photography – Page 2 – What Jessie Did Next…

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Pride London 2010: Paint The Town Ruby Red

Last weekend was Pride London 2010; once again we’d been asked if we could take photos for Paleday and The Pink Singers on the main stage, once again a privilege to do so.

Given last year’s experiences of schlepping to and fro from Battersea I thought it prudent to get down the day before and stay at a hotel somewhere in central London. We’d had plenty of notice this year and I booked Covent Garden Travelodge: pretty reasonable for our needs and easy for transport links. You don’t expect luxury at Travelodges, just a good night’s sleep so this provided all we needed.

So anyway, we got down on the Friday. After a bit of confusion I collected our Press passes from backstage in Trafalgar Square then wandered up to Camden for a lovely evening with friends (especially nice to meet Jharda again, and have unexpected company from Richie).

We were told that this year we were to have not just passes but also wristbands which I needed to collect from King’s Cross before the parade started. This meant a bit of a mad dash for me while Nicky and Si headed for the parade itself. Bad timing for the weekend – I was naffed off to discover the entire Circle line was shut down for maintenance which in turn led to various bus rides to Baker Street simply trying to get there before the parade started! Good news, I managed it (with just quarter of an hour to spare), making my way to the head of the parade led by Boris Johnson and Peter Tatchell.

There were a lot of photographers at the head of the parade – when it started we were moved back. Unfortunately (and this is my first experience of such behaviour) there were a couple of photographers who didn’t take any notice and started to spoil it for the rest of us conscientious lot; one photog was threatened with removal of his pass, and another idiot almost came to blows with a Parade Director. I strongly believe that there’s unwritten laws of courtesy when you’re a photographer, but this time it was a little… well, nasty I suppose.

I got ahead of the parade and started grabbing shots of the crowds of which there were enough to keep me going. At one point I turned back to see I was about 20 metres in front of the head of the parade, nothing in front of me and nothing behind me; at either side were thousands of cheering screaming people. Yes, it would seem I led the parade (pic here). Hurrah!

It soon became apparent we had a bit of an issue – how do we drop back into the parade to take shots of participants given all the photographers are being shoved back? Si and Nicky managed to do this by blending into the crowd while the parade flag went past, but I was skeptical of this given I’d got two huge cameras around my neck. I slipped out and walked with the spectators on Oxford Street while the first few floats went past, then found a steward near a break in the barriers.

“Can I get in the parade please?” I wibbled, after getting his attention. “I’m Press, meant to be over there. Sorry.”
“Um no. We can’t part the barriers.”
“Bother. I’m really meant to be photographing.”
He thought for a moment and grinned slightly. “Right, you could climb over?”

So I handed him the larger camera and lens, and vaulted the barrier with about £3k-worth of camera kit. I won’t repeat that experience but at least I was in the parade!

I walked with lots of floats – the London Gay Men’s Chorus, the LGBT Lib Dems, Labour and Tory groups, various campaign groups, and the London Raiders softball team – all the while taking photos (many of which are on my Flickr stream, all of which are on photos.jml.net). I was sorry to miss Gaz (who was apparently in Soho Square), the Gaydar lot, and one of the Pinkies I’ve been talking with since I photographed him last year. Never mind, there’s always the 2011 parade!

Post-parade, Si and Nicky were waiting for me with a nice chilled pint in The Sherlock Holmes pub just off Trafalgar Square. Recovery time, a good sit down. Phew.

Next stop – the main stage. I arrived to find one of the performers from West End show ‘Wicked’ singing her little heart out, and it was at that point I discovered that this year our passes and wristbands didn’t just get us into the press pit but it also got us backstage. Bonus!

The stage was higher this year, by my estimation about 18″. This meant the angles were a lot sharper on some of the photos, but the press pit was also larger. Unfortunately, it was also a lot more full and there was quite a lot of shoving around – unfortunate. Some of the acts were pounced on by the photographers (including for some reason the cast of the West End show ‘Hair’) while others didn’t get touched and my philosophy in such situations is that I’d prefer to get photos other people don’t, so step back. Instead I took photos of acts waiting to go onstage, little bits of interaction between performers and producers, photos nobody else would get. Given some of the reactions so far, it was appreciated.

Anyway, back to the day. After a while, myself and Si went for a wander to see what the Leicester Square stage was like. Crowded, lots of people around. Some good shots taken, quite nice, and we got the (now usual) kick out of being able to walk through the exit and go out of the entrance cos we had press passes, baby! 😛

We fought our way up through Soho, to find there was nothing in Soho Square – not even many paraders. We took a few snaps (for that is all they were) and set off back.

At that point, I received a text message from Nicky: “Pink Singers all lining up”. SHIT, THIS IS THE BAND I’M HERE TO PHOTOGRAPH AND I’M STILL UP IN SOHO. We run as fast as we can through seething masses of people. We got to the main stage to find that yes, they’d all lined up but weren’t on for about another 30 minutes. Thanks for panicking me, love! Still, it left me backstage to take some more candid shots – excellent.

