Live Photography

Live performance photography was my main extracurricular pursuit for several years, beginning in March 2007 at Deep Ellum's Curtain Club and ending in 2018 at the Rail Club in Fort Worth. I started out with vintage 35mm film cameras before eventually progressing to a Canon 40D DSLR, my primary camera from 2008 until 2020. The whole thing was a learning process for me: my earliest concert photos weren't of particularly good quality and most are fairly embarrassing to me today. The later photos were much better and evidenced tremendous growth from behind the camera in both picture-taking skill and shot composition. In addition, experience I've gained over years spent as an amateur photographer has enabled me to revisit a lot of early material and correct many of the mistakes I made at the time.

A live concert setting is a very challenging environment to shoot in. Impenetrable crowds of people and the constant movement of performers on stage can make shot composition very difficult. Capricious, unpredictable stage lighting and theatrical effects can throw off your exposure and focus. Unwitting audience members often stray into a shot, or (in an unfortunate reality of the digital, social media age) constantly hold up their cell phones in your field of view. Success requires being quick on your feet, having an intimate familiarity with your equipment and how it all works, skill and experience, and a fair bit of good old fashioned random chance happening to operate in your favor. When all these stars align, the results can be very satisfying. I took tens of thousands of live performance photos during my time in the local music scene. The best of that material is showcased here.