Early Gig Photography

I saw a recent Reddit post in the Photography Subreddit where somebody was disappointed with the quality of pictures they had taken at recent gigs and were wondering if upgrading their lens and camera would improve things. The replies all echoed then same advice, “Improve your technique first as you’ll still take poor photos with better equipment if you don’t understand how to use it and how to compose interesting photographs.”

This post reminded me of my early gig photos where the quality of my digital camera was terrible by today’s standards and yet I think these pictures manage to capture the energy and emotion of the shows. Working with the camera’s limitations, using black and white to hide excess noise as grain and using lighting to highlight subjects all results in compelling pictures that have a rawness that my more recent, more polished pictures lack.