Won't You Fly High, Free Bird?
Ooh...I think this becomes one of my favourite concert shots ever. :-)
A portrait of Rokia Traoré taken during Saturday night's monsoon conditions at this year's WOMAD Festival at Charlton Park.
I first came across Rokia at WOMAD in 2009. Her performance was awesome and I fell in love with her music.
However, at around 5pm on Saturday, monsoon rains descended on WOMAD. Rokia was due on stage at 7pm. The torrential rain persisted, like a big persistent thing from Planet Persistent.
WOMAD is a very camera friendly festival. I learned that the first time I went as it was routine to see people shooting with SLRs from the front row of the audience.
Normally, I'm shooting the first three songs from the pit in front of stage...then we get ushered out. So if we snappers want to see the rest of the show, we have to go stand at the back of the crowd.
However, for Rokia...as I love her music, I really wanted to see the full show...as well as photograph it.
So I opted to shoot the show from the audience with my 100-400mm lens. It was a good call. For the first three songs, there was no lighting on her and she was fairly static, while playing guitar. Later in the concert, she cut loose...as you can see. The weather was a concern in terms of my expensive camera kit. However, I had prepared for a rainy day with a cheap and cheerful plastic rain cover for my camera and lens.
The good news is it did the job...although it certainly added to the degree of difficulty in taking shots like this. When I first saw this shot, I was REALLY hoping it was sharp...and I think this will do? :-)
Capturing the "moments" which define a live performance is what first got me hooked on photography. It's still the source of my greatest photographic passion.
You can see more shots of Rokia in my Rokia Traoré set.
You can visit Rokia's website here:
You can see my WOMAD 2012 shots here: WOMAD 2012
You can see my WOMAD 2011 shots here: WOMAD 2011
You can see my WOMAD 2010 shots here: WOMAD 2010
You can see my WOMAD 2009 shots here: WOMAD 2009
My thanks are due to Giles Cooper of Borkowski PR for arranging my photo pass.
Won't You Fly High, Free Bird?
Ooh...I think this becomes one of my favourite concert shots ever. :-)
A portrait of Rokia Traoré taken during Saturday night's monsoon conditions at this year's WOMAD Festival at Charlton Park.
I first came across Rokia at WOMAD in 2009. Her performance was awesome and I fell in love with her music.
However, at around 5pm on Saturday, monsoon rains descended on WOMAD. Rokia was due on stage at 7pm. The torrential rain persisted, like a big persistent thing from Planet Persistent.
WOMAD is a very camera friendly festival. I learned that the first time I went as it was routine to see people shooting with SLRs from the front row of the audience.
Normally, I'm shooting the first three songs from the pit in front of stage...then we get ushered out. So if we snappers want to see the rest of the show, we have to go stand at the back of the crowd.
However, for Rokia...as I love her music, I really wanted to see the full show...as well as photograph it.
So I opted to shoot the show from the audience with my 100-400mm lens. It was a good call. For the first three songs, there was no lighting on her and she was fairly static, while playing guitar. Later in the concert, she cut loose...as you can see. The weather was a concern in terms of my expensive camera kit. However, I had prepared for a rainy day with a cheap and cheerful plastic rain cover for my camera and lens.
The good news is it did the job...although it certainly added to the degree of difficulty in taking shots like this. When I first saw this shot, I was REALLY hoping it was sharp...and I think this will do? :-)
Capturing the "moments" which define a live performance is what first got me hooked on photography. It's still the source of my greatest photographic passion.
You can see more shots of Rokia in my Rokia Traoré set.
You can visit Rokia's website here:
You can see my WOMAD 2012 shots here: WOMAD 2012
You can see my WOMAD 2011 shots here: WOMAD 2011
You can see my WOMAD 2010 shots here: WOMAD 2010
You can see my WOMAD 2009 shots here: WOMAD 2009
My thanks are due to Giles Cooper of Borkowski PR for arranging my photo pass.