Avangelist Photography

Jens Kidman - Meshugga. Brighton Concorde2

Meshugga have cancelled shows in the UK more times than I have seen Metallica (and that is quite a few) so it was a great pleasure to see these technical pioneers of metal finally grace the stage at the Concorde2 in Brighton.

I was unsure of how the band would be in a live environment, knowing their extremely intricate and complex work there was a concern that they were going to be stationary slabs of granite proving tricky to get a good shot. Oh how wrong I was.

Front man Jens Kidman is quite possibly the most frightening effigy of evil I have seen period. His almost robotic movement fits perfectly with their futuristic blast beats and off time signatures, rarely moving from the centre spot, foot on monitor, his body gyrates back and forth like The Terminator minus it’s skin and muscle casing.

Get In The Pit

One of the biggest hurdles for concert photographers is dry ice (smoke machines). visibility is reduced, and flight bounces off the dense fog.

Working With Dry Ice

First off, don’t bother trying to shoot anything during the first few thick puffs that get released, you wont get anything out of it. Waiting a few seconds for the smoke to clear and thin out is the best option.

If you are finding that the smoke is too visible in your shots when you are checking the back, try dialling down your flash gun, if using TTL maybe take it a whole step down, or slow your shutter further.

Where smoke machines really can make a massive impact on your photos is when you have strong coloured back lighting on the stage.

If you can get that one shot with a singer for example perfectly illuminated with the smoke behind creating a fantastic backdrop you are onto a winner.

This set of photos were taken for the Concorde2, Brighton. Other images are also available from musicpictures.com