FANS.com audience cameras too "obtrusive" ...

sounds awful. Sorry you had to deal with that. 
 

There's something to how the best photographers move like cats when they work and usually unless you actually spoke with the person you never even knew they were there until you see the photos published. They photograph everything right up close and personal, but hardly ever even leave a footprint. 

FOM - you're being too nice. Sounds like the guy was an unprofessional dickhead.

While it's nice to see what the venue looks like from the band's perspective, I don't want to see closeups of fans in the stands, or worse, fans dancing in their living rooms.

Enough with all the cameras already.

While it's nice to see what the venue looks like from the band's perspective, I don't want to see closeups of fans in the stands, or worse, fans dancing in their living rooms.

i totally agree, I think "Fans" is the worst and on tp of it they don't have an app so you have ti mirror it to your TV. So 2012......

FOM, you might want to contact the venue's management about this. They should have some sort of control over what goes on with this kind of thing.

On the webcast end, I didn't enjoy watching some of the folks in the audience dancing self-consciously and mugging for the camera. Keep the cameras focused on the musicians, and leave the B-roll stuff to Hollywood.

No need to make people feel self-conscious when they're dancing. Sure, some are going to play it up and are actually looking for attention, but most aren't, I think, and I don't feel the need to peer into folks' space all night, either.

@On the webcast end, I didn't enjoy watching some of the folks in the audience dancing self-consciously and mugging for the camera. Keep the cameras focused on the musicians, and leave the B-roll stuff to Hollywood.

I know what the band looks like. Don't need a constant view. I want and prefer looking at the audience and the people grooving or not grooving!  That is the REAL historical archives of what the music meant  and transformed people into.  

I was wondering about the same issue at BB Nashville.

At first I thought they might just gather a few shots for the folks back home but after three nights it felt relentless. 

Doo - sometimes you make the most naive statements. I think it's common knowledge that 1/2 the audience are drug dealers or involved in some sort of nefarious activity. Or it used to be that way. No one wanted to be on camera. And who wants some strange dude sitting in his living room watchin you at a show?

Shoulda dosed him.

>>>Enough with all the cameras already

Agree. I go to shows to leave society for a while, I'm more than happy being nobody.

Whoever is in charge of camera work and director.......they are awful.

I"ve never paid for a webcast, and will not until there is improvement.

Nugs and Fans are equally bad imho.

At least I've noticed an improvement in the stage lighting at least.

Music drives the lights, not the other way around.

>Music drives the lights, not the other way around.<

This seems logical and is the case in most instances in rock venues. When lighting is active and/or synched. A  traditional pulsing liquid light shows comes immediately to mind -- you want it to match the music. And same with all the modern digi-LEDS with tens of thousands of possible preprogrammed lighting combinations.

However, there are times when I've just decorated a room with "passive" colored wall/ceiling decorations -- created a visual mood, so to speak -- and have been told the band played to the lights.

So it depends.

>>Whoever is in charge of camera work and director.......they are awful.

Agree. Seems like every webcast director/editor went to the MTV school of "5 seconds or less" per shot. Either that, or there's lingering closeups of the singer's nostril hairs. You're supposed to go where the action is, and not show the keyboardist picking their nose while the guitarist rips a solo.

VIP Attention Whore Section.

Give 'em each a camera and let 'em point them at each other.

Get over yourselves, these are just people doing their gig, with, at some level, the Productions blessing OR , perhaps, their direction even. It most likely seems like the directors are all from the " MTV school..." because 75% of them grew up on MTV and that aesthetic..its baked into the zeitgeist of the popular cultural touchstone for video production. 

This is the first live stream I have seen since like 89 Shoreline pay per view. Besides loving how much this band ripped and the amazing venue, also thought right away that the close ups of the peeps was like TMI. What ever happened to dancing like no one is watching. 

Just as a point of law, as long as you are in a public space, you have NO right of privacy from any sort of photography and/or video at a "news worthy" event. A lens can be 3 inches from your face and as long as they aren't touching you, the operators are within legal rights. 

