Posts Tagged: Coldplay

coldplay / concert / portland / squid / www.fivezerothree.com — Comments Off
25
Apr 12

Coldplay rock Portland

Coldplay Portland Rose Garden

Check out my photo’s from last nights Coldplay show here

Coldplay is an amazing band.  I’ve been to a lot of concerts and I don’t think I’ve seen or been part of a crowd that was crazy from floor to nose bleeds.  I’ve seen Coldplay once before at the Clark County Amphitheater a few years ago and like this show, they put on a rock show.  Before they even went on stage the Rose Garden blew up with flashing lights. They weren’t your normal camera or cell phone or lighter, they were these amazing wristbands that had a huge sponsor logo on them from Twitter. They were not just wristbands but they were controlled by remote. They would flash, they would stay on and they would turn off. All at various times during the show. It was like the applause sign at a live taping of a tv show. Almost reminding people to go crazy.  It wasn’t like they needed it, Coldplay puts on one of the best live shows around.  It’s been over 10 years since they played the Roseland Grill for their first show in the US.  Yep, Coldplay played to what seemed like the most sold out show I’ve ever seen at the Rose Garden but their first show in the US was for a few dozen people at a venue’s 2nd stage for the radio station 94.7 KNRK over 10 years earlier.

 Coldplay Portland Rose Garden

photographer squid — Comments Off
15
Dec 09

The Year comes to an end

The Crowd Goes Wild/p>

With the year coming to an end  something about the second half of December that makes people reflect on the past year. Today in one of Flickr specialized groups, Concert Photography. The forum post/question was asked:

Favorite photo of 2009:
Favorite gig of 2009:
Greatest achievement of 2009:
What you like to achieve in 2010:
“I added one, biggest pisser of 2009:”

I had a very fun year in the world of concert photography I shot 22 concerts and 42 bands. It was a huge improvement compared to 2009 when I only shot 14 bands. I didn’t even shoot a band until mid April in 2009 so pretty much I had a busy busy summer of concert photography. I love it, it’s a major time pressure because you usually only get to shoot 3 songs unless the venue guy can’t count like what happened last week. He flagged me over and said “that’s 3″ i responded with “are you sure?” Of course he was sure, little did he know I know how to count and respect the bands. The show was part of our concert series and we were recording all the shows so after I was kicked out, he also didn’t give me a chance to show my VIP wrist band, the same color the bands were wearing. I get a little diva when things like this happen when it’s our radio stations concerts. After a little texting I was back in VIP standing next to the guy who only can count to two. I’m sure he noticed me because the next 3 nights I was also standing by him watching all the shows and taking photo’s. I don’t know if he felt dumb or a little weird but I could careless. It also could be my karma for my answer for my biggest pisser of 2009. So here we go my answers:

Favorite photo of 2009:
This was a very tough one to answer but it didn’t take me long to figure it out, it was between two different photo’s at this show and between two different photo’s at another show. Which ended up being my favorite show of 2009.
Coldplay – Clark County Amphitheater July 10, 2009

Coldplay/p>

Favorite gig of 2009:
This was my favorite concert to shoot because after the 3 songs that I had to take photo’s I sat 3 feet back in the front row watching a very good show.

Dave Matthews Band – Gorge Amphitheater September 4, 2009

Dave Matthews Band at the Gorge


Greatest achievement of 2009:
being able to work in radio and getting tons of photo passes. Most of the time it’s a cheap little wristband but with the big bands you get a pass that is a giant sticker.

 

2500 iso

What you like to achieve in 2010:
shoot MUSE in 2010, get a photo published. Muse is the only big band that I know of so far coming through Portland but they are super fun from what I’ve heard a great live band.


“I added one, biggest pisser of 2009:”
Getting my pass pulled 15 minutes before the blink 182/Weezer show in Seattle. I had my great little point-and-shoot and was still able to get some decent shots.  Blink 182 is my favorite band in the world and this would have been a dream to be able to shoot them with a good camera and have that experience. It gives me something to look forward too, unless they break up again.

Blink 182

With all this that happened in 2009 I can’t wait to see how it goes in 2010. I have a ton of fun shooting concerts. Some of my favorite things, music and photography.

 

photographer squid — Comments Off
12
Jul 09

What I learned from taking photo’s at the Coldplay Concert.

Coldplay

At this point in my photography life this is the biggest show I’ve ever had a chance to take photo’s at. Besides it being one of the best concerts I have ever seen from one of the biggest bands in the world right now and forever, top 5 concerts I’ve ever attended. I was kind of nervous for this show because I haven’t really taken photos at an Amphitheatre before. It will be good practice when I take photos at Dave Matthews for 3 days and Blink 182 3 days later.

1. Follow the newspaper guys.
These people know where to be if you are not allowed in a pit. If you have a choice to which side you get to be on, follow the paper jockeys.

2. Own the biggest and fastest camera you can afford.
I don’t own a great camera, I kind of fake it and get by with taking hundreds of shots. You need a lot of low light power.

3. Your lens isn’t long enough no matter how close you are.
    We couldn’t be in the pit area because this is Coldplay and the biggest band in the world. They had more light set ups and video camera’s in that area that I have ever seen. PUT U2 to shame. I have a 24-70mm L 2.8 Canon lens that is perfect when you get in the photo pit or any closer than row J. For some reason I decided to put my 100 – 300mm lens in my bag just in case we got put in the area around the sound board. This lens is in no way a concert lens. BUT, I faked it and made it work.
4. Bring a taser
Because you didn’t follow the newspaper guys you got stuck with two idiot novice photogs. One “winner” used flash the whole time, so she got great flash shots of the people 4 feet in front of her. The other guy had his camera above his head the whole time taking blind shots. What a good taser would of done. I just stood behind them the whole time shooting between them getting shots. I took almost 270 shots in 16 minutes. I would have taken more but my camera has a buffer of 5 shots at a time.
5. Bring a Point and Shoot
When talking with my buddy that works for Clark County Amp… Thanks Keevin. He told me to bring my Point and Shoot because they didn’t say no to that. Which they really couldn’t of. But I hate my point and shoot, it’s old and is harder to change settings and I needed control. I had been checking out the Canon G9 because of what a friend had told me about them and he uses it for everything. Concerts, interviews and everything in between. It took really good videos and that was the selling point. I can’t say anything really bad about this camera except it has crappy low light High ISO. BUT it makes up for it with it’s video and sound.
So those are my tips for taking photos at Coldplay. I had fun, I ended up with a few good ones and a lot of blurry ones.

Here are a couple videos from the show…

Coldplay – Billie Jean “Michael Jackson Cover”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gHbDec7n6Q

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