Lowlight: Having to leave before end to get the pictures off to the agency.
Fill in: As I trudged off to the Borderline (where I have photographed some pretty legendary acts including Amy Winehouse), a one hit wonder singer songwriter with guitar called John did not conjure up an image of wild rock and roll fun and I was hoping it would all be over pretty quickly. How wrong I was.
The surreal eccentricity and unabashed self deprecating humour that is Otway was a photographic joy and challenge. Half musician, half comedian, half legend, (that does add up as the man is 150 per cent larger than life), trying to capture the madcap energy of this guy as he somersaulted across the tiny stage with his guitar, re-enacted Travolta's famous disco grooves and pogo-ed to the screams of 'Rumplestiltskin' was enough to keep me shooting for well over an hour, and it was only the need to get the pics in before the night desk closed that dragged me away from this marvellous spectacle. John Otway gives true meaning to the phrase 'a legend in his own lunchtime' and doesn't come with as much baggage as Amy. His band are pretty cool too..
Tech Spec: I usually like to manage without flash but the light was so yellow (see top picture) it really needed a bit of flash to overcome the cast. Also I missed all the somersaults by trying to keep the flash turned off as I couldn't get the shutter speed up fast enough, even at 6400 ISO, to freeze the movement sufficiently. I used my pop up flash as I was very close to the stage and didn't want to blind the performers, especially as I was allowed to shoot for the whole gig. This did add the problem of nasty shadows from the mike stands but had to be done. I kept the ISO to 1600 and shot at F4 at 1/30 second so I didn't lose the ambient light. Although it was very red, the colour added atmosphere.
For editorial: www.gettyimages.co.uk
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