Todays Shoot - Matt Mingus of Dance Gavin Dance

The second of two Vic Firth shoots was with Matt Mingus of Dance Gavin Dance, who I had not seen in a while (since I last did a shoot with DGD a few years before, for outburn magazine). So I was pumped to get to see these guys again and do another shoot with Matt.

We set up on the couch in the dressing room - I started with two rims tuned to 25% and a boomed a beauty dish straight down on him at 25% - I shot this at F10 at a 160th with the 24-70 lens on the canon 1ds mark 2

I was going for a lens flare effect with heavy directional lighting for this - and it worked out perfectly while still having the sticks and logo perfectly visible.




































Next I wanted to have some fun shots with less dramatic lighting - I left the rims where they were and brought the dish straight in front of him for a more non-directional front full lighting. - I dropped to F8 still shooting at a 160th
























It was awesome getting to shoot with Matt again, the DGD dudes are always awesome to work with, im sure next time they are around, they will be in front of my lens again

Todays Shoot - Mehdi of In Fear and Faith for Vic Firth

Today I was doing two shoots for Vic Firth - the first was a quick shoot with Mehdi Niroomand from the band Of Fear And Faith, who actually didnt even have his sticks yet. I believe he borrowed a set from Matt DGD.

So I wanted to stay simple with this one, I used a small beauty dish - and just put it up around face level so he would be hit with harsh light for a high contrast image.

Lighting: single beauty dish on a dynalite jackrabbit uni400 set to 25%

Camera: Canon 1ds Markii Lens: 24-70

Settings: F8 at a 250th, ISO100

At a 250th it bled in the bright blue sky perfectly, while blending him, and the sticks/logo perfectly.

here are the two final images




































I'm hoping next time these dudes are around we will be doing a full group shoot.

Todays Shoot - The New England Metal and Hardcore Festival: Day 2

AND IT BEGINS! the last day!

So! when I first got there I had only a possible shoot with the LEGENDARY! Vic Firth! happening, and then a possible photo shoot with the (also legendary) definitive death metal band - Cannibal Corpse!

No big deal... AHHHH!

I started off by rolling up doing some candids of the early crowd - it was a nicer day then the day before, but a bit more chilly - not a cloud in the sky - so I was shooting a bit higher for a speed (1500-2000) when in direct sunlight - but in the shadows i was around 500ish

I immediately ran into John and Dave from XtyrantX - who I kinda forgot to get in touch with, because I forgot they were even on the show (DOH!) I set up a shoot with them - because it would be VERY uncustomary to NOT do a shoot with those dudes - who are some of my favorite people in straight edge hardcore. And obviously - Dave RULES for photo shoots - he is the only person with a two page spread in my book "bring the noise" So I did a quick shoot with them - natural light - these are all at 2.8 at a 320th at ISO100 - using the 24-70 - I really wanted to play with depth and focus (or depth of field for photo nerds) with the two singers - I thought it looked cool.

I went in and shot a slew of the earlier mainstage bands (I didnt miss one!) For these my settings were generally - 40D - 580 EX2 - with the lumaquest 80/20 pro-max system - I mostly used the 16-35 2.8 and the fisheye - but I popped on the 24-70 once or twice to get shots of the drummers - and again - didnt touch the 70-200 at all. - my settings were ISO400 - usually shooting around a 10th at F8.0 or so

I went around and got alot of stuff for monster on day 2.

I ran into my friends in Reign Supreme and decided to do a quick - why the hell not - photo shoot with the dudes

I wanted to run it quick between other stuff I was doing so I shot natural light - with the 24-70 at iso400 (light was fading) - f2.8 at a 400th

My ex-roomie Jessie Lee and Bella Vendetta (both stripper/porn stars) showed up and i figured id get some shots of them with the monster... but they wanted to take the plastic off first... and with stripper nails... the hilarity ensued. they could NOT get it open... sooo they decided to deep throat the can of monster... umm... yeah so i guess it is what it is... shot with the 24-70 - 2.8-4.5 between a 1000th and 3000th

I shot a couple more bands live then had a VERY tight window to do a single specific shot for vic firth - the shot was supposed to be all of the drummers who use vic firth... but due to the red chord playing at 6 and toxic holocaust playing at 615 - it wasnt going to happen in one shot - so we did the first group - for this i used two dynalite uni400s with cold tone umbrellas set at 50% - not exactly split - i gave it a bit of a tilt in and had them a little bit in front of the group - then shot at F22 at iso400 at a 200th (i didnt have time to play around - these are the settings i know like the back of my hand so i went safe for this) - For the second shot I asked Vic to do some solo shots - and he said ok - so i used more of a split on him then did some natural shots at 2.8 at a 2000th - and then finished up by shooting the second group with the same settings as the first group shot

It was such an honor and privilege to get to shoot Vic Firth! oh man... hes a legend and there is not a drummer on earth who doesnt know of his legendary drum sticks!

After the Vic Firth shot I went in and shot the next tier of bands which were the AMAZING Eluveite, who are always awesome to shoot, white chapel, and job for a cowboy

After Job for a cowboy it was about 9... my shoot with Cannibal Corpse was at 930 - and obviously there was no light - so I set up a beauty dish up high pointed straight down - then a barebulb w/reflector turned up high pointed toward the ground to give them a bit more depth and seperation.

I shot these at the same settings as the vic firth shoot - iso400 - f22 - 160th - going for a very standard cannibal corpse - serious death metal look

after the shoot - i ran in to shoot amon amoarth then shot cannibal corpse live... and then that was it... the end of metal fest... the most bitter sweet moment of every year

On the way to the car, I ran into Vince from Metal Blade and he was astounded to find out I did a shoot with Cannibal Corpse - as apparently they are very strict with who they work with, and generally will only shoot with one photographer (i forgot his name though) - so obviously thats a huge huge huge honor.

