“I’ve recorded a few songs in my day… Many went on to become huge hits. With your permission, I’d like to sing a few of them for you.” The words of a living legend, Tony Bennett.
I finally got the opportunity to shoot the timeless Tony Bennett at the Verizon Wireless Ampitheater on May 31, 2013. What an awesome privilege and experience to just attend this show, much less photograph the legend himself. It was a a great show to shoot and I have thank The Backstage Beat for asking me to shoot the show for them.
It was a difficult but easy shoot. Difficult in the fact that we were far away from the stage and had to whip out the big guns to get good shots, but easy because Mr. Bennett isn’t thrashing across the stage with a huge light show, canons and fireworks going off every two seconds. We were staged behind the mixing board, which probably out us about somewhere between 200 and 300 feet away from the stage. I ended up shooting my 300mm with a 2x converter on my D700 for most of my shots. I took the teleconverter off to do the panoramic shots for both bands. Overall… I really like the way the photos came out.
Mr. Bennett was traveling with his 4 piece consisting of legendary drummer Harold Jones, Lee Musiker on piano, guitarist Gray Sargent and Marshall Wood on bass. What a pleasure it would have been to just shoot those guys. Sometimes you just know when you are in the presence of greatness. This was one of those nights…
It took a while for it to sink in how Mr. Bennett has influenced numerous generations of musicians, singers and fans around the world and that I was photographing the show. My grandparents loved listening to him, my dad loves his rendition of “San Francisco” and my wife loves his music. It’s was surrealistic when he started to sing “San Francisco.” I’ve heard the song a thousand times, but here it was… Live and in-person. Goosebumps!
His influence is apparent, even with his special guest Jackie Evancho, the 13 year old phenom with the voice of an angel. What an awesome treat for those in attendance as Ms. Evancho performed with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra.
I think my favorite shot of the night is the panoramic shot I stitched together in Photoshop. There wasn’t a “whole-lotta” action going on, so I had to find a way to capture the moment. I didn’t put a high-res image on Flickr, but believe me, it’s a nice pano.
One of the COOLEST things I get to do is shoot concerts. I’ve always loved music and gettig to shoot bands or acts that I grew up listening to is an awesome experience.
I recently had the opportunity to shoot the “Motor City Madman” himself, Ted Nugent, along with STYX and REO Speedwagon. I was 14 the last time I saw “Uncle Ted.” He, along with Derek St. John, opened up for Kiss at the old Omni arena in Altanta. I remember that night like it was yesterday. My cousin’s husband knew Ted from his earlier days back in Detroit. We went over to the Omni hotel hoping to hang out with the band, but we didn’t get to go up to the suite.
However, I did get a guitar pick from a roadie as he was going up the elevator. Such is Rock-N-Roll…
It was a fun show to shoot and I have thank The Backstage Beat for asking me to shoot the show for them. I already had tickets and was going to the show, so shooting the show was a no-brainer. Like usual, the photographer gets to shoot the first three songs and then gets led away to a special holding room like the pond scum we are. Well, it’s not quite that bad… I was able to check my gear with Guest Services and sit with my pals for the remainder of the set(s). It was a tedious process to run around the amphitheater all night, in the rain, checking gear, but I love shooting bands so much… It was worth it.
Here are a few of the pics that from the show. Enojy…
[flickr width=”600″ float=”left”]http://www.flickr.com/photos/johndawg/8720793363/[/flickr] The Motor City Madman
REO Speedwagon took the stage second. The guys put on a great show, but Cronin let the crowd sing a lot of the high notes.
Still pretty awesome to see the guys playing on the road. I’d always wanted to see them live but never had the chance. So, having the opportunity to get as close as we were and shooting them was really cool.
[flickr float=”right”]http://www.flickr.com/photos/johndawg/8720754403/[/flickr] Kevin Cronin of REO Speedwagon
STYX closed the show at Verizon Ampitheater. It’s truly amazing how many hit songs they have had over the years. They put on a great show and were fun to shoot.
[flickr]http://www.flickr.com/photos/johndawg/8720718937/[/flickr] Tommy Shaw… Letting it all out!
What an awesome day of shooting! A few weeks ago, I was asked by my good friend, Jim Thomas of OnsiteShine (follow of Facebook), to do a photo shoot for a local magazine. The subject is Atlanta Krav Maga & Fitness.
As soon as he asked, I immediately started daydreaming. I knew exactly what I wanted to do and how I wanted to shoot the spread.
