Hacking Photography - one Picture at a time
September 21st, 1979. Forty years ago, British rock photographer, Pennie Smith immortalized the destruction of a Fender P-Bass guitar by Paul Simonon of The Clash on the stage of The Palladium in New York City, on gorgeous B&W 35mm film.
Her soft-focus, grainy image with its blown-out highlights and development stains has been dubbed by numerous publications and music fans, “the Greatest Rock ‘n’ Roll Photograph of All-Time.”
Fifty years ago, half a million people gathered at Woodstock to celebrate peace and love. Photographer Henry Diltz was the official photographer of the historic event. He took thousands of photos at the festival, and to this day people ask him to use his images. In this marvelous short film, you can hear Diltz’s story and watch the iconic festival through his lens.
Light painting gives you plenty of possibilities to create colorful and trippy images. The team behind Wango Tango Music Festival wanted photos like this for its performers, so they invited Jason D. Page to help them turn their idea into reality. They had to work fast and managed to take 50 celebrity light painting portraits – each of them in a single take! Jason has shared some of these photos with us, along with the backstory of how they were made.
If you’re an avid concert goer and a photographer, you may want to bring your two passions together. And if this is the case, Rachel and Daniel of Mango Street have a perfect video for you. In about four minutes, they give you plenty of tips to get you started with concert photography. And it’s not just about gear and shooting – but also about getting the pass and editing the photos after you bring them home.
Gear Acquisition Syndrome (or G.A.S.) is real, and we know it, right? No matter if you’re trying to fight yours or you have embraced it, Taylor Jackson now has a fun song for all the gear maniacs out there. Try not having it stuck in your head!
I love creative music videos and stop-motion movies, and we’ve featured quite a lot of both here on DIYP. Still, it looks like directors always find new ways to amaze us. The video for a song UnAmerican by Said The Whale brings music, creativity, and stop-motion together in a fantastic way. It seems like it was made with visual effects, but no – there are no effects whatsoever. The video was made using only physical, printed photos. Over 2,000 of them!
Rock en Seine is one of the main music festivals in France. This August, photographer Pierre-Louis Ferrer was invited to cover the 16th edition of the event. There was no dictated theme: the photographer had complete freedom to give his vision of the festival. He chose to stay true to his usual photographic style, so he shot the festival’s atmosphere in infrared. As a result, he created unique, funky, and even eerie festival images we don’t get to see every day.
Filmstro is something of a unique service when it comes to music. With plugins for both Premiere Pro and Final Cut Pro, you can pick your music and then use sliders to adjust the momentum, depth and power of that music throughout your clip. You can adjust any tune to match the mood of your scene as it changes from shot to shot.
But they have static versions of all their Royalty Free music, too, and they’ve just released them to the world for free for use on YouTube. Even if your video is monetised.
If you’re in search of sound effects, here’s something great coming from the BBC. Their library of more than 16,000 sound effects is now available, and you can download anything you like for free.
Other than having a good microphone to pick up voices, sound is something that new filmmakers often ignore. But sound is easily as important as the visual, if not more so, when it comes to video production. Sound sets the mood and tone for the video as a whole, or for individual scenes. It can create tension and excitement. Or, it can make the viewer feel comfortable and relaxed.
In this video, young filmmaker and YouTuber Rory Marion talks us through some of his tips and tricks for the sound design process. It begins with selecting music and adding audio effects to enhance the visual. At only 14, Rory may still be young, but he has some good insight and a promising future.
You can find out more about John on his website and follow his adventures on YouTube and Facebook.
can change a lens mid-rappel, swap a memory card while treading water, or use a camel as a light stand.
To see more of his work please visit his studio website blurMEDIAphotography, or follow him on Twitter, 500px, Google Plus or YouTube.
JP’s photography is available for licensing at Stocksy United.
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