Rock on the Range Review for Kotori Magazine

My husband, Christopher, and I ventured to Columbus, Ohio, excited by a mission to experience Rock on the Range metal music fest with Kotori Magazine's blessing to eulogize the event in 3,000 words or less, with photography by yours truly! 

Keepin' it real human. Read our review, A Family of Apes at Rock on the Range, featuring A Perfect Circle, Korn, Disturbed, Avenged Sevenfold, Red Fang, Bullet For My Valentine, All That Remains, and more!! To see even more images from Rock on the Range, visit my personal Portfolio!

Christopher & KellieAnn Reynolds - Kotori Magazine
Rock on the Range 2011

We would like to give thanks to all of our kick ass friends, because without them, this adventure would not have been possible, at least not nearly as awesome. A big thank you to Jake McGee and everyone at Kotori Magazine for extending this remarkable opportunity to us. A colossal thanks goes out to Douglas Snauffer and his family for supplying food and helping fund our trip to Columbus from North Canton, Ohio. A huge thank you to our long-distance friend, David Crane, who traveled from Pittsburgh, PA, secured lodging and allowed us to room with him, for free, at Days Inn. Last but not least, big bear hugs for both Neil Hamilton and Tiffany Miller. Our journey would not have been possible if not for our supportive, thoughtful, and selfless friends. Thank you all so much! Your offerings have left us full and humble.

Media Tent

Concert Photography : Shoot Preparation

 

Concert and Live Band photography is one of the most challenging and exciting photography jobs you can get. You've got the best seat in the house, right up against the stage. There can be anywhere from 5,000-30,000+ screaming fans behind you, constantly moving, throwing crap towards the stage, crowd surfing, possibly even kicking you in the head. There are bouncers and other photographers to move around. There are no-flash policies and unpredictable stage-lighting conditions to work with. You have to think about a lot of stuff like equipment, exposure, composition, focus, energy, and you have just a few minutes allotted to you to get the shots you need. It's a lot of pressure, and a whole lot of fun.

I'm covering Rock on the Range in Columbus Ohio, May 21-22, 2011, and it's my first large concert photography gig, so in a way, I am what you call a noob. A beginner. However, I have shot live bands at local venues (i.e. bars) and I have prepared for this live shoot to the same extent and attention to detail as any other professional photographer would prepare for the job. I've done a lot of research and figured it would be a good idea to post a list of prep tips for other budding concert photographers. This is a mish-mash of a post. It was written it in much haste as I prepare to leave for the Rock on the Range music fest today.

1. Obtain the Gig/Keep the Gig

Have the necessary information you need in order to pick up your Photo Pass at the Media Will-Call booth. Make sure to print out the confirmation letter/email and bring it with you, and have a list of the managers names. Bring it with you just in case something goes wrong and your name is not on the Media/Photo Pass list. Cover all your bases. There is usually some sort of waiver you must sign in order to finalize your photo pass. Obtain a copy of this waiver ahead of time if you can, and review the terms carefully before you sign it. I received a copy of the waiver a few days before the show. Pay attention and look out for Rights Grabbers. If you don't agree with the terms, you're SOL. When you sign the agreement, honor it! Don't blacklist yourself or get into legal trouble by signing a waiver that says you can't profit from the images by turning around and breaking the agreement anyway.

2. Prep Your Gear/Prep Your Mind/Prep Your Body

Gather your gear. Figure out what you need to take. Pack as light as possible. Charge all of your batteries and make certain everything is functioning properly, from straps to lenses. Clean your glass, blow out your camera body, format all the memory cards, and re-organize your camera bag. Pre-stage your gear by setting your internal and external modes.

Remember, most venues enforce a no-flash policy. This is both a blessing and a curse. I love shooting in low-light conditions, but of course there are a lot of potential frustrations to overcome. Dealing with colored lights, risking potential blow-outs and overexposure; it's a challenge. But don't use flash! It's disrespectful to the band, and you're bound to get yourself kicked out if you break the no-flash policy. 