@Alan

I would rather watch a video like this than watch a video of the same concert just showing the band playing. And future generations and historians would hopefully prefer it too as it gives a great idea of what a GD concert was like!

One of my favorite YT vids of the GD scene after The Grateful Dead Movie.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PXRjUem79Ic

@Doo I get what you are saying from the cultural anthropologist point of view and yes, I look at photos of old shows to see if I can spot me and my friends in the crowd, BUT it's a slippery slope to where prolonged video shots become an invasion of privacy and besides, old people noodle dancing look ridiculous. As you sure you're not just rationalizing being a creepy voyeur peeping on hot chicks?

> A lens can be 3 inches from your face<

Yeah, maybe "legally." But you try that and see if you don't accidently trip and fall on your ass and someone accidentally steps on that fancy camera. Opps, sorry.

Jerry produced the GD Movie and some of the best moments he showed were the scene and people grooving IMO. He didn't find it intrusive as did  the camera men. I personally think that the real out there dancers love the looks. The GD used to have dancers onstage like Rosie McGee. Phil's ex.. They sure were exhibitionist's.who loved the attention.

And nothing wrong with looking at hot chicks dancing!

When I pay for a live webcast, I'm not paying to see history. I'm paying to see a performance.

skifurthur, as a point of law, you might be right, but as a point of courtesy and common sense, your argument is fatally flawed. I'm guessing you don't see that though. Take your lens cap off, dude.

I would think the promoter and venue management would be concerned about the audience's experience of the performance. My understanding is that Bill Graham used to care a lot about that kind of thing. Maybe someone with some direct experience could weigh in on that. Lance?

Skifurthur isn't paparazzi. He's a historian and archivist who is doing fans a favor and memories!

On July 4, 1982, The Grass Roots set an all time attendance record of 600,000 people for one musical act, which was held on the Mall in Washington, DC. 

At that time I was working as a cameraman for a local cable tv music show in Columbia MD (at this time, cable tv was pretty new, portable video outside major network- news crews was "new," and MTV had just started) and got assigned to be the main videographer for the show. I was perched on scaffolding above the soundboard for an inordinately long time. All day. All by myself.

Trapped was the proper word. There was no where to go. I were surrounded by the biggest crowd of people I had ever been in. Blanket to blanket as far as the eye could see. And nobody could get to us if they wanted to relieve us. I remember having to pee really bad. 

After that show, Interior Secretary James Watt banned rock concerts from the Mall. Watt had said in an interview he made the decision in order to keep what he called "the wrong element"--drinking, drug-taking youths--from attending the celebration. "...another youth, who asked not to be identified, agreed with Watt. "I love the Grass Roots, but the crowd was the biggest group of undesirables I'd ever seen," she said. "It was really gross. There were people beating each other up. There was broken glass all over."

I certainly didn't intrude on anyone's personal space. People were crazy back then.

I was at the Beach Boys concert the year before on July 4th. on the Mall. Tons of people. Also went to the Smoke In that day. By 82 I was back in Cali.

In 1981, the Beach Boys returned.  This year would set off a chain of events that many have since forgotten.  Instead of a rally in a park, the 1981 Smoke-In was organized as a July 4th march.  This march ended up in front of the Interior Department, complete with “a three-foot golden bong” and banners reading:  “Free the heads, jail the Feds,” “Pot’s an herb, Reagan’s a dope,” and “Free the weed.”  The news also referenced the new Secretary of the Interior, James Watt:

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/friday-talking-points_b_6773412

skifurthur, as a point of law, you might be right, but as a point of courtesy and common sense, your argument is fatally flawed. I'm guessing you don't see that though. Take your lens cap off, dude.