I dont want it to end... i want to keep on shooting, hanging out, seeing my friends and tour fam...

but i cant wait for it to be over because im so tired/shot from working super hard and shooting so much.

metalfest is always the most work i do every year and its always the most stressful and fun time of each year...

I cant wait for the next one!

there will be a ton of photos up on the metalfest page soon - so keep your eyes open for that

Todays Shoot - The New England Metal and Hardcore Festival: Day 1

I think if i posted a few photos from every band i shot live, this would be too long of a blog, so im just going to post a few, and mostly talk about the day and how amazing it was.

I woke up to my merch order at the hotel (THANKS DANNY!)

So I had a shoot with Earth Crisis booked, and that was pretty much the only I had set up - going into metalfest, but as with previous metalfests, one shoot turned into two, then three, etc.

I started off slow, as the second stage started at noon, and the mainstage didnt start til three.

I generally dont cover ANY bands on the second stage because its not exactly safe for a photographer to shoot from the front of stage - and i dont really like the side of stage shots personally.

I started by shooting XTheWarX - because they are my friends from aussieland - and the mosh wasnt too scary to get up and get some shots.

Before the main stage even started I ran into Kyle, Stuart and Ryan of Misery Signals as well as Andy from Fall Out Boy - and was like "are you guys with burning empires?! LETS DO A SHOOT!" - so I ended up doing a shoot with them!

I wanted to get a very - against the blue sky - type of shot for this - i tried some with two umbrellas - and it was so windy the umbrellas flew out and almost into the street - so wojo hung with one - and one of their dudes hung with the other - then i popped a beauty dish up above them and did some just with the dish - then some with the dish and two umbrellas (split) - then some natural light... my settings were: Canon Mark 2 1ds - 24-70 lens - iso100 - F20/22 at a 200th and 2.8 at a 500th for the natural light shots - the shoot was all of 3 minutes.

Almost directly after that shoot, I had my 40D with the 16-35 and was doing some behind the scenes shots when I ran into Blake from BTBAM - and noticed he was using Vic Firth sticks so I took a couple shots (as i will later explain, I was doing some work for vic firth). I just went with natural light - I shot these at F 9.5 because I had him holding out his stick - and was focusing on the logo - and as you should know - for endorsement images - the logo is as important as the artist - so I didnt want to blur him out at 2.8 - and i shot at a 180th to kill any movement.

I ran upstairs real quick to get some live shots of burning empires - again from the front - because i thought I wouldnt get moshed too badly - then i jumped side stage to get some shots of andy drumming

After that I walked around to get more behind the scenes shots before the mainstage kicked off - shooting at 2.8 but my speed was generally around 1000

Around 3pm - mainstage kicked off with a few bands

and unfortunately Architects couldnt make it so My Children My Bride took their spot (WOOO) - Matthew was kind enough to rock one of my team saffer shirts during the set - which was super awesome of him - and getting some main stage shots of them is way better then the day before/2nd stage shots. For most live shots my settings were ISO400 - F5.6-11 (11 usually with fisheye) - and always a 10th - 15th. I generally used only the 16-35 and fisheye - unless I was going for drummer photos, in which case I would pop on the 24-70 (i didnt end up using my 70-200 all weekend)

After shooting a couple more bands, it was time for EARTH CRISIS! the ONLY band I HAD to see the entire set of, no matter what else was happening. I went side stage for this because I knew I would probably get really killed or break my camera if I was up front. When they played gomorrahs season ends and firestorm... oh man... that band is one of the greatest bands of all time, EVER.

After shooting EXC live - I ran around with the monster team doing some natural light shots for them F2.8 at a 500th - as the light was starting to fade out.

I met up with the Earth Crisis dudes for our scheduled photo sesh - but it was SO late that the sun was almost set. So I decided the last 4 shoots I've done with them was split lighting with two umbrellas, so this time I just boomed a beauty dish up high to give them a darker feel - and then did some natural light shots. But because of the dying light - i had to up my ISO to 800 - and shoot 2.8 at a 30th - luckily they were VERY still and my hands are very steady - so I didnt get any blur. the settings for the ones with the beauty dish are a 10th at F20.

Doug interviewed me a little bit on his flip cam for some behind the scenes EXC stuff - I SUCK on camera interviews - so I just said what came to mind - and how legendary they are - how it was my 5th shoot with them since the reunion - yada yada yada - it was an honor to say the least

Karl also restated his praise for my work saying "all your stuff looks amazing, youre the best photographer weve ever worked with" - which coming from one of my heros is so humbling and just... so awesome.

I went back in for mainstage shots of the last few bands who had a LED screen for a backdrop - the bands were valient thor - baroness - btbam - and mastodon.

My flash started acting weird and giving different outputs every shot i took - so i switched out the batteries - and it started working properly again.

After finishing up a couple M-Don live shots - I went over to the hotel and we had another pizza party w/Matthew, Dantera, Wojo, Jessie Lee, and myself

as some know - i do card tricks - so doing card tricks turned into throwing tons of cards at jessie - which then took to the halls of the hotel

all in all - we all suck at throwing cards.

but ill practice and get better! and if you see me - feel free to ask for a card trick - i gotta practice anyway

and yes - this is how straight edge kids party sober - by throwing cards hah.

My CF reader broke so I couldnt get the photos to do any photo work - bummer - but - more hang time...

I went to sleep knowing that I might be doing a VERY awesome shoot the next day...

..onto day 2..