Shooting video at night for live concerts

[Dan Wake]

I have not so much experience shooting live concerts, I will start soon with some friends. I'm now looking to buy a telephoto lens and I wish to ask you if shootihg at F4,5, iso 800, shutter speed at 30, with a Canon 7D mark 1 could be enough fast for a concert during night. I have found an old 300mm F4,5 lens that may be cheap enough for me to buy (I have economic problems).

thx!

 

edit.

I can find also a 300mm f4 lens.

[BTM_Pix]

I think its going to be difficult for anyone to give you a definitive answer really because there can be such a broad difference between the light in say a dingy pub and an arena concert so the answer is always going to be 'it depends'.

What might be useful for you though is to go and look on this flickr group of concert photographs.

There are over 200,000 on there from gigs in all different conditions and using all different camera and lens combinations. The majority of pictures have the exif data displayed to show you the ISO/SS and Aperture used so pick a sample set of the sort of level of gigs that you'll be covering and you should be able to get a feel for the exposures required.

I suspect the support with that lens might give you more challenges than the light if you intend to use it handheld.

https://www.flickr.com/groups/concertshots/pool/

[Dan Wake]

@BTM_Pix thank you very much I'll take a look in it!

[noone]

I shoot a lot of concerts (mostly stills but a bit more video lately) and I used to own a Canon 7D first version and I would not have liked to use that camera for concerts at all.

Your settings may well be ok but it is going to depend on the lighting and at least at many of the gigs I go to, most of the time it would be no.

You may well be ok at many gigs IF you are shooting the person under a spot light but that will be a bit more limiting.

I DO use 4.5 and even slower apertures for concerts but most of the time with those apertures I am well over ISO 800 (and sometimes am at ISO 102400).

With faster lenses of course you will be at lower ISOs and if you can get back in the room you will have greater DOF.

By all means give it a go but unless the lighting is good, don't expect miracles.

[quivering_member]

I don't claim to be a pro at this (or even a semi pro) but I do run a wee website where I put up photos and video from local gigs (https://dunedinsound.com).

It totally does depend on the type of concert you're shooting and where you're shooting from.

Most of mine are in dingy little venues and these are really challenging to get enough light on the sensor which is why most of my glass is pretty fast. I use a vintage M42 mount Asahi Pentax 50mm f1.4 and a speed booster most of the time. At the ~80mm equivalent focal length I've found depth of field isn't too hard to manage, and it's a great focal length for portraits of the performers from my shooting position which is usually right in the front row. I end up having to be quite active and panning around to get shots of each bandmember during video. Then I usually have a Samyang/Rokinon 12mm f2 in my pocket for if I want to capture the crowd as well as the performer. As a sidenote vintage lenses are a great way to get high quality lenses really cheap.

The few shoots I've done in slightly more 'proper' well lit venues have been much easier. If there's good stage lighting on the performers you'll probably be okay at f4. Obviously not everything in the shot has to be (or should be) well exposed as long as the performers are exposed.

I shoot with a micro four thirds camera which gathers less light than your 7D and also means I can't really go above ISO1600 (3200 in a pinch), you'll probably need to be higher than that.