It's quite a warm and sunny day outside. One that I could quite easily waste with a cold drink and my pipe. But instead I'm at the computer, gazing out of the window and typing up a long overdue update for you all.

I've only managed a couple of shoots so far this year. One each with my always reliable and eager models Scissor Doll and Alivya V Free. The results of which I'm very proud of. So proud in fact that I'm currently writing some verse to go with the pictures from my latest shoot with Alivya in order to put together a book, which I will probably self publish on Lulu and Amazon.

I'm quite excited by this prospect as it has been a while since I attempted any fiction or poetry despite holding a degree in creative writing.

Anyway here are a few examples from both shoots:

The Steampunk shoot along with some miscellaneous work is available to view on my flickr page. And there are more of the 'Oracle' pics as well as a couple of spooky black and white photos on facebook. However I'm only going to reveal a few until the book is finished. However there are also some 8mm style gifs from the oracle shoot in the works, so expect them to be available to see soon on my tumblr page.

You may have also seen another still life set called 'L'Absinthe C'est La Mort'. These will soon be available as prints/posters/cards on the red-bubble page.

In other news, it's sunny and warm... the perfect time for more infra-red photography. I'm looking to get a dedicated infra-red camera this year, so if you've been put off by the thought of long exposures and an element of the unknown, this solution should promise shorter exposures and crisper, more predictable photos. I'm still looking to arrange shoots with models and bands prior to this though, so if your'e interested, contact me through facebook, purpleport, model mayhem, or good old fashioned email.

That's all for now. Please continue to add my profiles and check out my casting calls.

A few recent shoots I've put together as collage sheets - by no means exhaustive but containing quite a few of my favourite shots over the past couple of years. See more on Flickr. 

For 2014 I want to completely focus this year on Black & White and Infra-Red images only.

Stylistically I want to go for Victorian and early 20th Century looks and themes. I want to incorporate historically accurate clothing/lingerie as well as occult themes (see the work of historical photographers such as: Man Ray, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Henry Fox Talbot. Or modern photographers e.g.: Kristmort, Sarachmet, Michał Mozolewski, Ellen Rogers etc.)

I want to be able to collate my work over the next couple of years into material geared towards exhibition and a book (as such I'll need releases to be signed).

These shoots will be TF* only I'm afraid. I may be able to contribute to travel fees if they are reasonable. Please only apply if you feel you are suitable for the roles, agree to the conditions and will actually follow through with a booking. I do not mind working with new or established models but please be aware I am on a shoestring budget for the foreseeable future.

The casting is open to male models, female models and bands. Contact me on MM, Purpleport, Facebook or via this website. You can also see more examples of this kind of work on my Flickr page or the galleries on my official website. 

'Bah! Humbug' - Model: Scissor Doll

'Happy Halloween!' - Model: Scissor Doll

'Zebra' - Model: Scissor Doll

'

'Talanas Promo Shoot' - Model: Alivya V Free

'Ghost' - Model: Alivya V Free

'White Room' - Model: Alivya V Free

'Tease' - Model: Scissor Doll

'Soviet Burlesque' - Model: Scissor Doll

'Double Exposure' - Model: Scissor Doll

'Gothic Boudoir' - Model: Scissor Doll

'Summer Infra-Red' - Model: Scissor Doll

'Thornton Abbey In Infra-Red'

Featuring:

Scissor Doll
Alivya V Free
Talanas

It's been a funny old year. Last year I made a decision to cut back on the amount of gigs I was photographing in order to save on the travel money I'd been forking out and instead focus on the field that I really want to be working in... i.e. surreal, infra-red and vintage styles.

Fast forward from the last shoot update which featured my partner Debz, AKA Scissor Doll's low-key vintage/burlesque shoot and Alivya V. Free's infra-red/monochrome shoot and I've scored my first, but hopefully not last, infra-red band shoot.

Once again featuring Liv we were joined by the sharply dressed London progressive death metal band Talanas, who to their credit took to posing for long exposures VERY quickly. The results, I think, are brilliant. Ethereal and spooky, the long exposure time let us play around with motion blur to get some ghostly effects.

I shot with Scissor Doll again for another infra-red and low-fi shoot, this time making use of a zebra print body stocking. We've been talking about this for over a year so it was exciting to finally do it. Despite the ominous looking sky we got some great spooky shoots that yielded some interesting mistakes and blurs as well.

As always you can see the full sets on my flickr page or in the models and band sections of my photography page here.