I wanted hard shadows to create mystery… I also wanted to show power and agility.
It helps to work with disciplined and experienced people. Eric Sepeda, from Atlanta Krav Maga & Fitness, is a Krav Maga Worldwide 2nd Degree Black Belt, one of only 25 in the country, and the only one in the state of Georgia. He’s also worked on film sets as a Fight Choreographer… most recently for the movie “Alex Cross.” Eric is currently working as a Krav Maga Technical Advisor for Season 2 of the USA television show “Necessary Roughness” with actor, Scott Cohen.
This type of experience makes it easier for me to capture what I want to do. I didn’t have to worry about emotions or staging the “models.” They showed me the moves a few times, I told Eric what I thought would make the best captures (angle, lighting, stance, section of choreographed move) and we worked from there. It was great!
The whole shoot took just over four hours and we are all excited on how the final images came out.
Hey… Check out the pics below and enjoy. Don’t forget to follow me on Twitter and Facebook!
Eric Sepeda(R) goes over the knife defense move with Bryan Forman(L). This was shot with my iPhone to show the setup for the ATL Krav Maga shoot.
Here is the final image taken just after the above setup image was taken. Knife Defense
[flickr]http://www.flickr.com/photos/johndawg/8680817741/[/flickr]
It was the summer of 1984. I had an Emerson boom box with a b&w tv. I thought It was cool…
There was only one tape any self respecting 11 year old would bring to the pool… That was
“1984” by Van Halen.
Jump and Panama ruled the radio airwaves. That’s what we referred to as listening to the radio… For you younger whipper snappers. No Pandora, Spotify or XM radio for us! haha
So… there I was shooting one of my most favorite bands of all time and I found myself wandering. It’s hard to shoot a band or a football team that you like. You want to pull away from the camera to watch the action. I was able to refocus and overcome being stowed in the back by the sound board to get a few good shots. Good thing I brought my 300mm and 2x teleconverter with me.
Let’s have some fun. I wanna try something new. I’ll post pics from time to time and let you guys give them a caption.
This is a picture of Larry Shipp @ShippForce1 with the @GeorgiaForceAFL He made an incredible catch over the Cleveland Gladiators Joe Phinisee. This pic was used on the front page of the AFL website.
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around a little bit with one of the Georgia Force photos that I took of Larry Shipp catching a bomb from RJ Archer to pretty much close out the game. It was a great play and I am so glad that captured that moment.
So, here is the original image that I had posted on Flickr. Not boring at all, but it is what it is. I think it should be in a magazine like SI or ESPN, but who am I to say.
So there I am looking at the pic thinking about what I could do to punch it up. I got out my brand new wacom intuos5 tablet. This thing allows me to do things that I could never do with a mouse. It’s a great tool… I highly recommend the drawing tablets if you have any experience with drawing. They are fun to play with and not priced too badly. I think I picked up the medium for $360? I’ll have to check the receipt.
Here’s the second image. I added a pre-made Lightroom Selenium Tone filter to it.
With this image I created a 3rd layer that was normal and masked it out. I only allowed the two players true colors shine through the Selenium Tone filter that I had assigned to the lower level.
For the final image… I bumped up the saturation of the background and added a heavy radial blur filter to the background.
And finally… I add a few more masks with a few strokes from some brushes to create some texture then I added and then added the text and the logos… and we are done.
I hope you liked it. It was fun learning with the new Wacom Intuos5 tablet. I can’t wait to see what I do next.
UFC 145 came to Atlanta last week and I had a chance to shoot the fights! Good thing I brought my new 300mm 2.8 lens and 2x teleconverter.
They put me and a few other fellas at the top of the 100 section. It still was an awesome experience and I met some great photographers along the way.
[flickr]http://www.flickr.com/photos/johndawg/7119151867/[/flickr] Here’s the view form my area.
I also attended the pre-fight press conference at Park Tavern. Jon and Rahsad seemed to both be very nice guys.
I think the hype leading up to the fight was more manufactured and fostered by the media. Just by watching their mannerisms… I don’t think they hated each other as much as they led on.
However, it did lead up to a great pre-fight hype and was an awesome event to attend.
[flickr]http://www.flickr.com/photos/johndawg/6973035786/[/flickr] Jon Jones pokes fun at the media for hyping the fight making him look like the “bad guy.”