Also, pack what is necessary, but pack light! Wear comfortable shoes and bring extra socks, because you are going to be on your feet for a long time. Always wear earplugs! If it's an outdoor concert, bring a towel, a super rad poncho, and some sort of waterproof bag to cover yourself and your gear in case it rains. For this, I went the cheap route and brought a see-through 89¢ poncho and couple of black trash bags. It doesn't matter as long as your gear is dry. Also, drink LOTS of water. Bring suntan lotion if it is an outdoor event, and wear it! Bring sunglasses, a wide brim hat, and a small first-aid kit.

Research the venue as much as you can, especially if you've never been there before. Scope out the stage(s) and seating arrangements. Know the line-of-sight to exits, higher grounds, safe zones, and take caution at all times but don't ever forget to have fun! 

If you have some, bring your business cards with a way to contact you and pass them out. 

3. Get the shots! Have fun!

I am a firm believer that how you feel while photographing will come across in your final images. If you're not having fun, you stand the chance of getting crappy shots. So, have fun with it and don't stress out. Be kind and courteous to the staff, you never know what they can do for you if you make friends. Be nice to the other photographers, if you need to get around them, a gentle tap on the shoulder to get their attention will do better than shoving them out of your way. You never know if you're standing next to someone from Rolling Stone, after all. Don't stand in one spot while you are in the photo pit, it makes sense that if you move around, you will get more diverse and interesting images. Pay attention to all the band members and maybe they'll woo the camera for you.

That is all for now, I must now leave for Rock on the Range!

Rock & Roll Saved My Soul

I have been given a most awesome opportunity to cover the 5th Anniversary of Rock on the Range in words and pictures for Kotori Magazine. Yet, Kotori is not just a magazine, but a "community of underground culture and arts designed for the emancipation of the human spirit." So stop by their site and to get a healthy dose of music, art, and politics.

Rock on the Range will be the the first time I have been invited, along with my husband, to officially cover a huge music event, and if you've seen my portfolio, it's a dream come true for me. Plus, I get to write my heart out for Kotori. I am super pumped!

I want to write a blog about concert photography, but I will save that for later, because that article will be geared more towards other photographers. But right now, it's awesome-story time. A personalized take on my childhood love of music that, over time, has created an entire world filled with vibrations, opening up new levels of consciousness, and making a difference in perspectives. :D

KellieAnn - 1996
Notice the nicotine-stained lace curtains

What I love about music is that it can connect people who would not otherwise be connected. My mother and I connected through music, and no other time. When I was a teenager, she and I would stay up late at night with just the stereo on and the candles lit. My mom, always with a cigarette burning between her lips, squinting one eye and drinking from a wine jug, looking like a big-breasted pirate in a holey concert t-shirt. And she'd start tapping her foot on the floor, succumbing to Pearl Jam's “Ten” or Alice in Chains, then she'd slap the table and start swaying her head back and forth and by the end of a song, we'd both be standing up, jumping and pounding the varnish off the tabletop, hootin' and hollerin' until our throats were hoarse and our hands hurt. "Have another drink!" she'd rasp, taking a swig and wiping her mouth with this look in her eye that said the fun was over when the music stopped. So I'd pop in another album, and hope for the best.

My cousin, Tony, and myself mock-playing his guitar

Good music starts with a beat, but great music comes from the heart. 

My grandfather only listened to Classical music. As a very young girl, I remember listening so intently that I was brought to tears not fully understanding why, so I listened to the songs over and over again until I figured it out for myself. I let the music consume me because it felt good to let myself go. Completely.

As an impressionable little girl, after endlessly tuning an alarm-clock radio in my tiny bedroom instead of playing with my friends, I bought my first boom-box for five-dollars at a yard sale. It was electric blue and matched my bike. I tied that sucker to the handlebars and rode around the trailer park listening to Genesis and Pink Floyd, singing to Jimi Hendrix, Queen and Yes in the woods by myself. My childhood babysitter, called Hannah, gave me my first pair of jeans and a cut-up Guns 'n Roses t-shirt that made me feel so much cooler than I actually was.

