What film and technique for nightclub phtography?

TimB

TimB

Suspended / Banned
Messages
104
Edit My Images
No
Hi all,
I sometimes take photos of events in nightclubs for friends who are promoters etc, and my usual tool is my D90 with 11-16mm f2.8 lens and a Yongnuo speedlight plus diffuser.

But.. I have just acquired a Nikon F5 and would really like to try this out at the next club night alongside the D90 as an experiment. I will be taking all the photos I would normally take using the D90 but I will be taking a load of additional pics with the F5 to see how they come out.

Now the advantage of digital is I can shoot in manual and over the course of the first few photos, keep looking at the shots on the screen and tweaking the settings until I'm happy with the way they look (enough ambient background club light in the shot, balanced with a little bit of diffused flash for the close ups of people photos etc)

But with film, I obviously cannot tweak the settings until I'm happy with the shot as I can't see them! Therefore I fear I am screwed before I even start!

The lens I have for the F5 is a Nikon 50mm F1.8, I realise this won't give me the wider shots of my other lens, but should be nice for torso/head style snaps of people, DJ's etc.

So, with the above in mind can anyone offer me any tips and advice to shooting in a nightclub with film to give me a better chance of ending up with usable shots of some description.

The club isn't pitch black, more like a dimly lit bar with obviously a lot of bright and coloured club lights.

What film should I use? Fuji Superia 800? Or even faster?

Should I just trust the camera and leave it in Programmed Auto?

If I attach a diffused upwards pointing speedlight such as a manual Yongnuo 460, how will I know what sort of effect it is having on my photos, or how much power to set it at?

Sorry for the stupid questions... I'm new to film! :)
 
Do you want colour or B&W?

For colour I would probably used Kodak Portra 400 and expose it at from 400 - 1600 (it makes barely any difference to the quality as many on here will agree with) and either process normally or if you've only shot it at 800 and above, get them to push it a stop (Not all labs will push C-41 colour neg films or charge an extra fee, 'The Darkroom' doesn't however, you just need to say when you send the film in).

For B&W theres lots of choices, if you want to go for an 'atmospheric' grain look then try Ilford Delta 3200 or Kodak T-Max 3200. Another possibility could be to expose an ISO 400 film such as Tri-X, HP-5+, Delta 400 or T-Max 400 at 800 - 1600 and push process it like above.
 
As James says, use your digi to meter for your F5. I'd go with Portra as well if you're definitely wanting a colour film & HP5 pushed for black & white. Basically what everyone else said :thumbs:
 
Jayst84 said:
Well, you've shot it before, what settings did you use on your D90? See what your most common ISO is and buy a film to match.

If you're taking your digi with you next time as well, you can still do a few test shots for settings and then dial in the same on your film body. Easy. :thumbs:
Click to expand...

Now this is interesting... I did not know I could do this.

So say I have my D90 on ISO800, F3.5 and shutter 1/5th, and this results in a good picture I can apply the same settings to my F5, use an iso 800 film and in theory get a similar outcome?

If so that is very useful :)
 
Also, I note your suggestions for Porta 400.

I take it you rate this over Fuji Superia?
 
bass_junkie83 said:
Will you be using flash?
Click to expand...

Yes, when I shoot with the D90 I tweak settings until i get a nice level of ambient/background light in the shots and then adjust the power level of a heavily diffused manual flash until I get the DJ/Customers lightly illuminated. I do it this way to avoid the horrible brightly lit subject and pitch black club in the background!
 
Good stuff.

You will be fine then. ISO 800 is a good safe speed to use in pretty much any club, with digital I often go a bit higher. But i'm not experienced with film though would be reluctant to go any higher.
 
ISO 200 or 400, approx 1/8th or slower second shutter speed depending on the clubs lighting, F5.6.
Flash settings depends on what flash you will use so can't really help there as they all are a bit different.
I used to use manual flash or auto when we shot film, nothing in the past 20 years has come close to the reliability of hammerhead Metz, except maybe qflash flash or F5/sb xxx combination.

The settings on the digital camera should relate to film, except if you use ttl flash, film ttl is still better, so experiment before you go out.
 
TimB said:
Also, I note your suggestions for Porta 400.

I take it you rate this over Fuji Superia?
Click to expand...

Superia is a consumer film so it has its limitations to remain cheap and balanced for mass market use. Portra is a professional emulsion which is much newer (released only last year) and has the latest in film technology with barely perceivable grain at ISO 400 and hardly an increase even if underexposed 2 stops and processed normally (i.e like exposing at 1600). Combined with a 1 stop push (i.e so the 'base' ISO is 800 instead of 400) improves it even more.

Edtog is right when I comes to film TTL, it works without preflash etc as film is reflective enough to meter right the film plane at the point of exposure, unlike digital sensors where a preflash is required as their not reflective enough.
 
Last edited:
Thanks for your help all,

I appreciate it :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top