Eigotaku design.

A band don’t come for free.

As much as I enjoy my jobs (and I genuinely do), I’ve had a desire to and sporadically dabbled in photography since I’ve been in Japan. I think I have a pretty decent body of work, and I enjoy taking photos of architecture and sport in particular. My Everest, though, is live music. I’ve never devoted enough time or money to it, and about a year ago I went to a mates bands gig that was to change my life. Jam sessions, singing and writing my own music later, I thought I was ready to offer my services. I wanted to make a live concert video for a band I have got to know. They are phenomenal musicians, lovely people and their tunes kick royal arse as well.
So, I started preparing to record their gig.

The gear.

Confession- I don’t excrete money. Although I am quite impulsive, I don’t tend to spend much on anything in one go. Sometimes to my detriment and my beloved guitar is an exception.

I’ve had a Sony alpha 200 DSLR since 2008 and it has been a trusty steed from the sodden rugby fields of Sussex, UK to the (sometimes) snowy mountains of New Zealand to the walls of Mont Saint Michel to the concrete steps of Tokyo game show.

After a LOT of going round in research circles, I decided to get a used (although almost brand new) Sony a55. More on that later.

I also used our trusty Sony handycam, a canon 6530 lent to me (thanks mate), and then I took a punt on a couple of cheap cameras from Amazon.
One was a digital camera with a lot of false promises. The other was a little sports camera. Again, more on those later.
A suitcase containing two regular tripods and three spotlight stands, a gorilla pod, an iPad and my little Xperia ace 3 rounded out my rig.

Professional? Absolutely not, and I am well aware of it.

Finally, I had my “new” (old but cheap) laptop to project the band’s logo and edit the footage, but again, more on that later.

The event.

I arrived during sound checks, set up cameras and tested the background projection. Pretty straightforward and looked pretty good even if I do say so myself. It’s cool how much difference something like that can make.

A tale of two DJs.

During the gig, there was a Japanese video DJ and a foreign music DJ. As I had to set my laptop up in the music booth, it was a bit tight, but just about manageable.

My heart first started racing when I got a message from the drummer saying the video DJ wanted to talk to me. It turned out that his laptop was as old as mine, but he didn’t have an HDMI adapter. Me to the rescue!

Quite a sense of relief that I wasn’t on someone else’s patch or causing an issue, and he honestly couldn’t have been nicer or more grateful.

The other DJ… I’ll get to that.

The time for the change over came, the background was projecting and the band was setting up. Time for final checks, turning the cameras on etc.

“Good evening Star Lounge!”
Those words went hurtling through my brain and all of a sudden I was incredibly nervous. I was sure I had done all I could. The band’s set was 25 minutes, the laptop wouldn’t go into standby for an hour. Cameras on, recording started.

I paced up and down the backstage area, peaking round corners, waiting and waiting.
The band finished. Rapturous applause, the intermission music faded up.

It was over.

I picked up all the gear, scurried in to the back stage area and packed up.
A huge sense of relief, sure, but there was still a lot to do and I also wanted to get some pictures of another band playing. Job not done quite yet. So, I swapped the video cameras for my trusty DSLR and carried on.
Bands finished, a well earned beer and a very rainy journey home, I dumped everything and took some time to reflect.

I hadn’t worked that hard on something like this for years, and even then I had a small team helping me. Even though the band were (and are) incredibly supportive, I knew this was on me.

The results.

The moment of truth came. I started looking through the footage.

I started with the camera I had the most faith in, the handycam. The angle was decent- pretty safe but a good start. I almost feel stupid saying this but Andy is such an incredible guitarist I could have used an extra camera just for his shredding, but I had to make sure I had something that was reliable, so I set it up closest to him but still got a wide shot. One thing that I was pleasantly surprised by was the sound quality. Considering it was only a metre or so away from the PA and speakers, it was pretty clear, both between songs and when everything was going at full pelt. It was also a huge help because I had no other audio sources even remotely suitable to use.

Next, the little sports camera which I decided to use to record the drummer. My first attempt at using this camera a few weeks prior admittedly was disappointing. Whether it was the frame rate or resolution, I was not impressed and considered returning it.

Despite this, I thought maybe being closer to the subject, and better lighting would improve the results. It turned out to be the case. Although it is still a bit blurry, due to the rapidly changing lights and Dave’s lightning fast skills, overall I was satisfied with the footage, and the sound was good enough to synch up with what would be used as the master track.

The Canon.
I’m going to take the L on this one. The footage was blurry (I probably was using the manual focusing) and I thought it was ok at the time due to the camera screen. In addition, I added a microphone to the camera, but there must have been a setting to activate it, which I missed, as the camera recorded no sound at all. Never mind.

The a55.
I had put maybe too much faith in my new purchase, and while the sound recorded was awful and the footage may be a tad bit on the blurry side, thanks to the angle and the bass player (shout out to Watanabe San) I got some really dynamic clips. Overall I was reasonably satisfied and I look forward to using the camera as a DSLR as well.

The Xperia ace 3.
In a similar way to the Canon, but for different reasons, I kinda conceded that a combination of a flimsy tripod which picked up a lot of vibration and unfortunate obstructions (which I might give the DJ the benefit of the doubt on…) the footage was pretty much a write – off. No big deal though, I used it just in case.

Finally, the cheap digital camera. I forgot to turn it on! Honestly, all of the video and photos I have taken so far have been trash, so I wasn’t expecting anything anyway.

So, here is the first edited video.

NOTE
this blog post will be updated when the other videos are finished.

The post mortem.
It was great to get back into photography and film making again. I want to support my mates bands in whatever way I can and I want to gain experience.
Ultimately, I think it’s important and I want to be honest and open when it comes to the process not just for personal posterity, but also to help myself and others learn. I’ve watched so many advice videos but there’s a reluctance to expose inexperience or experimentation.

*SHORT SHARP RANT TIME*

I want to be transparent about my processes and I use what I can, how I can. I’m sick of some people I’ve worked with in the past either being clandestine, snobby or just plain dismissive and judgemental without actually putting themselves in a similar position.

Short sharp rant over.

Anyway, if you’ve made it this far, then thank you kindly and I’ll be back in a few.