A guest post by Music Photographer Rick Bennett.

Band photography in bars can be very challenging, but with a little bit of knowledge and planning you can make images that blow away the standard fan photo. In Part 1, I discussed equipment choices: cameras, lenses and flashes. In this article, I’ll describe how to set up just before the performance to get the best shots.

First and foremost, you need to attempt to assess the security of your gear before you pull anything out. No band photographs are worth losing a camera or lens or flash over. The bands I’ve tended to shoot have played in nice neighborhoods in well established bars with well behaved clientele. But I’m constantly on the alert because the clientele could change in a heartbeat. In some situations, I’ll

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Over at the dPS Facebook page (please do connect with us there) earlier today I asked the following question:

What mistake do you most commonly make or what problem do you most commonly come up against in your photography?

The responses have been great so I thought I’d open it up for discussion here on the blog. Feel free to share your response here in comments below or over on Facebook.

PS: I’m glad I’m not the only one with the problem of forgetting to switch a high ISO off when I’m taking a shot in low light.

A guest post by Music Photographer Rick Bennett.

Some of my favorite photography subjects are musicians while they are performing. They tend to be having fun, they like the attention, and they’re challenging to capture well because of their environments. Capturing musicians in the wild can be tough and very rewarding.

Digital Photography School recently published 6 Tips for Budding Live Concert Photographers. One of the tips was to start out shooting friends’ bands in small clubs. I’m going to expand on that suggestion by writing a three part series on photographing bands in bars. In the first part, I’ll deal with equipment choices. In the second part, I’ll deal with set-up just prior to the performance. In the last, I’ll discuss shooting techniques.

The most obvious part of

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Weekly Assignment
Well, it’s time to celebrate the winner of this week’s Celebrate assignment. The assignment we finished this week asked you to show us in photos how you celebrate. Whether it was losing 10 lbs, picking the first vegetable from the garden, or something more traditional like a wedding or birthday, we wanted to see a photo that screamed celebration. Our winner this week was MKing‘s returning soldiers. Anyone who has known people in the military or who has family in the military knows that them coming home safe and sound is something most certainly worth celebrating. Well, this shot showed the happiness and joy of everyone celebrating a safe return home, which is why it was our winner this week. Our first runner …