Den Sorte Skole or War of the Worlds? The view from the stage was absolutely mad! Insane light show mixed with massive rain showers and a spellbound audience. Magic.
First there was Roskilde part 1 … now wait for it … wait like a bad edm drop, waaaaaaiiiit … boooom, it’s Roskilde part 2! Has it been a couple of weeks already? That is mad, I am still high from the Roskilde Festival experience and at the same time, still nursing a stubborn cold and sore throat. Give me a few more weeks, I am ready to go again!
Roskilde Festival gallery part 2
Let’s dive straight into a random view into more of my archives from Roskilde Festival 2017. Part 1 is here.
Den Sorte Skole was out of this world – and there is a special blog post coming up for them.
Popcaan kicking it.
The view really can be like a 30s sci-fi movie up from the Orange Stage.
Trentemøller in a great concert, finally a moody dark concert without all those TV spot lights.
The power of music
Justice landing their spaceship on the Orange stage.
Ice Cube made the sun appear, one helluva popular trick after days of rain!
Ice Cube brought an extra pair of legs along, just in case.
A security guy chills in a sofa – a rare glimpse underneath the huge Orange stage. I owe credit to friend and fellow photographer Jens Panduro, he discovered this hole in the black cloth that revealed this view – and being the classy guy I am, I totally copied his shot!
Princess Nokia crowdsurfing during her really nice performance.
The gorgeous Arena tent, largest tent in Europe I read.
Photographing Roskilde Festival 2017
The pit at the Orange Stage, all of us trying to get a shot of Justice. (Lasse, you are in the way!)
I wrote a long rant last year about photographing Roskilde and the 3 song and you are out rule, I won’t repeat myself, you can read it here. But I will add that when you are in the photo pits at Roskilde, you are shooting shoulder-to-shoulder with some of the very best concert photographers, some of them with decades of experience. This can be intimidating at times, it can be annoying at times (because they are so damn good), but it is always super inspiring and entertaining.
I see people standing next to me and make incredible shots under very hard conditions, we have no time, we have no space at all as the picture from the pit at Orange stage demonstrates. My secret weapon is my height + 3 meter long arms + light weight Fujifilm cameras with amazing LCD flip screens so I can very easily shoot and compose with one hand high above everyone, and for all 3 songs in the pit if I have to. I found that easier at times on the Orange stage, just stand at the back and shoot over everyone.
I made a conscious effort to shake hands and introduce myself to everyone this year and I am so grateful for all the new friends. It is really inspiring to meet such wonderful photographers, who are so amazing at concert photography, they kick my ass every damn time in the pit and that is, well, it is really annoying as hell haha, but also very, very inspiring.
Speaking of the Orange Stage, the photo pit was doubled in size compared to last year, a huge improvement. I don’t have a lot of pictures of myself in action, but my friend and kick-ass photographer Bobby Anwar made a nice picture that really shows how we work at the Orange Stage.
Yours truly at the Orange Stage and some dude from Compton. Security guy has clearly come up to pat us on the back for a job well done! Yours truly in the middle, grey jacket. Picture by Bobby Anwar.
Camera gear
Armed with the experience from last year’s Roskilde I brought a different setup this year, purely primes and no zoom (well one, that I did not end up using anyway).
The 5 Dollar Bag of Awesomeness
Primary setup, 2 cameras 2 lenses:
- Fujifilm X-T2 with Fujinon 35mm F1.4
- Fujifilm X-T1 with Fujinon 16mm F1.4
Extra lenses:
- Fujinon 50mm F2 – for closeups
- Fujinon 18-135 zoom – backup and the zoom range for some crowd and stage shots from behind the crowd (post festival note: I ended up almost never using this at all, the 50mm lens was enough range for me)
- Zeiss 12mm F2.8 – wideangle for artist and crowd shots from the pit
Everything fits in my 5 Dollar Camera Bag – which is heavily protected by Boba Fett and lizards, so stealing shit. All the gear worked to perfection, as expected. My only accident was my own fault – I dropped my X-T2. I was wearing a rain jacket that was slippery and the strap just slipped off my shoulder, the X-T2 took a nose dive onto concrete floor. Thanks to the 35mm lens hood which took one for the team! This was the only damage:
That is perfectly normal, just aim slightly left of your target! (I know this is my X-T1, but the lens was on the X-T2 when I dropped it)
Did I mention my Fujifilm cameras headlined the Orange Stage for a brief moment?
Fujifilm Cameras headlining the Orange Stage. Because…well I am killing time waiting for Ice Cube! Lets also take a moment to celebrate how awesome I nail the focus with my phone!
And a little glimpse into the base we all constantly return to, the press center:
The press center is a 24 hour living hub of activity, cameras, photographers, writers, laptops and countless cups of coffee. At times, during the day, 100 people occupy every little space, sometimes at night, 3 people sit around half asleep. A special thanks to the volunteers manning the 24 hr gear storage facility and most importantly, the coffee maker! You guys are life-savers!
It is … THE END
I know, you thought this blog post would never end but hah, surprise!
(If you have not read my Part 1 blog post – It is right here!)
There are some surreal and wonderful moments at times walking around the Orange stage at midnight, during the changeover, just before the last concert of the night at Orange. See you next year!
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Thank you so much to the Roskilde Festival team, especially Anders Hjortkær and the fellow Roskilde team photographers, all the other photographers and awesome people I met. I hope to see you all next year.
4 Comments on “Roskilde Festival 2017 – Part II – War of the Worlds and Boba Fett”
Some nice shots up there, and I really like your style of writing, Flemming 🙂
Thank you!
Hey Flemming! Awesome shots! I’ve been trying to find someone who has an X-T2 who does low-light music photography, and you seem to be one of them! I’m currently a Canon 6D shooter, so I have decent dynamic range for an old camera. My question is: How well would you say the X-T2 handles saturated colored stage lights. And, is the grain naturally coming from the camera, or is it exaggerated? I’m usually going up to ISO6400 for these kind of gigs. Thanks!
Hi Hanam, and thank you, glad you like my shots. The Fujifilm cameras have a good dynamic range and will handle the stage lights just fine as long as you get the exposure right!
The grain you see is totally as is from the camera. No exaggeration, no noise reduction either. Half of these pictures are from the X-T1 and they do have more grain than the X-T2. The X-T2 has very low noise and I very happily shoot and deliver pics from iso 12,800. I actually like the grainy look so much I never use any noise reduction, even at iso 12,800. Hope this helps!