I remember going to a concert back around 2001 when camera phones were pretty new, and event staff were forcing guests to return to the parking lot and leave their phones in their cars. Times have changed though, and while it is still a challenge to get a large camera like a DSLR into a concert, small cameras are now ubiquitous in live music audiences. Especially in the past year or two I have noticed security guards just don’t seem to care about compact cameras anymore. And why should they? Virtually everyone has a camera phone, and compact point & shoot cameras are incredibly small. What are they going to do, force every attendee to empty their pockets? Besides, fans sharing concert photos online is great (and free) press.

So now that we can usually bring a compact digital camera into most concerts without a hassle, how do you take better concert photos? This piece is inspired by a couple of music fans I met last night at a concert in Central Park who were struggling to get a good photo of the band — we had been chatting all night, so I offered them a few pointers and they were able to drastically improve the quality of their concert photos. This article contains the advice I offered.

Before I get into the details, here are the results possible using these tips. First, here is a photo of my vantage point at the concert:

Here are two photos of the band that I took from the exact same spot:

There was no expensive camera, and no fancy lenses and no Photoshop involved here. Just a small point & shoot Canon Powershot SD880 IS and the techniques I describe below. Here is how I took these photos, and what I taught my fellow fans:

Turn off the flash

Light from a camera flash falls off over distance. The inverse square law explains how this works with a bit of math, but basically what you need to know is that the light from the tiny little flash on your camera is not going to make it as far as the stage to light up the performers. It is useless. The only thing your camera’s flash will do is light up the head of the person in front of you. Turn it off.

Use exposure compensation

Here is a mantra I learned from renowned wedding photographer Cliff Mautner: what matters is the quality of light, not the quantity. Yes you are in a big, dark stadium or amphitheater, or perhaps outdoors at night. The house lights are dim and you can’t see the people around you very well. But who cares? You aren’t photographing them. You are photographing the band, who is on a stage lit up by expensive lighting gear controlled by skilled lighting professionals. There isn’t much light around, but what light is present is probably of a very high quality.

The fact that you are in a big dark open space is going to throw off your camera, confuse it, and trick it into trying to make the scene really, really bright. You do not want this to happen because the camera will end up keeping the shutter open for a long time in order to gather as much light as possible, which will cause your photos to turn out blurry. To counteract this you must adjust the exposure compensation — instruct the camera to make the scene darker.

Various cameras control this setting differently. Some call it “EV”, some call it “Brightness”, others by its full name “Exposure Compensation”. The common factor is usually a number line that goes from -2 to +2. By default your camera will be set in the middle of the number line at 0. Turn this setting down, perhaps to -1, take a few shots and see how they look. If you are still getting blur, go down even further towards -2. The features of the arena that are in darkness will come out black, but the band on stage probably be lit up well — try to zoom in and fill the frame with the band.

Use high ISO

Low light photography, such as concerts, is often high ISO territory. By turning up the ISO setting, you make your camera more sensitive to light. Since more light can be gathered at once, the shutter speed can be faster and therefore blur is minimized.

ISO is measured in numbers, with lower numbers corresponding to less sensitivity, and higher numbers corresponding to higher sensitivity. Turn the ISO up to a high setting to gather as much light as possible… perhaps in the range of 400, 800, or even 1600+. Some cameras will let you manually select these numbers, while others might have just a simple “High ISO” or “High Sensitivity” setting. If you cannot find either of those, look for a scene preset with a name along the lines of “low light without flash”.

There is a trade-off with high ISO: grain. Photos taken at high ISO settings appear grainy and their lose sharpness. In general this is not a desirable effect. Some cameras do a better job than others of controlling grain at high ISO. You should experiment with your camera in these shooting modes to determine the highest sensitivity level at which you are still comfortable with the image quality so you know which settings to choose at a concert.

As new cameras are invented, their high ISO image quality gets better, but nothing is perfect (yet?). I always say though, I would rather have a grainy photo than no photo at all.

Control your posture

In low light concert photography, your body movement has a direct negative impact on your picture quality. As your body sways and hands tremble with the camera is exposing the shot, blur is introduced to the photo. To counteract this effect you must adopt a good photography posture and control your body movement:

• Hold the camera with both hands.
• Steady it against the palm of your hand or a stationary object such as a wall.
• Don’t hold the camera far out in front of you — bring it in close.
• Tuck in your elbows close to your chest and keep your arms steady.
• Take a deep breath in, breathe out, hold your breath and squeeze the shutter.

Notice I said squeeze the shutter. Tapping the shutter button nonchalantly moves the camera. A camera that moves takes a blurry photo. Hold the camera tight in both hands and gently squeeze the shutter button to keep the camera steady.

Take lots of frames

Thankfully digital cameras are not limited to just a few frames on a roll of film. Take advantage of the fact that you can fire away for free as long as your memory card has space. Don’t intend on keeping every single frame. Rather, take many frames of the same photo to increase the probability that at least one will come out sharp. When you get home you can sort through a mountain of images and keep the best ones.