Low Light Concert Photography?
I have a Sony A100 but am totaly new to SLR cameras.
what are the best settings for taking photo’s in low light at a concert
Okay, a fairly simple question, but a rather complicated answer.
When you photograph at a concert, there’s a lot going on that you have to think about. On top of that, you have to be smarter than the camera’s metering system, which will tell you one thing but produce the wrong result.
First, let’s talk about the three things you’ll have to overcome:
1) blur, 2) noise/grain, and 3) overexposure/underexposure.
To overcome blur, you’ll need a fast enough shutter speed to overcome any vibrations from you and your camera and any movement on the part of your subject. If you time it right, like when your subject on stage stands still for a moment, then you only have to worry about your own vibration. Depending upon what lens you use, your own vibration can be magnified, so for a telephoto lens, a little shake has a bigger effect. Luckily, your A100 has image stabilization, so turn it on. At a minimum, I’d suggest 1/125 as your shutter speed and faster if you can get it.
To overcome noise/grain…well, this is tougher. To achieve an adequate shutter speed to minimize blur, you’ll need to a) open your aperture up and b) turn your ISO up. However, turning the ISO up makes images pretty noise, especially if they’re underexposed. Still a noisy sharp image is better than a low-noise blurry image. So keep the ISO high enough to get you a faster shutter speed, but low enough to minimize noise. Try ISO 800 to start, but be prepared to bump it up if you can’t get a good shutter speed.
Finally: exposure issues: surprisingly, with concert performers, you’re more likely to get overexposure because there’s a dark background and the performers are often spotlit. Camera metering tends to give more weight to the darkness and you get overexposed performers. You have to be smarter than the meter and adjust your shutter speed accordingly. This mean a faster shutter speed, which helps you out a lot–reducing blur.
Don’t use a flash. It’s not enough to light up a stage from the stands.
So, here’s where I would suggest starting, and you’ll have to adjust based on the results you’re getting:
1) start at ISO 800.
2) put camera on manual and don’t use a flash.
3) select an aperture wide enough to get some light without screwing up image quality. Depending upon the lens (and I’m assuming you don’t have any really good glass here), probably f/5.6 is as wide as you can go before running into image issues, although you can try shooting wide open to see if you can get decent quality.
4) select a shutter speed like 1/125 to start. Adjust if needed.
5) turn image stabilization on.
6) take a photo and evaluate. If faces are too bright, use a faster shutter speed and/or stop down the aperture. If the faces are too dark, you’ll need a bigger ISO, a slower shutter, or a wider aperture.
7) remember that lighting changes a lot during a concert, so you’ll have to evaluate as the concert proceeds.
Hopefully, that’s a lot more helpful than the other answer you got.
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