Paleday and the Pink Singers were wonderful – a better performance than last year, and I’m looking forward to Paleday doing some more full gigs.

And so we went on into the evening, with the final act being the DE Experience, a drag act performing most frequently at the Vauxhall Tavern. Lots of photos, lots of crowd shots, some opportunity to mess with the fisheye lens. It all finished up around 8:30pm so we headed back to the hotel.

(My t-shirt went down well – I’d opted for a red number with JAN MOIR THINKS I’M DIRTY printed on it. I got stopped a few times for people to take my photo, and met someone professing to be involved with the Daily Mail who said ‘don’t worry mate, we f*ing hate her too’. Comedy.)

Finally after half an hour of rest, showering, etc. we’re ready for a night out in Soho. That was a bit of a mess really, the whole place seemed to shut down about 11:30pm, maybe because of the broken glass? There were police everywhere and unless we wanted to go in a very very crowded club (Koko anyone?) we’d be out of luck. So, we strolled back to the hotel and in a display of middle-classed heterosexuality we had a few bottles of Carlsberg until the hotel bar closed. Meh.

There were about 80GB of photos this time round – a smaller number in total but I was shooting RAW and dumping them to a Vosonic Imagetank to prevent running out of CF (instead I ran out of juice on the BP511 batteries on the Canon 30D). I was carrying the 24-105mm f/4 IS L lens, the 70-200mm f/2.8 IS L lens and the f/2.8 fisheye (using it as an ultrawide on the 30D body at times). It seemed a good mix, and was supplemented sometimes by the Speedlite 580EX II flashgun to provide fill.

My photos are gradually appearing on my Flickr stream and over at our photo gallery.

Canon CPS Roadshow, Manchester

January 29, 2010 / Jess / 0 Comments

I took most of yesterday off to pay a visit to Calumet in Manchester for a Canon Professional Services roadshow where they were showing off some of the new stuff.

I like CPS (formerly CPN) – it’s open to everyone who has spent a ridiculous amount of money and provides on-site support from engineers at the larger events, ‘masterclass’ type newsletters, plus loan kit if yours packs up. More importantly (to me) their repair service guarantees you’ll have an item back within 5 days or send you loan equipment to use.

However, I can quite honestly say I was drawn to this particular event by the promise of free CCD cleaning and service! Normally I fork out at least £40 a shot for this (plus travel) so killing two birds with one (free) stone seemed like a good idea and I wouldn’t have to hang around in a cafe while the cameras were ‘seen to’. Besides, the 30D sorely needed a clean anyway.

The ‘roadshow’ itself was quite small and hidden in a meeting room in the depths of Calumet’s offices. One side of the room was given over to printing technology (the Pixma range) and the other featured a table full of lenses, flashguns and camera bodies to try out – lots of toys. One end of the room was given over to a small theatre-style arrangement of chairs, but no screen to see example images (which seemed a little odd).

So what did I have a play with? I’d heard the hype around the 70-200 f/2.8 IS L II lens (I have the first version) and had a quick go – the optics have apparently been redesigned but it was difficult to be able to compare in an office room (more about that later). Additionally the Canon rep wouldn’t let me store any images on a CF because “it’s a pre-release lens, this is the only one in Europe, and it’s not the final one”. Disappointing!

That particular restriction only applied to a couple of items though. I also fiddled with:

17-40mm f/4 L ultrawide (as a complement to my 24-105mm f/4 lens).
MP-65 Macro which gave some insane results – this photo was taken from a distance of 15mm. Great for getting pics of bugs I guess!
15mm f/2.8 fisheye, a lens I’ve had my eye on for a while which could give some fun gig shots. I’ll probably nab one of these from lensesforhire.co.uk for a week so I can make sure it’s good enough.

Then there were the camera bodies, and I had a play with an EOS 7D, an EOS 1D Mark IV and an EOS 1Ds Mark III. I really missed the full-frame, and the 1Ds Mark III didn’t really ‘wow’ me either, so it served a purpose in that it made me realise how happy I am with my EOS 5D Mark II and stopped me lusting after toys for a while. Additionally, the absence of edge-AF (the diamond is concentrated in the centre on all models) means I’ll wait a bit longer, thanks.

(Sidenote: I asked about the possibility of a ‘1Ds Mark IV’ and was told nothing was in development or in the roadmap.)

It was great getting hands-on experience of the kit and talking to people who obviously knew what they were on about, but it would have been so much better if we had something to take photos of when trying equipment out – even a couple of bowls of fruit with a softbox would have been something. As it was, I used the Canon guys themselves as models and did the best I could with the flourescent lighting itself.

I pottered back to Wakefield once the cameras had been cleaned and I’d played with enough toys. Nice to see the human face of Canon, and worth the jaunt.

