What Do You Have for Gear?

I do own a digital camera, but I don't use it for this.  In my humble opinion, if you want to shoot rock, there's no substitute for film.  Digital also can't seem to handle the distortion around bright lights.  For ambient light and bounce-flash shots, I use my Canon A1 on a monopod with 1600ASA film.  For fill-flash or flash shots, I use my Canon Elan IIe with 400-1600ASA film.  In general, I use color negative film.  Some shots, usually using heavy flash, are intended to be converted to black and white after scanning.  I have several lenses suitable for low-light photography.

Film is processed and printed at a little photo shop in Palatine called Flash Photo.  They do great work.  Prints (4" X 6") are scanned at 300 dpi.  This resolution is suitable for printing at up to 8" X 10", flyers, or CD artwork, and more than adequate for website use.  Higher resolutions are available.  My new scanner is a Canon 8400F which is capable of 3200 X 6400 resolution.  It also does a good job of negative scanning.

After scanning, I use ArcSoft PhotoStudio or Adobe PhotoShop Elements 2.0 for minor balance tweaks after scanning.  Both programs also contain various filters or special effects which sometime produce cool stylized or abstracted images.  Sometimes, a blurred or poorly exposed shot can be turned into something really cool with the right editing.

What Do I Get?

Depends upon what you want.  Generally, I provide a proof sheet showing the best photos, computer-printed 8"X10"s of a couple of my favorites, and a CD containing Bitmap images of any prints I'm happy with.  If I shoot 2 rolls of 24, you'll probably get about 35 pictures.  Unfortunately, this is heavily dependent upon the lighting at the gig and what the light guy is doing. 

I'll usually play around with photo-edits on a few shots, as well.  Requests for "real" prints or photo-enlargements are no problem, they just cost more...

Speaking of Cost...

To date, most of my work has been done for free or at cost for friends or acquaintances.  I'm aware of the financial status of most of the bands out there.  Lucky for you, I'm not looking to make a lot of money doing this, but I'd like to cover my expenses (which now include web-site hosting).  If you like my work and you're playing a gig with decent lighting, we can probably work something out.

How Do I Contact You?

Just click HERE and e-mail me.