True, we have been a bit lax in getting our posts out to the site, due to 10 days of non stop shooting in Austin, Texas.
We want to give the behind the scenes info on what goes on at the hottest festival around, in our opinion, SXSW.
With 3 sections, somewhat overlapping, categories of seminars, screenings, performances and conversations, you can come to one city, Austin, Texas and get a full helping of Interactive, Film, and Music in a 10 day period.

There were keynotes from the CEO of Twitter and conversations about becoming a professional photographer.
That one we were very interested in, but the info fell a bit short. Designed as a conversation, only a few joined in.
On the plus side met a ton of photogs in the room.

You could learn how the latest social media apps could help your business, no matter what profession you were in.
And there were celebs screening new movies, panel discussions with the directors of Zombieland and Cloverfield, plus music.

Raphael Saadiq © Damon Webster

How about Smokey Robinson, Raphael Saadiq, Broken Bell and Cheap Trick? No?
Then maybe Citizen Cope, The Drums, She and Him, Dawes, and Hole is more to your liking.
The point is that you get immersed in so many things in short span of time, that your senses get filled, and for us, so do the memory cards.

And the portable darkroom was working all of the time:

Yep, we were shooting the whole time, and had some very good access, thanks to the SXSW festival press people.

Cheap Trick © Damon Webster

The first 3 songs in the pit in front of the stage, per performer was what the shooters were allowed.
Most of the time. Cheap Trick gave us one, and Smokey only two, but it helped you think fast and pick your spots.

Tigs © Damon Webster

The smaller venues had some incredible talent , as the lead singer of Chew Lips, Tigs, gave a sweaty performance to a packed house at Maggie Maes.
Most shooters used the same compliment of lenses: 24-70, 70-200, and some very wide variation on the low end.
When the stage was lit with red light though, we all knew it was gong to be some trouble getting the shot.
You either had to grin and bear it, or go B&W. We’re looking at some of that now.
It’s funny though; the bands come to SXSW to get press and noticed, when the red stage lights come on, the photography is worse than tough.
We were rocking a Nikon D3s for part of the festival, thanks to the people at Nikon.
What a machine. more on that later.

We’ll be going into depth later this week on some of the very cool shooters we met in the pits.
A camera comraderie to be sure.

We brought a lot of gear to try and review while on a 10 day shoot, and we quickly found out what was working and what wasn’t. More to come on all of that.
When you have one shot to photograph a legend like Smokey Robinson, you don’t want to guess on your gear.

Small note: photographed a rocker we had shot when we were very young. Tried to get a similar angle. Posting “then and now” later this week.

Thanks for hanging in, very sorry about the tardiness of the posts but it was 20 hour days for the whole time.
The last thing at the end of the night was to ingest, edit and post the photos and it was a great way to end every day.
Think we’ll do it again.