Concertphotography with remote cameras

The first push someone gave me to try remote triggered cameras at a concert was Adam Elmakias with his take on remote cameras at concerts. Needless to say, I was quite intrigued. I always wanted to do it. But since you have to „sacrifice“ one camerabody to be static at one place for the whole concert was a turn-off for me, as I only had two Sony bodies. I always want two bodies on me to have two lenses ready at all times. Since I recently aquired a second A7IV body, I now have three Sony bodies ready to go and so I went into a deep dive into the world of remotely triggering camera bodies…

Remote triggered cameras are really badly documented in the web. I really struggled with building up knowledge on this topic. I got the Hähnel Captur Triggersystem, which promises a 100m range. But it seemed like it does not work, as the transmitter did not really fit on the hot shoe. But still, the camera was able to trigger the receiver on a different camera without any problem. The theory is: you trigger with the hotshoe a different camera, which you can place somewhere you cannot reach that easily. For example the FOH, the drummer or even in the rig of the stage. You could even trigger more than one camera with one transmitter, pretty cool, right? You can have a look on the system I use here.

With that being said, here is my prototype of a remote camera setup. You can see the camera and the receiver, which are connected with a trigger camera. Also, I use a SmallRig magic arm and a small ballhead from manfrotto:

I tried that whole thing out during the gig of Hatepop of the festival No Borders No Nations. During that gig, I placed a remote camera at the drumkit to gather some more drummer shots. Honestly, I did not imagine it working that well as it did. I was able to capture over 760 remotely triggered pictures over this setup. It was a success. I was able to gather some shots, I otherwise would have missed. Here are some examples:

I had the whole setup mounted to a microphone stand that was a spare on the festival. I asked for it and got to use it for my remote cam. You can see the setup below. It turned out really flexible with the ballhead. I had no issues of the magicarm becoming loose or something.

The next learning I had to go through was: I forgot the trigger cable – SHITE! The day I had to shoot 8 bands and would have had so much time to experiment with this setup, I ended up taking away the oppurtunity before I even was able to install it on the stage… Nevermind… The cable now lives rentfree in my case – lesson learned. Always keep your things you tend to forget packed up all the time!

During the concert of Conniver, I was asked to shoot hybrid (e.g. Video and Photos). I set up my Sony A7III right on the drum rack, to get more drummer photos. With that, I was able to capture some more shots of the drummer, as time in hybrid is really limited. The setup was similar to the one I did at No Borders No Nations. But this time, I was able to mount it directly on the drum. Below, you can see the setup of this time.

I captured 750 pictures of the drummer that night. The highlights are the following pics:

In conclusion, I think, I found a good way to capture more pictures of a place I am physically unable to walk to during a concert. I already was able to capture and deliver some amazing images to clients. I plan on using this method in the future for bigger gigs. With that, I’d be able to capture FOH-Shots without having to walk to the FOH. This saves much time, as time at concerts is the most limiting factor there is. I am looking forward to diversifying this field of photography and gather some unique pictures at places, I never would be able to create otherwise! Here are the key points to look out for:

• Set the remote triggered camera to manual focus
• Make sure, that you secure the camera tightly, that it will not move or become lose. Use adequate rigging safeties if you mount the camera over the crowd!