Yoshiki & Sugizo at Otakon 2010

I was very excited to have a chance to see Yoshiki and Sugizo at Otakon. And even more excited to take pictures of this event. I was able to find my way up to the front row. I had the 70-200 f2.8 with me, so the pictures came out fantastic. There were enough light on stage where my shutter speed was 1/100 to 1/160. During their second and last song, Endless Rain, the lights dimmed very low and my shutter speed was hovering around the 1/40 and 1/50. A few shots came out blurring, but I had enough where I had 3-4 good ones.

Yoshiki played the piano and Sugizo played vocals on violin. It was a very special event that'll probably never happen again.

A Few Photos with Atalie

Took a few photos with Atalie last weekend around the meet packing district in NYC. Atalie is not familiar to posing in front of a camera. She is only a seasonal cosplayer. I love the contrast of the black and red in the pictures. For a few shots I used a reflector to bounce flash off for a kicker light on the eyes.

Studio lighting is the $hit

Played around with studio lighting, Profoto equipment, at a photography class. The two examples shown are what David Ziser calls it as looping lighting. It's beautiful lighting and very flattering to our subjects. The lighting setup comes for an angle can casts a little shadow on one side of the face. The second shot, there's a second light source coming for the rear right of the subject. It's a hair kicker light that separates the subject from the background.

Miyavi Appearance at Kinokuniya

Miyavi made showed up at Kinokuniya in NYC for a Q&A, one song performance (Kimi Ni Funky Monkey Vibration), and ten lucky fans got his autograph. All this was made possible by The Diva Review. I was lucky enough to take photos at this private event.

The room was semi-dark, but a 2.8 glass was good enough for the job. I didn't shoot with a FX camera but for web viewing the noise level was also good enough. I thought I did a pretty good job capturing the moments of the event with limited movement. Getting the right white balance was tricky in the room, but luckily I was shooting RAW. I'll let a few sample pictures do the talking.

The Dream Station @ Arlene's Grocery

Band: The Dream Station
Venue: Arlene's Grocery

Shot a local band, The Dream Station, at Arlene's Grocery. I saw the lighting situation when the previous band played and was pretty confident. When it was time for me to shoot, I found myself not getting the good shots as I'm used to. I really need to upgrade if I'm going to get serious. Tip of the day: never get over confident for a gig.

Lilac at Webster Hall: The Studio

Venue: Webster Hall: The Studio
Date: May 16, 2010

It was J Summit at Webster Hall this Sunday night. My friends, Lilac hosted the show with four other bands. The lighting was very dark and had constantly changing lights. It was a nightmare to shoot without flash. This was one of the nights I wish I had a FX body. Well, at least I had fast glass with me.

I felt in their previous show at Don Hill's, I was very conservative in my shooting style. This time I want to spice it up with different perspectives. My fisheye lens will come in handy. Despite the terrible lighting conditions (tons of people were flashing), I felt I did pretty well. Definitely captured the mood of the place. Some of my favorite shots were of Gabriel Tanaka (bassist), check picture below.

Vocaloid Magnet PV @ BBG

Series: Vocaloid
Characters: Miku, Luka, RinI remember just two years ago, the amount of people cosplaying at Sakura Matsuri equals to the amount of finger and toes I have. At Sakura Matsuri this year in Brooklyn, cosplay has exploded like regular people owning DSLR's. Cosplayers were everywhere and the "regular" people were confused. A few of my cosplaying con friends were there as well in their Vocaloid Magnet PV outfits. We took this opportunity to take some photos in the backdrop of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden.

The sun was harsh that day, not ideal for taking pictures of people. Fortunately I packed my reflector along. A few of my shots I had someone reflecting light into my subject's face. In one occasion, I had to block sunlight shining on the cosplayer's face. The two lenses I carried with me were the 17-55mm f2.8 and the 50mm f1.4. It was very bright. This day I wish I had a polarizer filter with me to shoot at large aperatures. An interesting thing I found out in post was I was missing focus with my 50mm prime a lot more than usual. Not really sure why this is happening. My shutter speed for most shots were in the 1000's so hand shake wasn't the issue. Am I missing focus because of the shadow DOF? I was shooting center-weighted, that might be it. Not sure what happened, guess I'll have to test this lens again some day. I shot from many different angles, including shooting down from a tree. Got fantastic photos. My advice of the day is; move around and shoot from different angles is key to a good photoshoot.

More pictures from the shoot can be found on my flickr site.