"Two and three, no flash!"

“Two and three, no flash!”

The outcome of three Roxette concerts from a TDR photographer’s point of view. Then there are around 100 photos to look at thus it might take a second to load this page. We think it’s worth it, though.

The Daily Roxette covers selected concerts of the ongoing Roxette tour for you. We do this not only by providing you with written articles and status updates on our Facebook page but we always try to set the focus on visual messages as well. So most of the time when a TDR staff member goes to a concert, there will be photos. Lots of them usually, of which we mostly only show a small selection. The rest ends up in our image archives, to be used later to illustrate other articles. Also, Roxette and their management have used our photos and videos many times in their album sleeves and booklets, EPKs, tour programmes, posters and merchandising articles, among others (soon more about this topic.) Today, we’re opening these TDR archives a bit and show you what we have managed to capture during the recent concerts in Warsaw, Berlin and Dresden. More concerts to follow, for sure.

A small technical sidenote: We along with photographers from the local press are permitted to shoot only two songs per concert, “The Big L.” and “Stars”, no flashes are allowed (thus “Two and three, no flash!”, this is what you get told each time). That’s why most of the photos you have seen on various websites always show the same motives. During “The Big L.”, the stage is lit up with very red light which certainly fits the song but challenges camera sensors a lot. “Stars”, to the contrary, features a very cold light. With this knowledge now you can find out yourselves which photo belongs to which song.

Working as a stage photographer is fun and a tough job at the same time. You have like eight minutes to take the pictures you need. No rehearsal, no repeats. Light situations change every second, artists on stage are permanently on the move. The colleagues from the local press are mostly only there to capture this one moment when Marie and Per stand close enough to each other to fit on the same photo, then they transfer this file to their bosses and are done. Unlike we from TDR they don’t care about the other band members or other, more subtle motives. Still you have to make your way through them although the photo pit directly in front of the stage is very narrow, full of cables, guards, fences, photo bags, tour managers and other obstacles because you know that in two seconds, Per will run over to Christoffer, then they would pose like rockers and you want to have that shot. Of course, then you need to set the focus of your camera first (and be told that in these light conditions and with the lenses we use you need to work very precisely, an object only 5 cm in front of or behind your focussed point is already unsharp) and because Per never stops moving you’re adjusting the focus all the time, along with the exposure because you find out that this spotlight in the background shines directly into your lens and messes up the camera settings now. Just a second later, Dea and Marie sing a duet which makes for a nice view and you want to capture this motive as well so you run to the center of the stage now where you find out that the 6 other photographers have never moved away from there so you need to find your own little space between them. Best before Dea moves away again. And no, when you’re really into it you don’t actually hear the music. You know roughly in which song you are and that you have maybe 30 seconds before the photo pit has to be left again and you have to leave the venue as well because your camera gear is not allowed inside from now on anymore. Good that you came a couple of hours earlier this afternoon to find a parking place close to the exit where you can store your camera and then run back to see the rest of the concert, certainly not from the front rows then. If you’re lucky you only missed one song before you’re back. Maybe two.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s all huge fun. Really. I could do this every day although of course with the time the motives may get a bit boring because you really only have always the same two songs to capture in which always the same happens. After a little while you learn this choreography and you know what would happen next. It’s great that everyone in the band uses these two songs to strike every possible kind of poses, so you always get a certain variety of motives when you’re at the right place in time. This band is indeed a very challenging but also rewarding motive. It’s these moments when Marie looks directly into your camera for a couple of seconds or Per comes very close to the edge of the stage to play his guitar right in front of you that make you smile. Thanks for that, by the way.

Also, I would like to thank Roxette’s manager, Marie Dimberg, who so flawlessly organised all the photo passes in time.

Well, and here come the photos from Warsaw, Berlin and Dresden, eventually.

As the thumbnails are rather mashed-up we encourage you to click the photos to see them full-screen.

June 22, 2015: Torwar in Warsaw, Poland (46 photos)

Roxette in Warsaw 2015, photo by Kai-Uwe Heinze for The Daily Roxette

June 27, 2015: O2 World in Berlin, Germany (34 photos)

Roxette in Berlin 2015, photo by Kai-Uwe Heinze for The Daily Roxette

June 28, 2015: Elbuferwiesen in Dresden, Germany (24 photos)

Roxette in Dresden 2015, photo by Kai-Uwe Heinze for The Daily Roxette

★ The author:

Kai-Uwe Heinze

★ Publishing date:

July 1st, 2015

Internal reference code for TDR's Good Reporters: [tdr 951708]

This article was posted here on TDR in these categories:

TDR:Editorial, TDR:Live, TDR:Roxette.

★ Read more about...

Roxette

Live events

Issue: *

Your Name: *

Your Email: *

Details: *