As a person, I love photography.  As a photographer I’m not sure what I love to shoot the most!  Children, families, seniors, weddings, landscapes, things, or bands?  So I’m trying a bit of everything until my taste buds decide what they like best!

  I’ve been trying to get my friend Katie to let me photograph her and her husband Joe for a while now.  Katie has this amazing voice and even more spectacular guitar skills.   I heard through the grapevine (mostly Katie) that she would be playing a local bar, Zeller Inn, (which another group of friends just happened to own); so I did what any shutter clicking crazy photographer would do and asked permission to photograph in the gig.  Everyone said yes!

When I arrived with my flash and camera in tow I didn’t quite know what to expect.  Katie and Joe had set up their “stage area” in the day light, and as the sun drew to the other side of the world it became increasingly clear that there were no “stage lighting”, or lighting of any kind where they had set up.  My plan was to use the available light and avoid using a flash for a small gig. I wanted to preserve the ambiance for the listeners.  There was no way this was going to happen with my camera (and I love my camera).  So I snuck inside to capture some images for the bar owner and then sat there through the first set disappointed that I wouldn’t be able to photograph Belle and Dufflebag.  Then I remembered my sync cord and flash!  I didn’t have a stand but I had a husband who had an arm that could hold my flash in the air  (Think back to previous posts where I explained about the importance of not using the flash directly on the camera).

I quite literally started shooting my friend.  She may have been blinded by the light,but she’s quite a performer and one really couldn’t tell.  After a while, I wanted to move around a bit but didn’t want to make Chad stand next to me with his arm in the air like Monica in “Love & Basketball”.  So I got creative (it’s in my nature).  I sat my flash on a table next to me, put a glass of water in front of it to diffuse it, set it on the floor, on my lap, and on a chair.  It worked, all positions.  I got some really nice shots in a venue that literally was in the dark.  If you get a chance to catch Katie & Joe perform you should “Katie Belle & Dufflebag Joe”.  Great Stuff!

 If they send me the address I’ll link up to their tunes. –