David Bergman — ALL ACCESS — sports, concert, and music photographer

I shot the Barenaked Ladies ringing in the new year at the Fox Theater in Detroit for TourPhotographer.com. The guys dressed up for the occasion, so I’ve now photographed them in just about everything from a tuxedo to, well, nothing.

Right before the band went on stage, I made my favorite image of the night. Steven Page was fixing his bow tie in the mirror when Ed Robertson came over to give him a hand. It was a nice moment that most people never get to see.

(Nikon D3, 24-70, 1/125, F/2.8, 1600 ISO, SB-800 bounced off ceiling)

During the show, I had a remote camera mounted on a lighting rig at the back of the stage so I could get a shot of the sold-out venue. When the house lights came up during “If I Had A Million Dollars,” I knew I had my shot. On a large print, you can see almost every face in the crowd.

(Nikon D700, 14-24, 1/125, F/4, 1600 ISO, Pocket Wizard remote trigger)

I also arranged for a security guard to bring me a chair to stand on right before midnight so I could shoot over the crowd during the balloon drop. It worked out well, except for the fact that the same security guard decided to stand right in front of me at the last second. It’s kind of odd to see one guy facing the wrong direction right in front of the stage.

(Nikon D3, 24-70, 1/500, F/2.8, 1600 ISO)

These photos and about a dozen others are available as prints at TourPhotographer.com. Click on any of the images to go directly to the gallery.

Have a happy, healthy, and prosperous new year!

They tell you to never look directly into the sun, right? Sometimes it’s fun to break the rules.

Last week I was on assignment shooting Shinedown at the Starland Ballroom in Sayreville, NJ. I had very little time to make a portrait, so I did a quick CYA shot and then moved the guys over to a couch in the corner.

At camera left, I put a big softbox with two SB-900 strobes on a dual-flash speed ring. Nothing too crazy there.

But then I took an SB-800 and placed it under the couch, pointing straight out at me. I set the light on manual at full power and used Pocket Wizards to trigger everything.

So, what happened? The softbox did exactly what it was supposed to do. It gave me nice, soft, light falling evenly across the frame. There’s a reflection off the texture on the wall at far right, but I kind of like it.

What about that little “sun” on the floor? It completely blew out (there is absolutely no detail in there) and even flared out over Brent’s leg.

This is a no-no in some photography circles, but I like the way it looks. It adds a bit of grunginess to the image.

I did my RAW conversion, basic toning, and vignetting in Aperture. Then I brought it into Photoshop to play with the color tone for the final result.

For the concert a few hours later, I did something similar. I put a blue-gelled SB-900 in the far corner near the back of the stage. I asked for permission from the tour manager and he said it was OK, but if it affected the band during the show I’d have to turn it off. No problem.

I got about 20 frames before the sound guy sitting near my light pushed it over. I asked him what happened and he said that the flash was bothering him.

Too bad. The images were looking pretty good despite the fact that, once again, I was shooting right into the strobe. All of the red light from the front is the club’s lighting while the blue in the back and on the ceiling is all coming from my strobe.

I would have liked to shoot the whole show like that, but I still made a few other nice frames after putting the flash away. I especially like this one in black and white.

Ideally, I’d like to have at least two strobes firing — one in the back and another one in the front. I’d put them off camera and out to the side so I don’t blind the band with every shot.

It’s OK to break the rules, but I still wouldn’t want the band looking directly into the sun. Or my strobe.

A couple of weeks ago, I took the subway down to Brooklyn to document the shooting of the music video for “Secret Valentine” by the band We The Kings.

It’s fun to be a “fly on the wall” and find little backstage moments when they happen.

It was really cold, but I went out on the balcony to make this shot from the outside looking in. FYI - you might be able to see in the left window that they were shooting with the super-cool RED camera.

The guys seemed to be having a great time, despite the fact that they had been shooting all day and were exhausted.

The final video went up today on the band’s myspace page.

Yesterday, I spent the day around town with the guys from Barenaked Ladies, who were in NYC for a couple of TV appearances.

In the morning, they were on “Live with Regis and Kelly,” where I snapped this shot of a cue card during sound check. It’s interesting seeing supermodel Heidi Klum’s name followed by the words “Barenaked Ladies.” I’ll let you write your own caption.