Photos (and examples while playing with kit) are here.

Edit: I just got a call – I won the £500 voucher to spend at Calumet as well – what a lovely surprise!

Gig Photography In A Light-Hostile Venue

January 21, 2010 / Jess / 0 Comments

Now a few of my friends and acquaintances have dSLR cameras and enjoy music photography I thought I’d mention one of the better venues for gigs in Wakefield but which also has the most undesirable light; certainly it’s the most hostile I’ve come across for a photographer.

I’m talking about Escobar in Wakefield, a music venue which features quite a lot of upcoming bands alongside mainstream returners (such as The Cribs, Reverend & The Makers, The Kooks, etc.). As such, amateur photographers can find themselves shooting away at their mates’ ‘Unsigned Bands’ gig on a Monday alongside professional music-press photographers – the walls of the venue are decorated with images of past gigs and magazine articles sporting photos of previous successes. Myself, I’ve photographed there frequently including Leeds band Vessels, Rosie Doonan, Jonny The Firth, Chat Noir and a few of the Louder Than Bombs showcase nights.

The lighting can be described as ‘atmospheric’ – it’s quite dark with a predominance on red and orange lighting fading in and out (it doesn’t seem predictable and there’s no obvious lighting desk); as a result it’s very easy to unexpectedly blow out the red channel on your photos. There is no side-access to the stage so you’re left crouching near the barrier on either side with the crowd at your back.

From that particular venue I’ve learned quite a few lessons, most of which apply to ‘hostile stage environments’ in general:

It is a trial simply to focus on your subject let alone grab a steady shot so you do have to get quite arty.
I break my own rule in this particular venue and use a flashgun (checking – if I can – that it’s OK before using it, some bands find it distracting).
The flashgun is on-body and bounced off the ceiling – the main stage area has a brown ceiling which provides a nice warm glow.
I put a 1/4 CTO gel over the flashgun head -pick yours up from flashgels.co.uk and use a rubber band to keep it on (Royal Mail red rubber bands are ideal). This colour-corrects the artificial light, otherwise you will get an undesirable contrast in the blue-tinged subject near the flash and the warmer background.
The flashgun’s own focus-assist is pretty useful too, even if you stop the flashgun from firing it can help a lot.
As we’re using flash, we might as well do some 2nd-curtain work – that’s where the flash fires as the shutter closes. You can get some nice effects with long shutter speeds and 2nd-curtain such as motion blur in this photo.
Shooting in RAW is absolutely essential as you will need to colour-correct afterwards in Lightroom or Aperture.
Forget Tv and Av modes – utterly useless in this scenario. You will need to go fully manual and ride your settings. Expect a lot of duff photos as a result.
You may get away without a flashgun if you are using a very high ISO (start at ISO1600 in Escobar), have a fast (f/1.8 or higher) lens, and your subject doesn’t move around much – this particular venue has a lot of folk bands and Indie bands with slow songs which suit that setup.
If all else fails you can shove stuff into monochrome and slap on the effects, but I feel it’s always nice to get ‘real’ photos first.
Oh and whatever you do, don’t get in the way of the punters – they paid to be there.

Hopefully this will help a few photographers in Escobar itself, but in general those are the rules I apply in the ‘dark’. You can see my pics from this particular venue here.

For preference I use both Canon EOS 40D and Canon EOS 5D Mk 2 – although the former is fairly useless unless I’m using the f/1.4 50mm or the f/1.2 85mm – and the lenses I use for preference in the venue are f/2.8 IS L 70-200, f/4 IS L 24-105 and f/1.4 50mm.

(NB. if you want to practice a little, we’re playing in February…!)

Edit: I changed the title of this entry to something a little more representative of the content.

Canon G9 Dead – Point+Shoot Compact Recommendations?

October 1, 2009 / Jess / 1 Comment

Well, unfortunately the Canon G9 which broke on holiday is uneconomical to repair. I’m loathed to get a replacement one so I’m looking for recommendations for a compact camera I can stuff in my bag and carry around with me preferably before I’m told to bugger off to India on business with $contract.

Here’s the list of requirements, hopefully not too moon-on-a-stick…

Needs to be good in low light situations without using flash, since I use it mostly for parties.
Internal flash which doesn’t blind, external flash connector less important but a nice-to-have.
Needs to be able to do f/2.8, preferably with ISO800 and above.
Battery: Excellent battery life, bonus points if it takes Canon NB-2LH batteries (which sorta limits me to the G10 or a second-hand G9).
Memory: Compact flash or SDHC (‘cos this is what I have tons of).
Timer and long-exposure shooting.
10MP at least, definite bonus points if it does RAW.
Size: Not too unwieldy, and will fit in my back pocket. The G9 just about did.
Price point lower than £400.
Not too bothered about video, if it does it then it would be good if it were HD.

