so was going to use the 28-135 IS (partly because of the IS and range, partly because I am scared of getting the L glass bashed!). I am expecting that the light won't be that great (it's a student union stage without much lighting), so hoping ISO 800 and a bigger aperture will do the job, as flash will not be welcomed. The only other thing I'm not sure about is how well the autofocus will work in low light conditions - I popped out tonight and took some photos in the streets, and this lens was hunting around a bit.
I wouldn't use flash anyway as it ruins the atmosphere of the shots aswell as being a distraction for the performers.
I think it adds to the feel of this kind of image if you had a little grain in there(depending on what the client wants of course) so you would be ok in shooting on a higher iso setting.
Regards,Phil.
Here's a few points I've found useful:
Shooting up to ISO3200 has been no real problem. Noise and grain can be cleaned up anyway (there's several links to free tools to do this).
If you are a way back from the stage, so there's a lot of dark with the band being highlighted, shoot -2ev when using auto metering, or better still, shoot RAW (that will give some more lattitude). You don't want the highlights blown out, but you can recover shadow detail reasonably well.
Autofocus hasn't been a problem - you are normally photographing the highlighted regions anyway. The camera looks for contrast, and there's normally plenty of that at a gig.
Spot metering and manual mode are very helpful - spot meter off the highlights and leave the settings alone.
It's good to get a test shot or two before the gig starts for real.
Oh yes, and make sure you have one or two big cards to store the shots on. There's no time to review and delete normally 
Hope that helps!
Matt
There's also some good advice elsewhere on this great site:
Click here for the Technique "Snappin the stage"
Have fun!
Matt
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