Need advice for a shooting scenario please: Scenario: Dark auditorium, well lit stage, no flash allowed, shooting with a Nikon D7100 with a 70-200mm f2.8 lens. If I raise my ISO to say...

Pepper Loc: Planet Earth Country USA

Scenario: Dark auditorium, well lit stage, no flash allowed, shooting with a Nikon D7100 with a 70-200mm f2.8 lens. If I raise my ISO to say 600 and open my aperture to 2.8 3.5 this would allow for a faster shutter speed, correct?

Annie_Girl Loc: It's none of your business

Pepper wrote:

Scenario: Dark auditorium, well lit stage, no flash allowed, shooting with a Nikon D7100 with a 70-200mm f2.8 lens. If I raise my ISO to say 600 and open my aperture to 2.8 3.5 this would allow for a faster shutter speed, correct?

It should, but of course that depends on the amount of and quality of light the stage lighting is casting but typically I don't have any issues with these settigs when I am doing concert photography, my shutter speed hovers around 1/60 to 1/200. This is one place I switch to shutter priority over manual or aperture priority. I do set my ISO to around 800.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Pepper wrote:

Scenario: Dark auditorium, well lit stage, no flash allowed, shooting with a Nikon D7100 with a 70-200mm f2.8 lens. If I raise my ISO to say 600 and open my aperture to 2.8 3.5 this would allow for a faster shutter speed, correct?

Tripod? Test shots before the show starts?

robert-photos Loc: Chicago

Pepper wrote:

Scenario: Dark auditorium, well lit stage, no flash allowed, shooting with a Nikon D7100 with a 70-200mm f2.8 lens. If I raise my ISO to say 600 and open my aperture to 2.8 3.5 this would allow for a faster shutter speed, correct?

I would shot my first couple of photos at ISO 1600 and at aperture priority, setting the aperture for my desired depth of field. I'd check my resultant shutter speed and adjust my ISO from there. I prefer to shoot at f/4 on my 2.8 because it is sharper there.

Stage lighting often varies so you have to take that into consideration.

Pepper Loc: Planet Earth Country USA

Thanks guys, this will be the first time I shot anything under these conditions so I'll have some fun experimenting.

tramsey Loc: Texas

Let us know what settings you settled on and post some photos Good luck

CurreyPhoto Loc: Reddick, Florida

Pepper wrote:

Scenario: Dark auditorium, well lit stage, no flash allowed, shooting with a Nikon D7100 with a 70-200mm f2.8 lens. If I raise my ISO to say 600 and open my aperture to 2.8 3.5 this would allow for a faster shutter speed, correct?

The folks above give good advice, And point out some of the potential pitfalls, but dont worry. You have a great camera and lens. Your camera also has a light meter and it can be set to spot meter and further, the area of the spot being metered can be narrowed so that it is possible to meter from just the illuminated part of the stage, avoiding the darker areas of the stage. I would set the meter to as small a spot as possible, use the center spot for focus, set the lens to f2.8, set the ISO to as high as you can tolerate and see what the shutter speed turns out to be. If it turns out to be 1/500th of a second or faster, then play with lowering the ISO and upping the f-stop number. If the action on the stage is slow I would let the shutter get as low as 1/250th of a second. Let the ISO get as low as possible. One of the posters suggested a tripod. That is frequently not possible in an auditorium, but maybe a monopod? Good luck with your shoot, let us see some of the results and maybe we can help to get a better result the next time.

Pepper Loc: Planet Earth Country USA

Thanks to all for your responses I REALLY appreciate you taking time to offer your assistance.
Pepper

buckwheat Loc: Clarkdale, AZ and Belen NM

I also recommend you turn off the focus assist light or else use manual focus. That light will hit the stage just like a strobe light. (I know because I got yelled at one time.)

Pepper Loc: Planet Earth Country USA

buckwheat wrote:

I also recommend you turn off the focus assist light or else use manual focus. That light will hit the stage just like a strobe light. (I know because I got yelled at one time.)

Good point hadn't even considered that.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

buckwheat wrote:

I also recommend you turn off the focus assist light or else use manual focus. That light will hit the stage just like a strobe light. (I know because I got yelled at one time.)

Great idea! It seems that when you need that the most, you really have to turn it off, as in a performance in a darkened room. It can be super distracting to anyone in the line of that beam.

BHC Loc: Strawberry Valley, JF, USA

The scene sounds like an EV7. As ISO 400 and f/2.8, you can shoot at 1/60; at ISO 800, increase speed to 1/125. If the stage is really bright, try 1/250 at ISO 800.

dubach

dont forget to shoot in raw also

Gary Truchelut Loc: Coldspring, TX

You might set ISO to auto in Manual mode and then set the desired f stop and shutter speed. Take a reading to see what the ISO will be and if youre satisfied with it's range, leave it on auto. This way if lighting changes the ISO will change with it. Your metering mode may need to be set for center weighted or spot as well to get the desired subject exposed correctly.

robert-photos Loc: Chicago

Gary Truchelut wrote:

You might set ISO to auto in Manual mode and then set the desired f stop and shutter speed. Take a reading to see what the ISO will be and if youre satisfied with it's range, leave it on auto. This way if lighting changes the ISO will change with it. Your metering mode may need to be set for center weighted or spot as well to get the desired subject exposed correctly.

If you use auto ISO then batch processing with noise reduction software such as Topaz DeNoise is not possible.

Auto white balance and auto ISO have their downsides in that it makes batch processing (white balance and noise reduction) in ACR, LR, or PS difficult, if not impossible.