I have already discounted the G11 because I don’t like flop-out LCD screens and it falls outside the price range. The Canon G10 has also been suggested, the dust-in-lens issues have put me off that a little although it meets most requirements.

Does anyone have any other suggestions please?

Sexy A-Levels

August 20, 2009 / Jess / 0 Comments

It’s A-level results day in the UK, which means lots of photo opportunities.

Thus from @JoeTheDough and @flashboy comes Fuck Yeah, Sexy A-Levels which in their own words is “The more egregious examples of the UK Photo Editors’ tendency to promote rather more teenage flesh on A-level results day than would perhaps seem required”.

SFW, although you may get odd looks from your colleagues.

Canon Pro Network, EOS 50D, Jessops Part 2

August 20, 2009 / Jess / 3 Comments

Time for a bit of a sweep up on tales of photography which came to conclusions recently…

Remember my whinge about Jessops’ poor repair service where they’d taken 10 days to get it to Canon’s repair centre? I got my EOS 5D Mark 2 back with a note of ‘readjustment’ – after a little bit of research it turns out that this is a fairly common operation, and while they don’t map the pixels out they actually re-adjust the CCD (which bit I don’t know, so don’t ask). Jessops themselves are unrepentant about the delay, it’s fairly average for them and the Interwebs are full of complaints.

In the course of my investigations into quicker repair options I came across Canon Professional Network. While most of the website is open to everyone (I recommend the video tutorials/masterclasses from professionals), if you qualify for their full programme you get priority repairs and equipment loan if it takes more than a week to get the unit back to you. The entry requirements are fairly sizeable – you have to own at least 2 L-series lenses and 2 ‘professional’ bodies (base requirement is EOS 40D so your entry-level dSLRs don’t count nor do the older bodies).

They also make sure there’s a repair centre on-site at major events such as Wimbledon and other major sports events, yada yada. That way if something goes bang you can get it sorted damn quick (and they cover your lenses too, hooray).

Anyway, I qualified for it in the end because I’ve acquired a Canon EOS 50D as a body for Nicky to use. The 30D has been very heavily used (the trigger is reluctant to fire sometimes) and the accessories will fit a 50D so it seemed like a sensible purchase. Nicky’s used it a little bit on holiday and I’m looking forward to the first gig pics using it.

I guess I’ll see how the repair service deals with the G9’s failure and will report sometime in the future, but bear in mind the experience may be a little different as it’s a travel-insurance job.

On a side-note, there’s unsubstantiated rumours of the EOS 7D (again) and of course the new G11 has been announced. Maybe if the G9 is irrepairable I’ll go find one of those instead.

I’m so Canon’s bitch.

Jessops Slow Repair Service Part 1

July 23, 2009 / Jess / 1 Comment

OK, I’m annoyed. No, scratch that – I’m fucking livid.

After some nice experiences with Jessops over the past couple of years, they’ve done something that’s really irked me: they’ve sat on my repair job without sending it off.

Let’s backtrack: my Canon EOS 5D Mark II (list price over £2300) developed a small rash of measles on the CCD – dead pixels which would come up as red blobs indicating early CCD failure. Any photos which came out had to be manually retouched (including a lot of the ones from Pride London 2009), a completely unacceptable situation. I’d previously written about Jessops in both Leeds and Wakefield being excellent so let me be clear here, I’m not laying this at the door of the shops themselves.

I took the unit to the Wakefield branch of Jessops which (in my opinion) has a competent manager and isn’t so busy that they rush you along. Quite aside from the computer being a bit odd and linking the serial number to a Canon EOS 30D (!) they managed to book it in and said the courier would pick it up same day.

That was about a week and a half ago (10th July). I’ve started getting anxious for an update since I’m off on holiday next week and wanted to spend a good while getting to know the camera in bright conditions. I dug around on Jessops’ site for a link to repair updates: nothing there, no help at all – and the helpline I did phone said ‘call Canon on 0844 369 0100 and choose option 1’. So I did.

After sitting through what seemed like eons of ‘you must call xxx if you have yyy’ and other prerecorded messages I finally got through to a polite lady who took the serial number of the camera body, and then said she couldn’t tell me anything because of ‘data protection’. Right. Finally through a two-step comprising me telling her bits about what it was in for and stuff (and that it had been booked through Jessops) she let slip it hadn’t arrived at Canon until 20th July, it was in ‘the queue’ and the average wait time was 5-7 working days.

So, just to clarify: Jessops didn’t forward my 5 month-old camera body to Canon for almost 10 days.

(Sidenote: Jessops shouldn’t have told me to phone the Canon service centre apparently; “They know they’re not meant to do that.” said Polite Lady.)

I’m not optimistic of receiving the unit back before I go on holiday on 29th July. Indeed, aside from having to go back to the 30D I’m steeling myself for either a dash back up North on the Thursday, or getting a friend to courier the body out to Montpellier if it comes back in time (which might be a silly idea anyway, we’ll have to see).

