Photography

Photo Credit Jay Douglass

Doing something creative is good for the soul. At least it is for me. Creative outlets in my life have included writing (poetry, short stories, political commentary) and photography. My output of poetry and prose has declined the last few years, crowded out by political commentary, but my photographic endeavors have expanded. I started out with a point-and-shoot about 12 years ago and have upgraded a few times - but it's really the eye of the photographer that makes a good photo. Good equipment and editing software helps, but you can have the world's most expensive camera and still take crappy pictures.

I started taking photos at The Zoo Bar sometime in 2008 at a Chris Duarte Group show. I had been a CDG regular for several years and had come across a Fan Club website that encouraged reviews and pictures from the various concerts. I sent in a review and was told by the site administrator that someone else had submitted some photos of the same show. I was impressed with the quality of the image, which inspired me to start taking my camera to shows and submitting pictures to the Fan Club. My initial attempts were pretty horrible. Initially I wasn't aware of the "no flash" guidelines, and have some old shots of musicians glaring at me as I blinded them. My first camera had a few settings like "night", "cloudy" etc, so once I was cured of using a flash, the only setting that would result in any kind of image was the "night" setting, which defaulted to a wide aperture and slow shutter speed. This often resulted in a blur caused by movement. This could look really cool, or really awful! Eventually I upgraded to a camera where I could tailor the settings to the ambient lighting and the quality of my photos began to improve.

The biggest thing that has helped me improve my technical skills has been shooting in the inconsistent lighting of The Zoo Bar. For years, one of the issues for photography there has been the lights. Often one of the spotlights would be burned out, causing one part of the stage to be in deep shadow while other parts were well lit. A new lighting system has recently been installed, with movable spotlights, lighting effects and variable colors. Unfortunately for me and other photographers, there are still dark spots on stage and red lighting gets used a lot. This may look cool to everyone else, but red lighting makes for really bad photos! Without getting into technical and editing fixes, suffice it to say that continually trying different settings and listening to advice from other, more experienced photographers has helped greatly. Specific feedback from people who knew what they were talking about has been the single greatest contributor to improvement.

While I don't limit my photography to The Zoo Bar, the photos that I have taken of the shows there and at the annual Zoofest in July have gotten the most attention. In addition to affording me an opportunity to get better, I have met a lot of great people over the years as a result of my Zoo photography, Zoo Bar patrons, as well as musicians from all over the country, many of whom I have stayed in contact with after meeting them on break or out back for an "alley shot". Since I usually keep to myself at shows, I get a kick out of someone asking "Are you Tom Joyce?" when they see me with my camera!

What I try to accomplish, whether at the bar, on a Lincoln street or out in the corn fields is not to just snap a generic picture that says "Look, I was at the Dave Alvin show", or "This is a sunrise", but to find something about the image that says "This is pretty cool". A friend of mine referred to it as "editorial photography". A lot of my band photos are close ups of a guitarist's face during a solo, or a black and white image partly in shadow. Shots from behind the stage are something that is easy to do at The Zoo, and of course there's the famous "alley shots".

Photography has been fun for me over the years. Thanks to all who have encouraged me and have given me feedback and helpful tips. I look forward to another year of broken down houses, alley shots, grain elevators, and fighting funky lighting!