All photographs © Imago Mortis Photography

Talanas

Scissor Doll

Alivya V. Free

The Flesh Eating Foundation @ DV8 Festival, York 2010

(c) Imago Mortis Photography

Photographing festivals


There are two types of festival: Indoor and Outdoor, and each have their own rules. We give you a few tips on how to get access to them and get great results.

Festivals can be small scale affairs or major events. By the time you’ve shot a few good sized club gigs the chances are you’ll have a portfolio showing the best of your abilities. At this point you may want to contact small print or web publications about providing them with photos for gigs. This will give you the ability to contact band’s, promoters and organisers about getting press passes for larger events.

Shooting at this level has a few more rules to learn. An amateur to intermediate photographer wouldn’t have problem getting access to an event providing they have a publication to confirm they will be receiving the pictures, but they may have equipment limitations. Large festivals for example will require a more powerful lens due to the sizes of the stage. For smaller festivals though it won’t be so much of a problem, so a cheap telephoto lens or the top end of the standard lenses should do the job.

Natural light brings it’s own problems and eases too. There is less adjusting of the camera’s settings to do before hand for one. The abundance of sunlight will give an even spread of light that will allow you to focus on your angles, depth of field, and generally spend more time on looking out for the shots to get. However there can be an excess of UV lighting that will bleach colours - this can be easily compensated for buy buying a £10 UV filter. Glare caused by multiple light sources and excess light can also ruin photos, but again a £5 camera hood will cut this out.

At an indoor festival you will probably have the benefit of a press pit to free you up from the jostle of the crowd, but you must still pay attention to dark and complex lighting conditions and any rules regarding shooting times. In both the indoor and outdoor situations you’ll want to be ready to go without having to adjust throughout songs. The basic set up for your camera should be: ‘Manual’, ISO 400-800, Aperture F/4-6, and a shutter speed of 10th-30th of a second. These will give you a broadly quick starting point to get as many shots as you can.

Get as many shots of one pose as you can, use different angles and crouch if need be. Use different focal lengths, get different band members. Get a good spread of photographs and when the set is over go through them and delete the outright bad ones before the next set. You’ll be glad of this when it comes to post processing.

Luxury Stranger @ DV8 Festival, York 2010

(c) Imago Mortis Photography

Hints & Tips:
Get permission!
Some venues have a zero tolerance policy on cameras which may result in ejection from the premises so it’s best to contact the venue owner or the band first preferably by email so you can print a copy to take with you. Bigger venues, festivals, and band’s tour managers will issue press and photo passes to journalists so get in contact with a publication or website about contributing photos and the editor will more often than not sort you out with a pass.


The ‘rule of three’
At some gigs, and most definitely at festivals there is something called the rule of three to watch out for. This basically means you can only shoot the band for the first three songs. Some promoters and venues are more relaxed about this depending on the band. If you attend a concert as an unofficial photographer it doesn’t mean much to you, but it is in place so that photographers don’t get in the way of the audience. As this is the case you’ll want to focus on getting shots of the band at the climactic points of the first three songs which will sometimes require research. Needless to say having your camera ready to go is a must in this situation.


Post-processing
Chances are if you shoot four bands you’ll have deleted a hundred odd photos in total at the gig and still have a full memory card. The worst bit is you need to pick 15-30 to polish. This takes the most time and effort, and it will ultimately determine the look of your portfolio.
A standard way of going through your photos is to transfer the photos you’re considering editing to a separate folder. Only you can determine what you think is a great shot in this environment as all tastes are different. Motion may appeal to you, or you may be a stickler for clarity. In the end it’s your style. Once you’ve picked a few dozen photos, go back through them with a critical eye and any photos that look too similar or have noticeable imperfections should be binned.

If you’re not a fan of complex lighting there are two ways to enhance your photos, and they compliment each other in a portfolio. If you want to keep some of the colour, but not as strongly, simply de-saturate the colours by a few points and then adjust the brightness, midtone and shadow until you’re satisfied. The other option is to convert the picture to black and white and adjust the brightness, midtone, and shadow as well. These will give you sharp and atmospheric looking photos.

If the problem is a matter of noise on the photo, there are several filters built into photoshop and paint shop pro that will help. ‘De-noise’ and ‘Remove noise’ will take away some of the problem, but tools such as ‘Gausin Blur’, ‘Bightness and Contrast’, ‘Clarify’ and photograph restoration features on both programmes can be adjusted to remove major areas of noise.