To say I’m pissed off is an understatement. More as it unfolds.

Pride London 2009: Come Out And Play!

July 6, 2009 / Jess / 1 Comment

Well, what an experience!

I am of course talking about Pride London, a day of celebration of the whole gay/lesbian/bi/trans community. I’ve always wanted to go to a Pride march but it wasn’t until Anthony from Paleday asked me to take photos of the band on stage that I got the impetus to get off my fat arse and go.

“What prodded you to go then?” I hear you ask. Easy answer: Paleday were playing the main stage, we had press passes kindly arranged for us – these gave us some fantastic vantage points along the parade and also access to the main photography pit in front of the main stage. All we had to do was turn up at the press stand to collect them, we were pretty damn excited!

I’d been kit-shopping the day before and picked up a 24-105mm f/4 IS L lens for the 5Dmk2 (sidenote: Calumet London are really helpful). This was a bit of a risk, a brand new lens for such a huge shoot but I was really pleased with it (I suppose hiring/borrowing it before means it’s not quite ‘blind’). Alongside the 5Dmk2 I was carrying the Canon 400D with the f/2.8 70-200 IS L and a rather large amount of compact flash. Sorted!

So we showed up around 11am in Trafalgar Square, retrieved our passes and had a little walk around before catching the Tube up to Baker St where the parade was due to commence around 1pm. What struck me immediately was how polite everyone was – I’m used to folks giving me black looks when I take a photo, but we got poses! There were some excellent outfits including an entire cast of “Michael Jackson’s Thriller”, sparkly dresses, a huge 16ft-wide feather set, and lots of flags. I even had a little chat with Boy George, who seems like a nice enough chap!

(Thankyou to the nice young man who wolf-whistled me at Baker St station – very complimentary, gave me a little morale and confidence boost did that!)

I’d split off from Simon and Nicky by this point and walked down Baker St towards the junction of Oxford St: the head of the parade where Sarah Brown (as in ‘wife of Gordon’) was standing. The conditions weren’t very photogenic so I thought I’d stroll down Oxford St – a disastrous move, I got stuck behind the barriers amidst the crowd which ain’t great for taking photos! Ten minutes of walking later – sheer relief – I managed to find a break in the barriers thanks once again to the miracle of the press pass (“let me through! i’m important!”)

And so I found myself standing slap bang in the middle of Oxford St, crowds on either side, walking backwards while taking photos of the head of the parade and officials jostled us to keep our distance from the very important people at the front. As we snapped away I picked up some tips (and observed how more experienced news photographers handle situations) – all very very useful.

There were about 10 of us photographing at the front, very courteous behaviour (again something I’m not used to) – and quite easy to get some fab shots of the costumed people in the parade. We were hustled behind a barrier at Oxford Circus because of the tight turn (dangerous territory as you could get snagged under the wheels) although once the officials all buggered off the photographers joined bits of the parade.

At this point I was starting to feel the heat, literally. The temperature was at least 30C in the middle of the road and although I had a hat on it was blisteringly dry: another photographer I’d hooked up with was also having dehydration problems, our water was all gone, no chance of us getting through the crowd barriers let alone the crowd to get water. Si was on the other side and had a bit of water left, as a lifesaver I texted him – he met us outside H&M and goodness me a mouthful of H20 has never been so welcomed, plus he was waved into the parade too and we started strolling down the middle of Regent St.

(In a rather unexpected moment, Si revealed a gift for me: a Gaydar Radio lanyard! Apparently these are highly prized and I shall treasure it forever, wish I’d seen them in person but t’was not to be.)

The parade participants marched around us, Simon and I occasionally joined in. We became honorary members of Norwich LGBT for about 10 minutes (“Isn’t Norwich a bit flat?” said one photographer. “Depends who you’re lying on top of.” came the reply). As the march continued we dropped back to join the Krishnas for a bit, then the LGBT Catholics, the scouts, and goodness knows who else. Thanks to everyone who let us march with them, it was great fun 🙂

Scorching hot with crowds cheering around us we rounded into Piccadilly Circus and down towards Trafalgar Square – punctuated by the shenanigans of rough lesbians, onlookers partying on scaffolding and bus-shelters, footballers, marathon runners and rugby scrums. The parade marched down Whitehall and petered out in the shades of a side-street – some hugs with participants before myself and Simon decided now would be a great time for a pint, heading for the Sherlock Holmes pub just down from the Square itself. A pint of lager never tasted so damn good.

We were both wondering what had happened to Nicky – our text messages went unanswered, our phonecalls went to voicemail. Turns out she was in the media pit in front of the stage taking pics of Peter Tatchell and her mobile phone battery had run out! We joined her for a while and photographed Kele Le Roc, Bob Crow (who got boo’d), Harriet Harman, Scooch, Mark Read (formerly of A1), Now Then Now Then, Urban Cookie Collective (fronted by Diane Charlemagne), and The Dolly Rockers. That took us up to about 5:30pm.