[flickr]http://www.flickr.com/photos/johndawg/6973105362/[/flickr] Joe Rogan introduces the fighters at the weigh-in.
[flickr]http://www.flickr.com/photos/johndawg/6973105704/[/flickr] Jon Jones comes onto the stage at the weigh-in.
[flickr]http://www.flickr.com/photos/johndawg/7119186705/[/flickr] Jones let’s out a primal scream as he weighs-in.
[flickr]http://www.flickr.com/photos/johndawg/6973105032/[/flickr] Jones and Evans got face-to-face at the weigh-in.
The Fights
[flickr]http://www.flickr.com/photos/johndawg/6973067712/[/flickr] Rory MacDonald (Blue White Trunks) is a beast!
[flickr]http://www.flickr.com/photos/johndawg/7107057253/[/flickr] With all the pre-fight hype and hoopla… Evans and Jones finally got to fight in the octagon rather than in the press. They did now disappoint.
[flickr]http://www.flickr.com/photos/johndawg/7107055897/[/flickr] I am new fan of Ben Rothwell. This guy refocused his training and got into great shape. It showed as he knocked out Brendan Shaub
If you don’t want to watch the entire video: A chicken was thrown on stage. Alice, thinking chickens can fly threw the chicken back in the crowd where it was immediately ripped apart and thrown back at him again, in pieces, by a group of handicapped people.
Or you were introduced to Alice, like me, by The Muppets in March of 78. I was 4 then… Dang, now you know! :)
embedded by Embedded Video
I remember being scared mesmerized by the act. I mean… he even brought his own muppet monsters with him.
As the years went on, I realized what a performer Alice Cooper really was. So when I was given the opportunity to shoot the legend that is Alice Cooper, I jumped at it!
He and his crew delivered their “No More Mr. Nice Guy Tour” to the Cobb Energy Performing Arts Center in Marietta Atlanta, Ga.
It was a packed house and they were all ready for Alice to kick their butts. Flagrant rock talk… 5 yard penalty. Still second down.
Here are a few of my favorite shots from the show…
I’d like to see Alice try to swing a golf club with that jacket on… :)
With Alice on this tour is rock guitarist Orianthi. She has performed on American Idol and with other acts like Adam Lambert, Mary J. Blige and Carrie Underwood live at the 2009 Grammy Awards. However, she is probably best know for her performance in Michael Jackson’s “This Is It” movie. She was supposed to go on the road with Jackson, but we all know what happened to Michael before the tour opened.
Anyways… She’s is really cool and an awesome guitarist. Check her out on Twitter if you get a chance. @orianthi
The above photo isn’t as sharp as I would prefer, and I probably would have never shown the world this pic… But, I love the colors.
Alice… still rockin’ hard at 64 years young old. You thought I would use “young” in that last sentence… Didn’t you!
Alice singing 18… and he likes it!
And… of course, we always show a lil’ love to the guys that work behind the scenes to bring your favorite shows to life. GREAT job fellas!
Check out the rest of the set on my Flickr account:
For those of you that “know” me… you probably remember a time when every thread of clothing I owned was red and black and had a “Super G” sewn or ironed on. My son thinks for favorite (color) is “red & black.” Well… getting married and taking on life has changed that a bit. These days I have some white button up shirts and black, grey slacks and even a green pull-over. I’ve really stocked up on the blue sweaters as well… Not sure how that happened. But the love for the Dawgs is still there and I still own a lot of red and black.
I’ve been shooting the UGA football team on picture day for 5 years. Every year is a little birthday treat for myself. Picture day usually falls on or close to my Birthday. It’s been awesome to meet the team and the coaches as they prepare for the first game of the season. The guys are always courteous and Coach Richt is as advertised… a true gentleman, always stopping to talk to everyone that wants to speak with him.
What that said… there’s been one thing that I’ve always wanted to do, but not had the chance. That is to shoot a game in Sanford stadium. It just hasn’t worked out over the past few years due to schedule conflicts. Well, I finally got a chance last Saturday and I loved every minute of it.
I want to thank Claude Felton and Karlene Lawrence for this great opportunity. Here are a few images from the game on 11/5 vs. New Mexico State.
Michael Bennett TD catch
Brandon Harton celebrates a TD with Tavarres King
Orson Charles with a TD catch… The ref got in front of the pic when the ball hit his hands. :( Oh well…
Aaron Murray… Keeping his eye on the ball.
I hope to shoot a few more games before the end of the season! We’ll see what happens.