The final thing to remember is to make high resolution copies of your files for print, in case you want to submit them to magazines or to create a physical portfolio or even to sell as prints through outlets such as Deviant Art. This can be done by simply resizing the image to 300 dots per inch in the image-resize option. However, if you are also making low resolution copies for an electronic gallery/portfolio, remember to add a watermark (if you want) and save the file at 72 dots per inch for a faster loading speed.
 

Wayne Hussey @ DV8 Festival, York 2010

(c) Imago Mortis Photography

Screaming Banshee Aircrew @ The Duchess, York 2010

(c) Imago Mortis Photography

Photographing touring bands


Shooting in your local is one thing but there are a few different rules and hazards to look out for at club venues. We tell you the ins and outs of club shooting etiquette.

You’ve maybe had a few good goes at shooting local bands which has made you some friends and contacts, and given you a nice start to your concert portfolio. The next step is getting bigger names in that portfolio. It’s all well and good having a great shot of a band nobody has heard of, but it’s even better if at least someone will recognize them. The fact is that most bands don’t play huge arenas, most play venues no bigger than a secondary school’s assembly hall. This means the door price is low (typically £5-25) and there is no set photographer pit. This has it’s advantages and disadvantages. It doesn’t mean it’s necessary that you have to wrangle your way onto the press list, but you will have to watch out for the crowd.

The crowd are there to have a good time and will typically be indifferent to the plight of the local photographer, so expect to be jostled and your movement to be impaired. Also, don’t expect people to let you get to the front, getting in their early is your best bet for a clear view of the stage and when the place fills up, to move about as best you can without annoying people. The other thing to look out for is security, some clubs don’t allow cameras, so be sure to email ahead of time to get permission (and take the email with you just in case) or else you may be ejected.

The lighting will typically be better quality in a club as well so you can expect more ambiance for your photographs, but also more movement and complex saturation. This can be extremely frustrating for the beginner as moving light will throw your camera out of focus, and over saturate pictures. The trick is to keep shooting. Most bands have a set ‘pose’ list meaning that if you miss a fantastic shot or it’s blurred or over saturated, don’t fret as the performers will usually do it at least once more before the end of the set. They want to look their best in your photos and will almost always play up to the presence of cameras.

One thing that many bands and promoters discourage is the use of flash, whether the built in or external variety. It’s already been mentioned how it may effect your photographs, but it may also effect your reputation. Strong flashes on small or busy stages will get in the eyes of performers - remember they only see a dimly lit crowd, not the full brightness of the stage, so bombarding them with flash is not going to help them visually perceive hazards.

 Inertia @ The Electrowerkz, London 2010

(c) Imago Mortis Photography

Equipment for your camera
 

1) MEMORY CARD You’ll want a good size compact flash card, preferably 8gb and over plus one for backup. To get that one perfect shot you’ll shoot at least ten others that wont make the grade and when shooting in RAW those memory cards fill up quickly. Also remember to delete the outright bad shots between bands.


2) SPARE BATTERY DSLR batteries drain annoyingly quickly. Four bands doing a 30-45 minute set each will drain half of your battery’s life, so a day long festival will quite likely take the lot. Add shooting in RAW to that equation and you’ll soon realise that it is always best to keep a charged spare.


3) UV LENS FILTER Again it’s an optional extra but it can be useful for outdoor festivals in the summer if not in a tent or shooting a covered main stage. This will give you better colour correction when a strong sun would otherwise bleach out colours.


4) TELESCOPIC LENS This one is a very practical option as in festival situations the press pit can get quite far away from the performers. Even standing to the side of the stage in some indoor venues can put you further away from the action than you’d like so if you have the spare cash a good telescopic lens can work wonders and free up your aperture range as well.

5) SOFTWARE Unfortunately unless you own a top of the range camera ISO noise will be a problem. ISO noise occurs in dark patches on the photograph where the camera struggles to get more light. Shooting in RAW and editing in Photoshop, or now for those on a budget Paint Shop Pro X3, will enable you to edit out noise and also give greater control over colour and white balance.
 

Midnight Configuration @ The Electrowerkz, London 2010

(c) Imago Mortis Photography

Part 3 Coming Soon...

Decadenze @ The Duke Of Wellington Pub, Lincoln 2009
(c) Imago Mortis Photography 

Concert photography isn’t the exclusive realm of professionals with extensive magazine contacts. Anyone, with any level of DSLR can get fantastic shots of a band whether it is at an outdoor festival, your local pub, or an arena. We show you how to get stunning results and how to overcome low-light and movement issues.