(I phoned my hairdresser during Scooch, he’s the spitting image of Russ; I don’t think he was impressed.)

During all this I’d been Twittering with other acquaintances who were at the event. Simon and myself decided to wander up to Soho taking in Leicester Square and Dean Street en route. Being in the protected media pit had spoilt us – we hadn’t anticipated the vast crowds and our progress was slow (especially around the Old Compton Street/Wardour Street end). We totally failed to find the women’s stage, but did gatecrash through the exit to the Soho Square dance area waving our passes (“look! we’re allowed!”).

We totally failed to meet up with @fnar although Si clocked Nadia from Big Brother, apparently. It was then we encountered a gentleman wearing briefs who, if I am going to be honest, was packing a hell of a lunchbox – I swear he was padding with a pair of socks, nobody should have a penis that big. Nobody.

I did not want to miss Paleday of course: we left Soho Square for Trafalgar Square again, enjoyed an ice-lolly on the way and picked up choc bars and water for Nicky. On our return Tina Cousins was singing on the main stage, with Paleday due up afterwards – I could see Alex tuning up his guitar, and Steve checking his drum kit.

A bit of a wibble from the compere, and they’re on! It was going to be a short set but they stormed through Eurotramp with the crowd loving it. Anthony welcomed on stage the Pink Singers (a gay choir) who launched into a medley of disco hits, before completing the act with a full choir-and-band version of YMCA which had the entirety of Trafalgar Square (well over 10,000 people) doing the actions – I looked back across and everyone from the front row up to the National Gallery had their arms in the air. Really, it was the highlight of the day for me, absolutely mind-blowing! I also have to say I love Anthony’s new costume coat – and please, more songs from Paleday next year.

Following on was Suzerain and Elouise as we snapped away from the front of the stage. The Dame Edna Experience drag queen from the Vauxhall Tavern bringing South London Action Girls Society to the party with the entire crowd singing along! Finally, Jimmy Somerville – only three songs but he finished with a beautifully calm, quiet comedown version of “Small Town Boy”. Utterly magical, taking us up to about 8:45pm and the end.

We gradually ‘came down’ in the Wetherspoons on Whitehall after meeting Clare and her friend, before grabbing some food and having a walk up through Soho once we’d finally come to the dawning realisation we were just too knackered to go dancing.

My legs hurt like hell as well – principally the top of my thighs since I was crouching, jumping up, crouching, jumping up, rinse and repeat from about 1pm straight through to 9pm. It’s making walking up and down stairs rather difficult.

I took about 14,000 photos (roughly 55GB) and I’m still sorting through although some have been filed to photo agencies already. I’ll get the lot on photo.jml.net over the next day or so I think – if you publish a magazine or are part of an organisation I photographed, and want to use any, please get in touch.

Next year’s Pride is set for 3rd July. Regardless of passes and such, we’ll be there — it was just such a wonderful experience. Meantime I’m back in the office, listening to Gaydar Radio and reliving the happy manic bounciness of the day. Smoochies, darlings.

Mobile Phone Cameras Are Killing Live Music

June 19, 2009 / Jess / 3 Comments

And so last night we went to see the Pet Shop Boys at Manchester Apollo. I’ll blog about that in a bit but this is a little more of a grouch, so deserves its own blog entry. Actually no, it’s a full-on rant.

PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD PUT YOUR FUCKING CAMERA PHONE DOWN AND WATCH THE GIG YOU PAID A FORTUNE TO COME AND SEE.

I am absolutely sick to the back teeth of paying a fortune for concert tickets to go and watch a band, purely to have some village idiot in front of me holding his camera phone sky high so I can either watch his arms or see it all through the back of his LCD display. This applies especially to large concert venues with stalls, gigs with lots of visuals, or places where we’re all crammed together and dancing.

So, tips for aspiring photographers at gigs, please:

Remember people are standing behind you – they don’t want to see you fiddling with your camera all the way through. They paid just as much as you for a ticket (and may be shorter in stature as well).
If you do want to take a few photos (which is fine, I do it myself with the Canon G9 occasionally), don’t do it throughout the entire gig. At some gigs I get asked to photograph, I’m restricted to a couple of songs where I can take pics then I have to sod off (or at least not get the camera out again) – take the lead from that, the rule’s there for a reason.
Feel free to stand in the aisles, in front of a stairwell, next to a wall, somewhere like that and hold it high if you want – at least you’re not pissing anyone off behind you.
If you’re not backed by a wall, aisle, etc. then hold the camera at head height, not a foot and a half above.
If all else fails and you do want photos, take your pics in the cheering, applause, etc. when there’s no major performance going on – folks can’t really object to that when they’ve got their hands in the air cheering!
Turn the flash off! You will get shit photos with the flash on, probably of the backs of the heads of the two rows in front of you and unless you’re an aspiring hairdresser this will not be what you want.
Likewise they don’t want to smell your armpits. It’s hot in here, don’t make the experience worse.
Avoid taking video – the sound will be terrible (loud, distorted), the quality will be awful, and the bloke standing behind you will miss an entire song.
Hey, you might be on a hide into nothing anyway: unless you have brought a reasonable point-n-click your phone photos will be rubbish – blurry, lots of movement.
The gig photographers will do a better job than you, why not look on Flickr for the event tomorrow morning instead (I found some pics of last night’s gig which are lovely)?
Remember YOU PAID HARD EARNED DOSH TO SEE THE BAND, NOT HOLD YOUR CAMERAPHONE UP.

