Advice for Clubbing Photography?

[KajeYomama]

Hi everybody!

I've been invited to shoot a clubbing event. I want to do it because I think it'll be a great experience for an amateur photographer like me. Can anybody provide any tips?

I've somewhat researched this topic online, found some useful stuff and found some not useful stuff... ultimately I'm still left with a lot of questions.

My Equipment:
- Canon 7d
- Sigma 10-20mm f/3.5
- Canon 28-135mm f/3.5-5.6
- Canon 50mm f/1.8
- External Flash + diffuser

Should be a standard clubbing event + DJ's and strobes/lights, but still relatively dark...

- What mode should I shoot in? What settings should I have preset?

- What equipment do I use/bring (I don't think I want to lug around everything)?
Sigh, I'm missing the 20-28mm range, which is a good range to have, will that be a problem...?

- Any other equipment I should have/prepare (for myself, camera or non camera related)... extra batteries, extra cf cards... etc?

Thanks for you help!
<3Kaje

I'll be doing practice shots when I can this week...

[BigFuzzy]

Originally Posted by KajeYomama

Should be a standard clubbing event + DJ's and strobes/lights, but still relatively dark...
- What mode should I shoot in? What settings should I have preset?
- What equipment do I use/bring (I don't think I want to lug around everything)?
- Any other equipment I should have/prepare (for myself, camera or non camera related)... extra batteries, extra cf cards... etc?.

Hmmm lots here to discuss.
Ideally you'll shoot in Manual and adapt to the lighting conditions. But I'm assuming that's not an option considering the questions.

So.. here's what I'd suggest. Shoot in Aperture mode (AV) using the widest aperture possible (small f/number).

I'd use fill-flash, so if you're clueless about that, learn it. And learn flash compensation if you're not shooting in manual. Do you know the venue? Can you bounce flash or will it be direct? Can you get your flash off camera (either wireless or with a cord)? Do you have gels to better fit the 'feel' of a club or are you only going to blast your subjects with white light (which can still work)?

What is your task? ie focus on the party-goers or the DJ or both? I imagine I'd probably use that 10-20 more because you can do some funky stuff with it at the widest but also be pretty useful on your cropped sensor when shooting at 20mm which would still allow you to include some context in the photos. I'd also use the 50mm (but that's b/c I have full sized sensor.. on a cropped sensor it'd probably be too long a lens).

I like to shoot these sorts of events with a lot of DoF simply because I like the feel of milky colorful backgrounds, which is why I mentioned the 50mm @ f/1.8.

In the end seeing as you're basically asking us to teach you various general photography skills, I'd have to stick to this very basic info:
AV mode
Lowest f/number (in your case 3.5 (and 1.8 on your 50mm)
fill or bounce flash
probably at least 800 iso (especially if you have Lightroom3 which has awesome noise reduction) but depends on how much ambient light there is.

IDEALLY, you'd shoot in Manual adjusting as you go to ensure you have nice ambient light and not too much fill/flash on your subjects.

[OsmosisStudios]

Depends greatly on what youre being asked to shoot. "A clubbing event" is vague.

[KajeYomama]

thanks for the replies;

What I was trying to ask about the settings was; how would it be different than shooting regularly? I came across another website which I just watched videos and read the forums, and said that most professionals don't shoot with the lowest apeture setting. additionally 50mm may be considered to long at a clubbing event even for full frame sensors;

In the end, I read (and found out by trying), that a good setting is about f/4-f-5 I was okay with iso400, shutter speed at 1/5th, external flash (wired but off camera w/ stofen diffuser) -> set to second curtian; oh and I used the 10-20 f/3.5 and it was perfect. and last thing, i did have to adjust the FEC through out the night.

When writing this post, I wasn't exactly sure how to get the lighting in the background to come out along with keeping the subject in focus with such a low shutter speed...

anyway, thanks again for the insight, my information source can be found if googling or even youtubing "nightclub photography TV"

<3Kaje