Hello and welcome to Out of the Darkroom on Adorama TV. I'm Ruth Medjber and today
I'm going to be chatting to you about music photography, but specifically how to
shoot from the photographer's pit.
I'm here in Whelan's of Wexford Street, probably one of the busiest venues we
have in Dublin and a place where I've spent a good chunk of my life
photographing everybody that's come through the doors. Now, you'll notice when
small venues like this sell out, they will put up a steel barrier in front of
the stage. This is to give the band a little bit of protection from the crazy
fans in the front row. It also creates a little bit of space in which the
photographers can work and that's why we call it the photographer's pit.
Photographer's pits are these elusive and exclusive places. When I was a teenager
sneaking into gigs,
I used to really admire the photographers in those pits because they
get to shoot so close to the stage. Now not everyone with a camera can just
wander into a pit because it's usually guarded by a security guard, so you will
just have to show your press pass. Press passes usually come in two forms. They can
be stickies like these which you just stick onto your jeans or your t-shirt or they could
be tour laminates. Now, both of these are granted by either the promoter or the band
themselves. So, if you're looking to shoot a show of a non-local band who happens to
be passing through your area
the easiest way of getting accreditation to this gig would be to contact the
venue promoter. Another way around it, if it's a local band then get in touch
with the band themselves through social media or onto their manager, that kind of thing.
So let's talk about what you can't do in a photographer's pit. Photographer's pits are
small spaces, usually. In small venues the photographer's pit could be about a foot, a foot
and a half wide, so no tripods, no monopods. Nothing that's going to take up
excessive room. It just makes a lot more sense. You're in there to take
photographs, you're not in there to shoot video, generally. So, make it nice and
handheld, duck in, take your shots, move, let another photographer in. Over here in the UK
and Ireland, we say this rule. Three songs, no flash, three songs no flash. That
means, you're in the pit for the first three songs and you are not allowed to
flash. No band wants to have 10 photographer's flash flash flash flash
in their face. It's really distracting. Distracting for the band and for the
crowd as well. So learn to shoot with the stage lights. Always wear black. It's not just to
come across as super cool, it's so that you're not distracting. You don't want
the fans to be looking at you instead of the bad. It's just a common courtesy,
so wear all black and don't cause a scene. Just dart in, take your photos,
crouch down. If you're in a position that you have to stand up on a barrier
or something,
make sure you apologize to the fans for the few seconds that you're going to be there.
There's nothing worse than when you are at a really quiet gig in a really small
venue and there's a couple of photographers there and the song gets really gorgeous
and quiet and the crowd are really respectful and all you hear is beep beep beep and
that beep is the photographer beside you getting autofocus. Turn it off. It
doesn't have to be on. You don't need it. Gigs are always going to be low light
conditions. It's always going to be hard to autofocus. Switch to manual focus, save
everyone the hassle and all the spoiled shots in the world. Just turn off the beeps,
turn off the lights.
Photographer's pits are tiny spaces and when you're in a bigger photographer's
pit for a music festival or a massive tour, there's usually more photographers in there,
so we don't have a lot of room to move around. The worst thing you can do is
have a massive backpack on. It's going to get in everybody's way and it's going to cause
a lot of frustration. So, what I'd suggest doing is putting it away somewhere where
no one's going to trip over it and then if you do need to change your lenses, why
not just have them in a little pouch on your belt. What I'll say, though, is never
leave them on stage.
Not only will your lens block another photographer's wide shot, it's also very
tempting for the lead singer to kick it off the stage and you're down a lens.
Something which annoys me the most in a photographer's pit is when you see a
photographer who may have only brought one lend and it happens to be a fisheye or a
wide-angle and that means they have to go super close to the lead singer to get a
decent shot. Not only are they only getting one shot, but they're blocking
everybody else's shots. So, do everyone a favor when you're in the pit, be
considerate of the other photographers and the other shots. Go in, by all means
get your shots, get what you need but then step back. Shoot it from different
angles. Let other people get in and shoot what they need to shoot as well.
Well, that's all I have time for in this episode. I hope you enjoyed the show. If
you want to brush up on your own photography skills then check out the
Adorama Learning Center. If you want to see more videos, then subscribe to the
Adorama YouTube channel or if you have any tips for the photographer's pit yourself,
then please leave me a comment in the section below. Thanks and I'll see you again soon.