So, last night I finally said something to the guy in front of me: “‘Scuse me feller,” says I. “Are we all going to have to watch the gig through your phone screen?” “Er, no. Sorry.” he stammered. At least he did shift it, and was suitably embarrassed. It’s just thoughtless.

This may strike you as hypocritical considering I profess to be a reasonably competent gig photographer (and get frequent requests from bands to take photos for them). Fair one. However, I try and be careful not to get in the way and I think I do that pretty well (doing stupid things like crouching next to million-decibel speaker stacks, and less stupid things like turning off the LCD) – OK there’s been one transgression (knocking a mike stand, thankfully in an almost deserted pub) which I duly beat myself up over for days afterwards but by and large I’m there to get in the way as little as possible.

Ergo, I’m not saying “don’t take photos” – I’m saying “don’t let it get in the way of other paying customers’ enjoyment of the gig.”

In other words, just be considerate eh?

A Temporary Dip In Productivity

April 15, 2009 / Jess / 0 Comments

I have a bad cold. I attempted to ignore it since chugging the first lot of Nightnurse on Saturday night, but tonight I finally gave in – it’s got the better of me. Bother.

On a positive note, in the past few days I’ve received five emails from bands and producers liking my photos, wanting to use them in accordance with my turn-up-and-shoot usage licence (CC non-commercial attribution), and in two cases are prepared to give me good hard cash to show up at a gig to take some more. This is indeed good.

I’m not booked to do any pics for a week or so but Shrood are playing O’Donoghue’s on Saturday and Nicky will be there. I’ll probably find somewhere to photograph on Friday – it would be good to find a showcase night around Leeds so any promoter types are welcome to get in touch and drag me over, especially if there’s decent lighting and a bar 😉

Open Mic Monday: Some Weeks Later…

March 31, 2009 / Jess / 0 Comments

Ryan’s Open Mic Monday at The Hop has been going for some weeks. While most of Wakefield is dead on a Monday evening, this is where the party’s at. It’s usually worth a looksee even though it can get a bit packed out especially with “the grunge youth of today”.

Anyway, those who have shown up will be fairly familiar with me – I turn up, I take photos, I use it as practice space for my own photography in a no-pressure environment and try out new kit and new techniques. It’s useful, but last night I decided to instigate a new policy which is: if you’ve played at Open Mic and I’ve photographed you more than twice, I will probably not take any more pics unless you’re either extremely photogenic, you specifically ask me, or I’m trying out some new kit. I think that’s pretty important to point out: I was asked by one of the younger devotees last night why I’d not shot his set, there’s your answer.

(Sidenote: it’s nice if folks say “thankyou” once in a while. I was standing at a gig on Saturday with some folks who’ve used my pics before, and got utterly blanked. Come on chaps, at least nod and say ‘hi’, politeness costs nothing.)

Of course, if you do want me to show up and it’s an interesting venue with lots of opportunity to expand my portfolio then please do drop me a line. I’m always amenable to showing up and taking some pics especially if it’s in Leeds or Wakefield.

Update: Last night’s pics are here. I think I’m getting better at the B&W stuff.

A Postscript About DSG/Jessops…

March 28, 2009 / Jess / 1 Comment

OK, I got it wrong! A rather helpful chap from DSGi Head Office got in touch and pointed out that Jessops have never been a DSGi operation, stating:

“…in the UK DSGi operate Dixons, Currys, PCWorld; TheLink has sort of finished and is web only, as is Dixons, except the Airport stores. (There are also lots of European chains, which have names I can never remember); but Jessops has never been a DSGi operation.”

A couple of other comments from several folks indicate that Jessops competence is still very much changeable and your mileage will indeed vary. I must have been lucky!

Anyway, I won’t name names on this but thankyou for the clarification and consider me corrected.

Experiences With Jessops

March 26, 2009 / Jess / 4 Comments

As many folks know, there is no love lost between me and DSG (“Dixons Store Group”). The inefficient stores, the 16 year-old school-leavers and disinterested sales assistants, the “Mastercare” warranty debacle, the staff who aren’t particularly knowledgeable and the poor stock control all contribute to horrendous experiences in Currys and PC World (I won’t touch Leeds Headrow PC World with a bargepole – but that’s another story). Jessops seems to stand out in competence though. At least, they do now.

