Photography in dark pub

benj1867

benj1867

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Ill be doing some work for a friend in the next few weeks at a pub in town for a kinda battle of the bands for DJ's. IM not too sure what the lighting will be, i imagine dark. There will be no lasers or anything like that initially. Does anyone have any pointers for me?

cheers in advance
 
This is quiet a difficult one, you will need a wide aperture such as f/2.8, or as wide as your lens will allow. Then use a slow shutter speed, around 40-80, but not to slow, you don't want the pics to be blurred, a tripod or IS lens would help. Lastly, not essential, would depend on how dark the room is, but you will flash, but not to bright, or it will light up the whole room, I tend to turn down the power a stop or two, that way will still capture the stage lighting, and the atmosphere of the venue.

Hope this helps
 
Cheers for the tips Chris. I was thinking of using my 18-55 IS lens anyway but you have cemented that altho f/3.5 is the best it can muster

Ben
 
Contact the venue and find out what the lighting will be! And put your ISO up to the highest your camera will cope with. You can use noise reduction in post to get rid of the worst of the grain. Avoid flash if you possibly can - it tends to kill all atmosphere.
 
You might think about buying a 50mm f1.8? Poor build quality, but inexpensive and gives very good results. It's about two stops faster than the kit lens at the short end. Only problem I can see is that 50mm might be slightly too long on a crop body inside a pub, but that's going to depend on space/distances etc.
 
In proper dingy pubs I'll often go to f/1.8 AND ISO 3200, maybe even higher so I think you'll struggle with f/3.5 unless the camera has a super-high ISO setting (remember a grainy picture is better than a blurry one!).

Do you have a flash you can bounce off the ceiling?
 
Cheers Martyn, thats something i may do depending on the frequency and success of me doing this. Ive got a 500D so the highest ISO i can do is 3200 i believe and just the built in flash

Ben
 
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