RTFM – V2

I got a response from a comment I made to a new photographer who asked a really basic question about how to find a menu item in his new camera.

I said “read your manual” and my FaceBook friend asked if RTFM (read the furbished manual) was my answer to every question and he’s right it is.

And then the same day I saw a begineer’s post where the new photographer said she was so disappointed in the blurry images she got while shooting her musician husband playing in a dark nightclub.

While RTFM still applies, I realized this was one shooting situation where the manual wasn’t going to be helpful enough for a begineer. While the answer does mainly depend on understanding the exposure triangle there was a lot more happening.

So how do you shoot a musician playing on stage in a dark night club?

This is the scenario that will defeat every newcomer shooting on any of the auto modes. But that’s not the only issue. Most newcomers will be shooting with the small moderately fast kit zoom. But it’s the wrong lens. Auto focus will make life a lot harder in a dark room.

Here’s what I suggested:

• Go all manual. Not only should the photographer be shooting in manual mode but they should be using manual focus as the slow lenses will be searching for focus in the dim light of the nightclub. The camera will never lock in on focus;
• Next use a different lens. A faster but still cheap 50mm f/1.8 will work but a 35mm f/2 would be better. These wider lenses are easier to hand hold and will less prone to camera shake than a zoom or longer prime lens;
• If the club will allow an off-camera flash would work but most clubs won’t allow it. But that doesn’t mean you couldn’t setup a series of shots before or after the performance especially when the musician wants your images;
• As for metering the light, either set up the camera’s light meter to spot metering mode or use an external spot meter and meter the musician’s face. Ignore everything else. On centre-weighted or even matrix mode the light meter is going to get the reading wrong.
• Lock down the ISO. Leaving the ISO on auto is going to result in the camera boosting the ISO into the stratosphere.
• So what’s the settings (and this is a guess as I can’t know the available light but I do know I can make this happen most of the time)? It’s to open the aperture wide open to let’s say f/2 and to set the ISO to 400 or max to 1600 (depending on the light on the musician’s face) and now work with your shutter speed to be high enough to avoid camera shake – 1/30 or 1/60 of a second – and fast enough to stop the action on stage (or wait until the action stops for an instant) around 1/125 or 1/250 of a second;
• That’s it. And while it’s all in the manual this is why I recommend that new photographers take a lesson or two on basic photography and end years of potential frustration and unhappiness with your gear.