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Justin and I are on a mini-vacation this week. Why is it mini? Well first of all we are insanely busy with work so I really must keep up on things, however we’ve been taking some time over the last couple weeks to attend a few of Pearl Jam’s most recent Canadian shows for their PJ20 tour (the tour is named PJ20 as this year is Pearl Jam’s 20th anniversary).
To give you a little background on these images, Justin is a huge Pearl Jam fan and has been a member of their fanclub for years. Pearl Jam’s fanclub is called The Ten Club, and members buy tickets to each show, and then are assigned tickets based on seniority. Those members who joined earlier get better tickets – pretty cool, eh? Even cooler is that no matter when you joined, all members have a chance to win what the Ten Club calls the “Lottery”. Basically the first, second and 10th rows are raffled off lottery style, so everyone always has a chance of winning the best tickets.
WELL, we certainly got VERY lucky because Justin’s tickets for the first Toronto show on September 11th at the Air Canada Centre ended up being first row, centre! We were completely shocked and not to mention excited! Luckily Pearl Jam is very cool about their fans taking photos with point and shoot cameras, and thank god I had brought along my Canon G11 point & shoot camera to the show! I ended up with some great shots that I’d like to share with you below.
The show was incredible (Eddie pointed me out and threw me a pick! SO COOL! Sorry to sound like a fan girl but when Eddie Vedder singles you out and throws you a pick you feel special, haha). The night got even more incredible when during the final song of the last encore, Neil Young himself joined Pearl Jam on-stage to jam and sing his classic hit ‘Rockin’ in the Free World’! Amazing! And since this was highly anticipated, it was even more amazing to be front row centre for such a moment. It was actually quite funny because guitarist Mike McCready walked over to the side of the stage and handed Neil a guitar, then he joined them on-stage and Eddie seemed genuinely surprised – which I managed to catch in the images below!
Big thanks goes out to Pearl Jam and Neil Young for an amazing night – we’ll never forget such a fantastic show!
Cheers,
Lisa & Justin
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10 comments
Tara - Very cool! What a dream… Fantastic shots too! It’s like you’re a pro or something
Selin - Thanks so much for sharing your photos. I wasn’t at the Toronto gigs but did Calgary, Edmonton and Vancouver. Certainly understand the feeling
ed - Hi Lisa, Can you tell me what your settings were on the G11? I have the same camera but have not been able to get the same quality shooting at concerts. Perhaps being close gave you more light but curious if you could share how you got these great shots?
admin - Hi Ed,
For the Neil Young portion of images it has mostly to do with the fact that during the last few songs of the night Pearl Jam always turns the house lights up almost all the way, which makes for a well-lit stage (not something that happens often at shows). Also, for the rest of the show we’re dealing with a major arena show at the Air Canada Centre. Any large arena has very powerful stage lights, better than clubs, etc. so you’ll always get better light there.
It’s really a case of waiting for the brightest lighting to happen on-stage and shooting many exposures to ensure the sharpest and best exposure possible. I had a LOT of images I didn’t use or keep as they weren’t great but the great ones are posted here. There is naturally a lot more trial and error when it comes to shooting a concert with a point & shoot VS a DSLR camera.
If memory serves, I shot most of these images at 400 ISO, at multiple shutter speeds and the lowest aperture possible at whatever zoom I was using at the time. I think my fastest shutter speeds were over 350/sec. during Neil Young.
I hope that helps!
Cheers,
Lisa
ed - Thanks for responding. I figured the house lights must have been on by the look of the performers. I have brought my P&S into a few concerts but have not had the greatest luck even being in front rows at small and large venues. Trying to capture a performer in dramatic light is very difficult especially when they are moving around. Keep up the great work Lisa!
monte holmquist - lisa…ironically, i was suppose to be at both Toronto shows and had pearl jam club seats as well…but due to friends work layoff we didn’t go and will have to catch them another time…would have been a fun trip for two guys from Nebraska…anyways, love the photos of Eddie and was wondering if any are available for purchase? would love to blow up to 24×36 size to have it framed for my home…let me know and thanks for reading…-monte
admin - Hi Monte, Thanks for your comment! Unfortunately I don’t have the rights to sell these images so although I’ve been asked many times I must decline to respect Pearl Jam’s intellectual rights. Hope you enjoy the photos!
Cheers, Lisa
joanna johnson - Hi Lisa,
These are just awesome. I’m an administrator of Jeff Ament’s Army, a division of the Wishlist Foundation. I’m wondering if I can post a link to these photos on our Facebook wall. A lot of our people would love to see these.
Joanna
admin - Hi Joanna,
Thanks so much for your comment! I’d be happy to have you share these on the wall. Please include my photo credit and website link to any posted images
Cheers,
Lisa
joanna johnson - Absolutely, I will post your link. You’ll get a lot of traffic, I’m sure! Thanks again–these are just terrific. And come on over to Jeff Ament’s Army. It’s a great community of PJ fans.
Thanks.