Two weekends, two local bands, two album launches, and finally getting around to shooting in RAW format. Egads!

Snowman @ The Bakery 280608

Snowman, Bakery

Really not a lot to report with this one. Was running late as ever, got stuck off to the side of stage with not much room to move. The lights were red, red, and more red. Fiddled around with the in-camera white balance for a bit, but ended up converting most of the photos to black and white anyway.

Snowman, Bakery

Snowman, Bakery

Snowman were launching their latest album ‘The Horse, The Rat and the Swan’, and played said album from start to finish. It resulted in a surprisingly short set, and a few very confused looks were exchanged between audience members when the band left the stage after only 40 minutes. I think most people were under the impression this would be the last time they’d be able to see Snowman before they relocated to the UK, so were a bit disappointed. Luckily a farewell show has been announced, but I get the feeling if it had been announced before the album launch, people may have been able to enjoy the launch in better context. The reviews were a bit mixed, I’m not a particularly big Snowman fan, but I thought it was pretty entertaining. They’re very good at what they do, even if it’s not something that I really enjoy.

Snowman, Bakery

Schvendes @ Bakery 050708

Yet another band that falls in the ‘they’re good at what they do, but it ain’t my cup of tea’ category. The Schvendes Myspace page describes them as sounding like ‘murder, mystery and mayhem’, and I couldn’t have said it better myself.  Richly textured songs, dripping with theatre, but unfortunately not quite enough to keep my attention on a freezing Saturday night. Luckily, long-standing favourites Sugar Army were the support for the night, and while I only caught them by accident, they were as entertaining as ever.

Sugar Army, Bakery

I’d recently upgraded my computer, and treated myself with some new software, namely Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop Elements 6. I’d never bothered to shoot RAW previously, as I didn’t have any software that could open the files, and my old dinosaur of a computer would throw a fit having to do anything beyond basic processing. So now that I DO have the resources, I thought for the sake of curiosity I’d shoot RAW at this gig.

Sugar Army, Bakery

My usual 400+ images on a 4gb card was cut down to 170-odd. I’d rarely ever shoot that many frames for two bands anyway, but because I had that limit I was finding myself being overly cautious about when I pressed the button. I hate having restrictions, and found myself worrying more about my card capacity than what was going on in front of me. I took about 70 photos altogether, which is a bit lower that I’d normally go, but I had a pretty good hit rate, so I guess it was beneficial in the end. I’m really enjoying using Lightroom, though I’ve only really had it for one weekend, and it’ll take some time for me to work out all the tips and tricks, and to get my workflow running smoothly. Same with PS Elements. It’s a big step up from PS Elements 3 (which I’d been using before) in terms of workspace appearance, but not anything too startling in terms of major features. I’ve had a bit of a play with Photoshop CS3, but given the sort of processing I do, it’s a bit of overkill. Combining Lightroom and PS Elements, I’ve got everything I need. And for the record, I’m not totally sold on RAW. I can see its benefits, but I don’t know if I’ll be shooting every gig RAW from here on in. I’ve done ok without it for the last few years.

Sugar Army, Bakery

I don’t think I can write too much more about Sugar Army without repeating myself from earlier posts. They’re great, go check them out, end of story. They pulled out a few new tracks at this show, and they were pretty damn good. I can sometimes take quite a while to warm to new material when I’m a fan of the band’s older stuff, but these newies have me eagerly anticipating the next EP or album. They’re starting a national tour with Gyroscope in a about a month, so if you’re heading along to see Gyros, get down to the venue early to have a listen to these guys.

Sugar Army, Bakery

While Schvendes bring the drama to the table in a big way, they’re a pretty static band, so not always the most interesting to shoot. The lights were going between ‘really good’ and ‘abysmal’. The lights pointing up at the front of the stage were awful, mainly just cause they were mis-used. A dull red overhead light with a bright white light underneath looked pretty ordinary. But, when the lights were more balanced, they looked really good, and were simple to shoot. The Bakery is pretty hot and cold with it’s lighting, it’s like a photographic adventure every visit! ‘The Bakery is like a box of chocolates. You never know…’

Schvendes, Bakery

Schvendes, Bakery

Schvendes, Bakery

It’s relatively quiet this weekend in terms of shows, but hopefully next week I’ll have a couple of promos up. I haven’t done any press shots for a few months, so it’ll be good to get back into the swing of things.