In the evening, we had some free time in a hotel room overlooking Bryant Park, where the guys watched the crowd gather for the upcoming show.

The band played “Elf’s Lament” and “Green Christmas” as featured performers in the Bryant Park Christmas tree lighting show.

Except for the fact that CBS couldn’t get the tree to light up when it was supposed to, the day went pretty well.

Thanks to my friends at Photoshelter, I created this slideshow with a dozen of my images from the day. You can embed the whole thing on your own site or blog by clicking the arrow in the bottom right corner and copying the embed code.

Recently, I had an assignment from Kerrang Magazine to shoot Lamb of God singer Randy Blythe recording in the studio. Sounds simple enough, right? The catch is that the studio was 280 miles away.

I packed two Nikon D3 bodies, three lenses, four SB-800 strobes, Pocket Wizard and Radiopopper wireless systems, two shoot-through umbrellas, and all of the necessary hardware into my Thinktank Airport Security roller bag.

I also brought my Domke F-400 sling bag with three lightweight stands, one low-profile stand and a large Chimera softbox. I usually have an idea of how I want to light each job in advance, but I bring extra gear in case the situation changes.

After returning the rental car from my shoot with Madina Lake the day before, I flew to Boston and then drove to the studio in Rochester, NH. Thank goodness for GPS, because the studio is pretty far away from civilization. Here’s a quick photo I shot with my iPhone.

When I arrived, I knocked on the door and called the studio number but got no response. After an hour of sitting in the car and emailing back and forth with the publicist in London, it turned out that someone was in the studio and just couldn’t hear the phone or door. He let me in, but Randy wasn’t there yet. I was told he was “on the way.”

Two hours later, Randy finally arrived. Apparently there was some miscommunication along the chain of photographer-magazine-publicist-management-studio-artist. I had hoped to spend at least a couple of hours shooting a portrait and the recording session, but since the last flight out of Boston was rapidly approaching, I had to switch to hurry-up mode.

Randy wasn’t feeling well but agreed to shoot a quick portrait outside. He wore the clothes that he arrived in and looked like rocker/hunter Ted Nugent. It was cold out, so I took him right outside the studio and shot 14 frames in 93 seconds using one wireless strobe with an umbrella. Normally, I’d want to work the session for a bit and shoot at least 100 frames, but it just wasn’t going to happen under the circumstances.

Back in the studio, I was amazed how quickly he was able to get into “screaming” mode as he worked with producer Josh Wilbur. I set up two wireless strobes - one with an umbrella in the front and the other with a blue gel in the back. Halfway through, I took the umbrella off and bounced the front light off the ceiling so it wouldn’t be so directional.

My original plan of casually shooting a few hundred frames during the session went out the window because I had very little time left at this point. I shot 59 frames in 11 minutes and 48 seconds.

After that, I packed up as quickly as I could, drove back to Boston, and flew home. I worked on the photos as soon as I got in and sent seven images to Kerrang before going to bed.

During the 15+ hour day, I took three Hertz shuttles and two Delta flights. I also spent four and a half hours driving and four hours sitting around waiting.

I only shot 73 frames in 13 minutes and 21 seconds, but I think I got what I needed. Kerrang published the outdoor portrait with the caption “Forest Grump.”

On Tuesday, I shot Madina Lake while they were working on their new album “Attics to Eden” in a recording studio in New Jersey.

It’s always a challenge to make a natural looking “in studio” shot because bands rarely record multiple instruments at the same time. Each of the parts are recorded at different times so we have to set up a shot of the guys surrounded by recording equipment to show they’re in the studio.

After getting that out of the way, I moved them into the large studio, where there’s a foosball table. I thought it would be a fun prop for a photo, but I had no idea that these guys are very competitive foosballers. I just let them go at it while I shot away.

At the end, I posed them for a more formal portrait. I would have liked to get my camera lower into the table so the wooden foosball men were more prominent, but I couldn’t fit the D3 and 14-24 in between the posts without taking apart the table. I didn’t think the studio manager would be too happy about that, so I made the best of it.

The goal of a shoot like this is to get a few different “looks” in a short amount of time. The guys were a pleasure to work with and everything went smoothly — as long as I didn’t try to take them away from the foosball table.