Goggleman, (ISO 25600)

For me, on-camera flash pretty much robs a club night of its atmosphere.  Sort of slaps the subject in the face with a big white hand of light.  (Like God probably did in biblical times when it was still fashionable to smite those renegade mortals He’d made..)  Photos using on camera-flash might get the subjects sharp and bright, but usually it just looks like they were taken in broad daylight.  Or more specifically in a sort of non-time particular to flash lighting.  I went to White Mischief’s Journey to the Centre of the Earth night at La Scala in London’s King Cross the other week and most of the photos that have turned up on Flickr all seemt to suffer from this same effect.  Yes, the subjects are bright and sharp and the fantastic steampunk outfits pop out at you.  But you don’t really get a sense of the night..

http://www.whitemischief.info/photos

This is where the Canon 5D Mark II’s super new high ISO settings comes into their own.  The shot above was taken with the ISO on 25600!!  Now, obviously, there is some noise.  It’s never going to be clean and crisp pushed that far.  But that gives it a grungy kind of feel that works here.  If I’d used on-camera flash, or really any kind of lighting it would have changed the mood completely.

All the shots here are taken with the ISO pushed right up, from 5000 to 25600 so that the ambience isn’t blanched out.

Pagan Love (ISO 25600)

Rhiannon (ISO 6400)

Arabella Bow (ISO 12800)

Fred from Top Shelf Jazz (ISO 5000)

more at www.nicktuckerphotography.com