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..

Todays Shoot - The New England Metal and Hardcore Festival: Atticus Pre-Party

For metalfest this year I had a few jobs to do.

I was hired by Monster Energy drinks to shoot for them, I was also doing as much coverage as possible of the live bands, and wanted to do ALOT of behind the scene type shots

I rolled up with my ex-roomie Jessie Lee and my bud WOJO as an assistant.

The first day was a pre-party sponsored by atticus clothing













This was the first time I used my 580 EX 2 - so it took me a little bit to get used to - alot of the shots were blown out at first and not balanced the way i like to balance light

Because the pre-party was upstairs there was no baracade or much for lighting, so I was using my flash as a main (which i hate to do, but whatever)

I did alot of shooting outside - looking for behind the scenes stuff, people holding monster, wearing atticus, etc.

for the entire day my ISO was at 400 and all of the shots this day were with the 40D - i changed up between my 24-70 2.8 and 16-35 2.8 lens - the shots outside with flash were around 5.6-6.7 ish - the ones with out are all 2.8 - around a 200th - later in the day when the sun went down i was shooting at 5.6 at a 10th to soak up the natural light - and the indoor shots are also at a 10th to soak in the ambient lighting

MCMB













Matt (kenmore), Vincent (acacia strain/cockpunch)













Mark













Nick (with words)













Jay (within the ruins)













Sylvia (massconcerts)













Scott (palladium/massconcerts) - Phil (white chapel)













Jay (within the ruins)













After doing some behind the scene type stuff I went up to shoot My Children My Bride - for these shots I was shooting with the 24-70 which i thought was a big mistake (in hindsight) - i dont like in the inability to go super wide. and do to being moshed on - walked on - I couldnt do a lens change - and only shot one song - no biggie though - I was shooting at a 15th at 9.5 because i was super close and didnt want to get any flash blur. - one of the shots i took of dan... vincent (acacia) was lurking in the background so i zoomed in so you could see him being a creep haha




















































Next up - Vincent and Phil were giving The New England Metal and Hardcore Festival - Hall of Fame award away (I was inducted last year, and its seriously one of the biggest honors of my entire life and career). This year it was going out to legendary ex-hardcore vocalist/current booking agent - Matt Pike














































































After the award, the top secret band of the night was White Chapel - again i risked being up front (no baracade) and facing the mosh in order to get better photos - while most other photographers shot side stage... sometimes its worth shooting up front and risking a little mosh - sometimes its not. - i dropped my speed down to a 10th to try to get a bit more blend but the lighting upstairs is so shot it was kind of a moot point







































After that, we hit the hotel, had a pizza party in the room with Matthew of MCMB and got to hear the new record which KIIIILLLLLSSS - its so good, everyones going to be stoked on it.

I prepped a bit for the upcoming day, and went to sleep...

on to day 1 of metalfest...