Photographing the local pub circuit

Everyone who is shooting for magazines, and websites started in the same place. The local pub. The local live circuit is an invaluable place to gain experience and network with bands. Just because a band is playing small venues doesn’t mean they aren’t showmen, and never underestimate the quality of light at pubs that advertise regular gigs. The big advantage to starting out taking photos down your local is the relaxed atmosphere. Exchanging your photos with bands for a credit and link back on their website will mean more invitations to gigs and even being invited to do promo photos. And by the end of this Beginner’s Guide you’ll know all the tricks to get great quality photos that will standout and open doors for you.

There are no set rules to concert photography, so experimentation is the name of the game. For instance, some people like to get a crisp shot, others like over saturated light and some prefer motion blur and light trails. Atmosphere is king as it is about documentation rather than promotional portraiture. This means that you are free to use whatever tools are at your disposal: entry level cameras such as the Sony Alpha 200 with the standard lens can produce the same level of quality as the top-spec counterpart as long as you know your way around the settings.

A good sized memory card (2gb and over) is sufficient for a four band line up, and with an average set lasting about 30-40 minutes there is plenty of opportunity to take a few test shots, adjust the ISO and aperture settings, and see what works for the band. What is a must though, is to set your camera to continuous shooting. This will allow the camera to work at it’s maximum speed to increase the chance of getting that perfect shot.
Exposure times will add the atmosphere to a shot. A shorter exposure will mean crisper foreground colours and a darker background. This works particularly well in intimate gigs to ‘hide’ the size of the venue. A longer exposure will allow more light into the camera at the expense of sharpness leading to movement blur and light streaks. These can be used to great effect but it reduces your chances of getting a clear shot. A wider aperture setting with a shallower depth of field however can compensate for this as it will blur the background and make batter use of the available light, thus increasing your shutter speed.

The flash, whether it is your camera’s internal flash or a flashgun with a diffuser fitted will not be needed in any concert situations. The flash will only serve to over illuminate the subjects, eliminating the natural ambiance and bleach the skin tones. The internal flash will also decrease the shutter speed and over expose your shots. There are other reasons for not using the flash but we’ll come to those in the next section.

Eibon La Furies @ The Duke Of Wellington Pub, Lincoln 2009

(c) Imago Mortis Photography

Settings for your camera

1) MODE You can set your DSLR camera to ‘Action’ mode - this will automatically set the camera up to capture fast movements. This on it’s own may be sufficient for acoustic gigs or small gigs in pub beer gardens or local playing fields, however some small adjustments may also have to be made to get the correct exposure. But for situations where natural light is plentiful, the beginner can get away with shooting in this mode with no fiddling. Otherwise set you camera to ‘Full Manual’ and adjust the spot metering, this will take the meter reading of a smaller area when shooting complex lighting situations.

2) EXPOSURE Set your exposure as low as you dare - a longer exposure will create vivid colours and streaks. If you like this then go for it. If not, you’ll want to make that shutter speed as fast as possible. This will create sharper images with darker backgrounds that will hide the size of your venue, and when shot from the right angles, capture a more dramatic shot of the subject.


3) ISO The rule of thumb is that the more ‘professional’ the camera, the higher you can crank up the ISO setting. Top of the range DSLRs will give you sharper images with less “noise” on them if you increase the ISO setting. On entry level DSLRs it is best to either stick to around the 400-800 ISO mark depending on the light quality, or leave the setting to automatic if you’re not sure. Again this is an area where trial and error is best - sacrificing a few early shots in the set to find the right setting will lead to more great photos overall.

4) APERTURE A wider aperture with a shallow depth of field will use all of the available light to the camera’s advantage, creating a sharper foreground capture while blurring a distracting background. A setting of around F/4-6 works best if using a standard lens. An expensive telephoto lens will allow you to move outside of this range but it isn’t necessary for this level of concert.

5) FORMAT Consider shooting in RAW format. This has advantages and disadvantages, RAW captures more information than JPG meaning that you have greater control over the editing of the image. However as the camera works harder to process the information your shutter speed decreases. Fine quality JPG is still OK and will let you shoot in faster bursts, but the compression noise on the final image coupled with ISO noise can sometimes ruin otherwise great captures.
 
 

Fall Of Industry @ The Duke Of Wellington Pub, Lincoln 2009

(c) Imago Mortis Photography

Part 2 Coming Soon...