Combatting Red - Going On The Offensive

I had a small band at a smaller club in the area complaining about my flash between sets. The lead singer was all "Man, you're blinding us with that flash" (it was turned down -2 stops but I was blazing away in spots at 6.5 fps)

I replied "Try a different gel in your stage lights because that red ain't cutting it." I then showed them a couple shots where I didn't use the flash.

"I thought red was cool but now I see what you mean."

They came back to that club a few months later and were using no gels except to light the drummer.

That's only band I've been able to convert.

Jamie "Shooter" Taylor
TailWind Imaging
"Away you will go sailin/In a race among the ruins/If you plan to face tomorrow/Do it soon." -- Gordon Lightfoot
http://www.myspace.com/tailwindimaging
http://tradewindimaging.photoreflect.com

http://www.sldlighting.com/shopdisplaycategories.asp?id=10&cat=Color+Filters+%2F+Gels

http://www.creativestagelighting.com/

http://www.prolightingsupplies.com/gel.htm?PHPSESSID=7b2ce8ddd2db65177a38c8f8fa930e77

Just let Google do the walking for you under Theatrical Lighting!

Jamie "Shooter" Taylor
TailWind Imaging
"Away you will go sailin/In a race among the ruins/If you plan to face tomorrow/Do it soon." -- Gordon Lightfoot
http://www.myspace.com/tailwindimaging
http://tradewindimaging.photoreflect.com

Gels are also at musiciansfriend.com and guitarcenter.com. (considered DJ gear.) Search on keyword 'gel'.

Getting the can lights pointed in the right spots is another discussion!!!

What if a bar does not use can lights? A couple places I go to have recently installed these multi-colored programmable LED lights:

Small bars also might not even have a "lighting guy". Or even a sound tech who would do dual duty on lights. So either a band member or the venue manager will set up the lights. If that's the case, you'll have to come early to set up, scope things out (better if you do that on some night prior to your shoot), "make nice" with whoever is in charge of the lights, and ask a favor.... such as setting the lights the way I want for "just 3 songs". Getting a favor usually works *only* if the band has actually hired you, then they can ask on your behalf too.

It works for me! If it's not my home venue, I show up as soon as the doors open and immediately find out who is working the lights that night. I then find out from the bartender what their favorite beverage is. Next, I have the waitress bring them a drink (assuming they are allowed to drink on duty, and at pubs, most are as long as they don't over do it) along with my card. I give it a few minutes, then stroll over, introduce myself and ask for white spots for the first three songs and explain why. Unless they have explicit instructions from the band or tour manager they usually are happy to oblige. If they do, I send another drink over after my three songs are up.

Daniel Knighton
Pixel Perfect Images
(760)730-3224/(858)335-4540 cell
Carlsbad, CA
www.PixelPerfectImages.net
www.MySpace.com/PixelPerfectImages

Great idea! I'm definitely going to try it. Hopefully, if it's a guy, they won't think I am trying to pick them up....lol

Hi All,
I have found that shooting in manual and underexposing the scene and then converting into a B+W will work very well.

With Digital, the RED channel blows very easily and you will lose all the detail, shooting in any other mode besides manual the camera will try to correct the exposure by over exposing( trying to make the scene 18% grey)

with the scene under exposed you now have all the details you will need when you convert to B+W. At that point you will be able to increase the exposer in PP and not have blown out whites... Try it out and let me know how it works for you all

Tas

Very interesting. Definitely worth a shot (pun intended).

I've only been doing gig photography for about a year now, and when I first started shooting bands in small venues I couldn't believe that all that lit them up were red and blue lights (sometimes even green!!!).

I'm fortunate that in one venue I shoot in a lot (The Scala, near Kings Cross in London) they have a lighting tech who is friendly, approachable and willing to listen. I explained to him about lighting the performers with white spots from the top or front, using colours for the back and not leaving the drummers to fester in the dark. During one sound check he ran through all the lights for me to see if I approved, and now every time he sees me he comes down from his booth at the back to ask me if all is OK. Of course I repay his helpfulness with drinks.

I have tried your approach of showing photos to bands I know and they have words with the techs if they can, but in smaller venues it can be a hit or miss affair. More recently (since getting a few shots published I now feel I can talk to bands with a little more authority) I have sent out polite emails to bands I know I'm going to be shooting, introducing myself, explaining that the promoter has asked me to shoot the gig and explaining about the potential lighting problems in the venue. So far so good. I've had positive responses from the bands (after all they don't just want to sound good on the night, they want to look good for posterity) who have asked for specific lighting patterns that enable me to get better shots. The downside of course is that all my efforts in getting better lighting also benefit any other (rival) togs there that night :-)

Personally, I wouldn't worry about other togs... let your images do the talking

:^)

Been a while since I've been here.

IMO, red (or other crappy) lighting is just a fact of life.
Expose well (do *not* clip any of the channels by either under or overexposing) and deal with it in post.

Frankly, IMO red is not the worst color...
And I have more problems with bad or boring lighting then with a specific color.

If all else fails, convert to grayscale ;)

I think the real issue is that the smaller bands just don't realise that red lighting is band.

It's probably the lastthing on their mind!

I've had some sucess educating bands, using the same method as Walter...show them some images.

A lot of very small bands don't even have their own lights, let alone a lighting tech, and rely on house lights, many of which don't have a tech either and are just left on static or sequence.

I regularly shoot at a venue that has 40% red static lighting (no tech) and the reds were focused on the front line players.

I successfully convinced the bar owner and sound guy to let me take the red gels out for the perfomances.

Failing that, as someone else mentioned, under expose slightly and convert to monochrome.

I've yet to find a post processing method that works successfully on red saturated images, but I think the key is don't let the red channel blow skin detail.