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.

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.

In between football games, I spent a week in Miami Beach at Best Buy’s “convergence summit.” It’s a retreat for some of the company’s top employees and I was brought in by Blue Pixel, a group of digital photography experts. They organized some fun events including a video commercial production contest, green screen karaoke, and technology presentations by photographers like me.

I’ve worked Best Buy events in the past and they are a lot of fun. It’s a nice change of pace from my usual shooting schedule and is always in a great locale.

Most of the time I was either speaking with small groups or helping teams with their video projects.

We did have some time to relax, though. One night there were about 50 of us hanging out on the beach around midnight. It was dark. The beach was lit only by moonlight. I took some photos of home theater supervisor Stephanie Radtke near the water, but it needed a little punch. I asked Blue Pixel president Alex Stevens to hold my small flashlight.

It gave just enough pop to light up her portrait.

I shot the photo with the D3 and 14-24 at 6400 ASA, 1/15 sec, and F/2.8.

At the end of the week, we were treated to a private concert by Ludacris. There were a lot of cell phone cameras, but I had the only “real” camera in the room.

It’s a good thing that the light was so good in the Jackie Gleason Theater. Otherwise, I would have had to pull out my flashlight.

I recently had my first three-peat for Kerrang Magazine. It’s the third time I’ve been assigned to photograph innerpartysystem.

The first two shoots were portraits (see them here and here), but this time I went on the road with them to do a day-in-the-life type shoot.

We started in New York City where the guys had interviews at MTV and FUSE. Then it was five hours or so in the van to Boston. It was snug in there, but they were nice enough to make room for the writer and me.

The most interesting photos I made were taken as the guys loaded their gear into the club in Boston. There was a narrow alley that led to the back door and it was lit by a single flood light. It created a long shadow so I shot a bunch of frames as they came in and out of the doorway.

This isn’t one of the images I sent to the magazine because the guy in the back is the writer. But I like the mysterious feel of it and the flare coming over the lead singer’s shoulder.

I shot it using available light with the Nikon D3 and the 14-24 mm lens. I cranked my ISO to 3200, dropped my shutter to 1/30 and opened my aperture up to 2.8. There’s enough light bouncing around off the walls so I still get a little bit of fill on their faces.

The band travels with lights for the back of the stage, but none for the front. Club lighting is traditionally horrible, so this created another back lit situation. In this case, I decided to pop in a little bit of fill flash to compensate.

We were all pretty tired at the end of the day, but we managed to make it to our hotel in Boston. As I checked in, two of the guys were still passed out in the van.

I’m not sure if they left them there or not.

I spent all day Saturday in the hot sticky mess that is known as the 2008 Warped Tour, where crowd surfing is the most popular attraction.

There were 103 bands playing on 12 stages in the Nassau Coliseum parking lot. I bought quite a few $6 Gatorades throughout the day.

I had a few minutes to do portraits with All That Remains. With limited location options, I put them in between some tour buses and shot from a low angle. The sun was directly overhead, so I put a couple of Nikon SB800 strobes inside of a large Chimera softbox using a two-flash speed ring. Some toning in Photoshop completed the look.

After the portrait session, I shot the band in concert. It was a hair-raising experience.

I also shot a bit from the stage, which usually makes for a decent photo.