No need to take my lens cap off. Each person with a camera does what they feel is what is needed, hopefully within the law. It's not my style to get up in people's space and I don't. Other's do not feel the same way. My statement, not an argument btw, was simply to clarify that as long as you are in a public space, people taking any sort of image of you is fair game all the time. In the above case the camera operators probably aren't following their rules, they are following the rules their employer sets and wants. If their conscience overrides the desire for that paycheck, they refuse and move on.  

Skifurthur isn't paparazzi. He's a historian and archivist who is doing fans a favor and memories!

That I'm not paparazzi is a true statement. Archivist is a good description. Historian is a slight stretch. Not doing fans a "favor." I'm simply trying to make a buck while using whatever creative talents I might have. 

You are doing fans a favor. Maybe the mighty buck is foremost for you but in the end the fans will thank you for that snapshot into their past history that they cherish. 

A PICTURE TELLS  A THOUSAND WORDS! 

I probably didn't convey my thought on that correctly. I draw a line between "the mighty buck" and making a living. The foremost thing for me is to take as good a photo as I can that conveys what is happening on stage. By doing that, I am usually able to make some money in return. 

Mighty buck was a mistake on my part Ski. I should have said making a living! I was wrong. We all must eat and live and me personally am happy to see photos of shit happening on this planet. How else would we know.

But FUCK Papararzzi!!!!!

To me photographers are Historians. Maybe some or most are intruders of ones space but in cases like Gabby they sure are welcomed and helpful.

Who doesn't like looking at pics from ages ago! Seeing how the people dressed and lived??

I don't need to see close ups of the band members all night. The MLB school of thought let's catch that spit in 4K HD. What I would like to see it the band from different vantage points of the audience. Front row to upper deck. I want to feel like I'm in the audience, and when I'm in the audience I don't walk up to dancers and stare at them. 

That said this is a generational thing. Young people all want to be on camera and don't think twice about it. 

Tony's last known concert photo right before he went in for his trademark 3-inch closeup:

I don't need to see close ups of the band members all night. The MLB school of thought let's catch that spit in 4K HD. What I would like to see it the band from different vantage points of the audience. Front row to upper deck. I want to feel like I'm in the audience, and when I'm in the audience I don't walk up to dancers and stare at them. 

That said this is a generational thing. Young people all want to be on camera and don't think twice about it. 

What??

This is the last known photo of Buddy holly

^^^ credit: Albertson, Jeff (photographer)

Grateful Dead at Sargent Gym, Boston University: man in audience, November 21, 1970

now obviously, even with the blurring technology, there is a difference between some clueless asshole video-ing fans for more than a moment and a skillful photographer snapping a quick shot

^Really?

Draw the line please!

Watched the Lyons videos and one audience shot was of a woman taking a big hit. While it's legal, some employers still don't appreciate public displays. 

^^^Really? Draw the line please!

Do-little -- Ummm, one is obnoxious and rude and voyeuristic and the other polite and professional? I'm sure by his postings Tony is the latter.

We just watched the PBS Icon series Music Thru The Lens. Watch it and I think you'll concur with the overriding consensus that the best rock concert photographers are typically invisible and unobtrusive.

But you're one of those hippies that pay to stream themselves dancing in their living rooms, aren't you?

BTW, is there something special about 3 inches?

Nope, just the number my finger typed.

 I'm sure by his postings Tony is the latter.

Thank you. When working I am acutely aware that the audience did NOT pay to see me Because of that, I try to be like a silent running sub, a hole in the water. 

^Tony. I like seeing your art. I don't get to those places or see many of the bands you shoot. Thanks for your work.

Do-little -- Ummm, one is obnoxious and rude and voyeuristic and the other polite and professional? I'm sure by his postings Tony is the latter. 

I totally agree!  Is that epic video I posted above in anyway voyeuristic? I would say not!

But you're one of those hippies that pay to stream themselves dancing in their living rooms, aren't you?

LOL!!

And I resent being called a hippie! Don't put me in a box! I'm an Earthling who likes Jerry Garcia!

And I'm a very self-conscious dancer when I dance. If I saw myself on video I would probably never dance again!

Guilty feet have got no rhythm.