I’ve had good experiences from Jessops branches over the past year: I bought the Canon G9 in Marlow’s branch and they were helpful and considerate. I chinwagged for an hour with the manager in the Wakefield store where I’ve not bought anything major for a year or two but he didn’t seem to mind. Then this past fortnight I have had exceptional service from the Headrow Leeds store.

So what happened in Leeds to warrant this outpouring of joyfulness? The EOS 5D Mk II I bought was faulty. Nothing major but definitely an annoyance – a hair looked to be trapped between the focusing grid and the lightbox: when I took the camera bodies to be cleaned the bloke at Calumet said he’d have to have most of the unit apart to remove it so I went for a replacement. The nice lady in Jessops got me a 5D shipped in from the only store in the UK which had one left, I kept the first body while the second arrived, and then was in the store for about 10 minutes today doing the switchover. During the process I had phonecalls advising me of progress which I really appreciated.

This isn’t the first time I’ve had good times with Leeds Jessops either – the Merrion Centre store (now closed) were equally helpful when I bought my 30D. I didn’t have time to get it cleaned before I went on holiday so needed one with a CCD as clean as possible: we had almost every 30D body out of the box doing a dust-check (f/22, point at sky, take photo, look for dust). Seems to be something they’re used to, and experience speaks volumes.

Let’s backtrack slightly here for some background: DSG tend to get “lowest common denominator” staff in – at least that’s how it appears. I’m sure the folks in charge of the stores are great but that’s not how it comes across. For instance, I can walk into Currys in Wakefield and there’s shop-floor staff staring into the middle distance in a sort of “sales droid standby mode”, who seem to bluescreen when you ask them anything past “how much does it cost”. That’s always seemed to be the norm for DSG-owned stores, but they’ve pulled a blinder with Jessops. Indeed, staff seem to know what they’re on about (for instance being able to discuss photographic techniques and scenarios rather than them reading from a sales document stored in their heads – almost like I’ve gone to an independent shop).

It’s not always been this way: when Jessops aggressively expanded (and bought up Wakefield’s own local camera shop, Richards Cameras) the shops were largely staffed by salesmonkeys and the aforementioned pubescent YTS staff. I think it all changed about 2 years ago when they decided to get some folks in who knew what they were on about.

I heartily recommend them – and coming from someone who passionately hates DSG, that’s a recommendation to take note of.

Edit: Jessops it turns out aren’t DSG – see my followup post here.

Canon EOS 5D Mk II

March 10, 2009 / Jess / 1 Comment

Happy new camera!

I now own a Canon EOS 5D Mark II – the Leeds Headrow Jessops had one in, and after a lunchtime jaunt (where I’d convinced myself it was a stocking error and they didn’t really have one) I happily bounced back to the office with a bagful of toys (body-only, since I have glass for man and dog, but I did add on some screen protectors and an 8GB Sandisk Ultra CF).

Good timing too – I spent the evening at The Hop shooting the Open Mic Night. It’s a regular night for me so I was able to compare the photos from my 30D in previous weeks: the end verdict is that the camera displays a totally different dynamic from anything I’ve used before.

The first big difference is the full-frame sensor. OK, I know this isn’t specific to the 5D itself but it’s taken vaguely 20-30mm off my lenses – the 85mm lens acts like a 50mm on the 30D; the 70-200mm acts like a 50mm… you get the idea. In short, I don’t know my glass any more: where I could pick out any lens straight away it’s now going to take some experimentation to get the optimum balance again!

Onto the ISO expansion: the high-ISO noise is pretty nonexistent. Fair enough if you run it at H2 (ISO25600) you get some grain, but I was happily shooting at ISO6400 last night: instead of riding aperture and shutter speed (my technique on the 30D) I found myself riding the ISO instead. It also meant I could take some cracking crowd shots, and stop making up for the poor light with low shutter speed. Brill.

Finally, the video – 1080p HD video to be precise. Now I’ve not worked out a way of resizing/transcoding that yet given a 5-minute performance yields a 650MB file, but it looked good; actually my big problem is that I can’t hold the sodding camera steady, a skill I suppose I’d better learn if I want to do video alongside still photos.

It chucks out 8MB JPEGs. Consequently my 8GB card was almost full when I left the venue. The end result of the Hop shoot is here.

Minor annoyance: Canon have rejigged the buttons on the top of the body. I suspect this will get really tedious when I’m swapping between the 30D and 5D at paid-gigs. However there are quite a few gigs coming up including an all-dayer at The Hop on Sunday (the “Oxjam” thing) so I’m sure it’ll get some hammer.

More when I’ve got used to it!

Landmark

February 1, 2009 / Jess / 1 Comment

Mine and Nicky’s photo gallery surpassed 50,000 photos online yesterday. Woo.

What Jessie Did Next...

...being the inane ramblings of a mundane Yorkshire bird.