1. I TURN MY CAMERA ON Concert Photography and Music Journalism Maria T Sciarrino | Dept. of Broadcasting, Telecommunications & Mass Media | Temple University

3. Photographs of rock’n’roll music concerts are used as documents of live events, in addition to traditional written accounts.

4. Photographs of rock’n’roll music concerts are used as documents of live events, in addition to traditional written accounts. Despite the reliance upon these constructed images as “news” within the music press, currently there is no literature explaining how these images are made or why they are used.

5. Photographs of rock’n’roll music concerts are used as documents of live events, in addition to traditional written accounts. Despite the reliance upon these constructed images as “news” within the music press, currently there is no literature explaining how these images are made or why they are used. This presentation seeks to explore the production methods and selection processes of concert photographs in order to understand the role of photography in the music press.

7. The inclusion of photographs suggests they are useful, but given the array of complex meanings attached to them, concert photographs may complicate notions of journalistic objectivity.

8. The inclusion of photographs suggests they are useful, but given the array of complex meanings attached to them, concert photographs may complicate notions of journalistic objectivity. These issues are crucial for music journalists to consider, especially as print publications close and the music press shifts to online outlets capable of generating news almost 24/7.

10. I conducted a small study in November/December 2008 to understand the production of concert photos and their role in the music press. I interviewed 2 freelance photographers, in addition to 2 editors at music publications through email, using semi-structured questionnaires.

11. I conducted a small study in November/December 2008 to understand the production of concert photos and their role in the music press. I interviewed 2 freelance photographers, in addition to 2 editors at music publications through email, using semi-structured questionnaires. For this study, I was previously acquainted with all the informants prior to this paper through my own experience as a freelance music critic and photographer, and have previously contributed to the publications mentioned here.

12. PARTICIPANTS * Photographers: Mimi & Bradford Editors: Hannah & Kathleen * The names have been changed.

14. “ There are pros and cons of each [venue]. Mostly the small/DIY venues will let you photograph the whole show, no restrictions.... but it can also be harder to get good composition in the shot: either you're right up close (and then you can only really get headshots) or you're not too close (and then you get half the crowd's heads in the shot). At larger venues (particularly larger artists), you get tons more restrictions: 3 songs, no flash, you can only stand in X spot, etc.”

15. “ Sometimes you're even asked to sign an extremely limiting contract. I've never had to do this, but these can ask you to sign off all your rights to your photographs, or guarantee that your images will only be published in X publication on Y date – which is a commitment that most freelancers can't make on behalf of their publication!”

17. “ Absolutely no one, myself included, likes the pushy, arrogant, too-cool photographer who acts as if they have more of a right to be there than anyone else. As long as you respect the fans, the band, the security, the venue personnel, and everyone else, they’ll respect you and understand the job that you are there to do.”

18. “ A photo can be even more removed from [the] actual experience because there’s no sound to go with it, and you might capture a moment that runs counter to the energy and feel of the performance. So it’s a huge challenge, but it’s fun to try to represent what the event was like to someone who wasn’t there.” “ [I]n a way, I’m trying to put myself in the artist’s shoes and see the show their eyes, and capture that.”

20. “ I do a couple of passes in my self-editing: first I toss out everything that's unacceptable: out-of-focus, uninteresting, you can't see their face, etc. Then, I try to group them into categories: if I have 6 shots of the singer screaming, and 3 are full-body while 3 are just face shots, I'll try to pick the best of each, and what I look for are things that matter to me: Is his mouth blocked by the mic? are his eyes open? Are there other band members in the picture, and if so, are they adding something to the image or are they distracting? Once I have what I consider the "best" of every group, then I do my final pass which really depends on what the publication needs.”

21. “ [M]any times you see technically perfect shots that, artistically speaking, are a bore. Those don’t do much for me. I’d rather capture a mood well and have the shot be a little blurry or maybe have part of a hand cropped off than get everything technically sound but have it just be some blah, ordinary photograph.”

22. “ I know concert photographers [who] will edit the content of the shot – [such as] removing a mic stand because it makes the image ‘look better’. I think that's absolutely wrong, unethical, and completely misrepresents the performance, particularly if the image is going to be used in a journalistic context.”

23. “ The input I typically give is in the photos that I submit to the publication. In general, I submit only those images that I would be happy to see on the pages of that publication.” “ I’m usually fine with whichever one they select because I like all the ones I’ve sent over… No editors ever talk to me or make suggestions about style things and so forth – they know and understand and like the work I do, so I’m free to do whatever.”

25. “ If we're using concert photos in a news story, it is because something interesting happened at the show. Something newsworthy. So the writing will describe what happened, and the photos will be inserted accordingly. I want the artist to be in interesting poses, something that conveys their personality. Generally, I find that the best photos are the most exciting, where something out of the ordinary or special is happening.”

26. “ Working with concert lighting is very difficult so an understanding of how to deal with that is important [for the photographer]. Also, I think being aggressive and mobile leads to excellent live photos.”

27. “… it has to be an artist our audience is really interested in, and it has to be someone we haven't already run a bunch of photos from recently (exceptions being Radiohead, Arcade Fire, Sufjan…) And the images have to be clear. Also, we favor horizontally-oriented photos over vertically-oriented ones, due to the [publication].”

29. While photographers have the freedom to render their assignments any way they choose, in practice, they do not due to the limitations placed upon them by the technologies involved and the tacit knowledge that an editor will go with the more traditional image. The style of concert photographs are socially determined by technology, the division of labor, and the demands of the music press. Overall, these findings suggest, as Barbara Rosenblum (1978) “a variety of institutional and organizational constraints act in concert to steer photographers to take pictures that conform to an idealized version of” a live performance.

30. Source: http://tr.im/lilyallenbv