Today, after a game of Squash with Jan, we decided to check out Vlado Kreslin, who played in the city center. A switch of my racquet with my Nikon, and we were off. I expected to take a shot or two from a distance. But when we got there I went to the security guards, and managed to convince them to let me in for a song.

I like a couple of other photos, but this one, to me, really stands out so I’m posting only this one.

Aside from the concert, I also took a quick, handheld picture of Čopova. ISO 800, 70 mm, F 2.8 @ 1/20s, VR on.

Although I’ve posted the Magnifico concert first, I’ve actually covered Prljavo Kazalište first, but I haven’t had the chance to post it on my blog. Those of you reading e-Delo could have already read my report.

I’ve recently discovered Prljavo Kazalište and their music, and I really like it. My personal analogy was that they are a balkan reincarnation of Dire Straits :-). The lights were terrible again, with very little frontal light. There was no room beneath the stage, so we had to photograph in the crowd, which, at the sold out venue that is Cvetličarna, was a bit hard.

Yesterday, Magnifico performed in Hala Tivoli, in Ljubljana. Magnifico really managed to shock the general public after having handed out 100.000 copies of his new CD along with Delo. Anyway, the concert was great, Magnifico and the boys really know how to throw a party :-). But, what I didn’t like was the crowd under the stage. Having all of Slovenia’s metrosexuals in a crowded space leads to confusion and loss of common sense it seems :-). Anyway, here are a few pictures.

You can also read my report here. Comments appreciated.

I promised more photos from Neža’s session. Aside from the promised portraits I’ve also found some more pics I like with, the classic ballet poses.

Now, as for the portraits, I tried using counter-light a little bit, but apart from that, I just wanted to experiment a little bit with two flashes.

I’ve also played around in Photoshop a little bit and came up with this:

What do you guys and girls think? I’d really like to hear comments, specially for the last series of pictures — is it too much?

I had this idea in my head for a long time… It involved a tutu, and an abandoned building with large windows. I’ve been inside Tovarna Rog once, and I wanted it to be my location. However, to shoot inside, usually, you need permission from the municipality. And I must say that the people I dealt with (Kristina Novak, and Jerneja Batič) were extremely helpful and friendly. Anyway, once I got the permissions, I wanted to get a little bit of extra help… this involved one borrowed SB-800 (tnx Jan), one make-up artist (tnx Anja), a reflector (tnx Samo), an assistant (tnx Urša) and a ballerina (tnx Neža :-)).

So, here are the photos… I did two separate series, and I’ll post the other one later this week.

Comments are greatly appreciated.

Most of you probably saw it, and I hope those of you with better views than mine also took a picture. But the light was amazing. Orangy-blue, warm and mysterious…. Very nice… A quick snapshot:

 A couple of weeks ago, a friend of mine invited me to “help out” with a session with his friend, Urška. It was more of an improv session, so no special ideas from my side. I did howewer get to play with a reflector screen (thanks Samo). So my obvious choice were a few of to the sun shots.

I divided them into two series, a bit more “urban” trying to go with the effect I like the most, which is a little extreme saturation and black increase, and the sun shots :).

I LIKE THE SUN, I NEED THE SUN.

 But untill then, another SB-800/600 will do just fine =).

All in all, it was a really fun experience, and I’d love to repeat it one day, with a bit more ideas in mind, now that I know the model ;-).

So, after getting some sleep, going to work, and driving home for 1 hour due to the traffic jams around Ljubljana I finally started writing my “report” from yesterday’s concert. My Delo report is available here. By tomorrow I also hope to give another reference but I’ll see what happenes there.

I went to this concert with very low expectations. I admit, I’m not a fan of Severina. I know her from more than just her “home movie” but I’ve never liked listening to this type of music too much. This was topped with complications with acreditation getting lost in the mail (I recieved an empty envelope!!).

I decided early on that I will try and do as much as possible with my 50 mm f/1.8 lens. And I did. Obviously, I did use my 18-200 for a vfew closeups and a wide shot of the public from the balcony.

Anyway, Severina, along with her guests, performed for alkmost 2 hours and a half, and the show was amazing. Maybe I wasn’t as impressed with music as I was with the performance aspect of the concert. This includes the durations, lighting, coreography, guests, spots in between bunches of songs etc.

As for the pictures… I’m actually quite happy as I mentioned in my previous post. I hope that those of you reading my blog are happy with them as well, and as usual I would appriciate any critique.

What I did notice however, is that I like the portait orientation when shooting solo artists. Do you think this is good or bad?

I’m still excited about the events that took place during the concert (more about this tomorrow). I must admit that the concert surprised me in a positive way as far as perfomance goes but not so positively about organization (we had 30 seconds to take pics of Luka Nižetić and Klapa Nostalgija). But it’s a challange. Anyway, because I really, really, need some sleep right now, here’s a teaser of what I’ll be posting tomorrow.

I’m really satisfied with the pictures I’ve took, and I think it has something to do with me using my 50 mm F/1.8 most of the time… Well, I’ll wait until comments tomorrow and decide if the pictures are really any good. I think the above one is the only one I took with 18-200.

Have fun ;-).