My mother may have forbid me to watch “Kids Incorporated” on the Disney channel (not that I was interested to begin with), but I was never told I couldn't listen to Robert Plant wailing and moaning through the speakers. I was only allowed to use profanity when I was singing to a song. And as long as I knew what it meant, I was encouraged to run wild. You can't cut a person off from their imagination, after all.

Wastelands
Metallica Cover Band

When I was in middle school, I quit both Drama and Classical Violin to play the Drums. I begged my divorced parents to get me a drum-set (a 5-piece Pearl Export Series), and they did so without too much effort. When I lived with my dad, he said I played like an African tribesman. When I lived with my mom, she paid for six-months of lessons with a guy called Roth in Northwestern Pennsylvania. Roth told me to bring in a song I wanted to learn so I brought Tool's second album, Undertow, and told him I wanted to learn "Sober". He listened to it and told me to pick something else and then we worked on Paradiddles that day instead. Eventually, I ended up learning a Metallica song and later joined a Metallica cover band (See: Gig Photo, above). I played in a death metal band after that. We called ourselves Anti-Justice and we played once at Peabodies in Cleveland, Ohio.

Moving around a lot as a kid, my drums got beat up over time. Rained on, smashed up, and set on fire in wars with my mom during a few of her binges. When I turned 18, I sold what was left of my drums before moving to the state of Georgia. A few years later, I returned to North Canton, Ohio and eventually married the guy I had sold my drums to, so I got the set back. Funny how things work out.

Drums at my mothers home
Pennsylvania 1997

That was my childhood, filled with music to keep the connections strong by filling the air with an amount of soul that I wanted to attain for myself. Music brings back memories, and creates new ones. A certain song (i.e: "No One Knows" by Queens of the Stone Age) can even remind me of a particular season (Autumn). Music reminds me to keep on living, looking back on even the worst of times as if they were actually pretty good.

In many ways, Rock & Roll Saved My Soul. And I pay it back through light and images. I want to pay tribute to the music that continues to make me think differently, creating photographs with the same heart and soul. Music photography is a career goal for me. I am working my ass off to get where I want to go. Some of the biggest magazines in the industry is where I am heading. It's about time. Thank you, Kotori. 

♫ KellieAnn

Cleveland Metroparks Zoo

[All Images and Content are Copyright 2010 by KellieAnn Reynolds]

I have lived near and around Northeastern Ohio for practically my entire life, however I have only been to the Cleveland Zoo twice in the last decade. The Cleveland Zoo has brought ZooKeys back. It was really popular back in the day. I have an old elephant key stashed away. The animal-shaped keys unlock audio story books full of information about the Animal Kingdom. The audio boxes can be found all over the zoo, and they now operate on solar power, which I thought was pretty awesome, except that the boxes have a big British Petroleum logo above it. The ZooKeys still have the same nostalgic appeal, but with an updated look much like a card rather than a key.

We didn't see much of the lions, but we did get to see the Clouded Leopard, perched so prettily on a branch, snoozin'. And, through the plexiglas, I spent a few curious moments with a Wolf's Monkey.






We missed seeing the Elephants due to construction, but we plan on returning to see the new African Elephant Crossing when it is unveiled next year. When we got to the Rhinoceros, we were told in secret that a baby rhino had been born and that she would be announced the first week of September. That explained why we were seeing one very lonely looking Rhino.



They have a new Dinosaur! exhibit that I was so excited to see. The Dinosaurs are medium to tall, rubber animatronics that Roar and some will spit water on you if you're not paying attention. The dinosaurs are definitely cool, but I was hoping for something a little more entertaining. The most lasting effect of the Dinosaur exhibit is the Jurassic Park theme music, which we were humming for the rest of the day.

We looked at just about everything in the the Aquatics at the Zoo. Ocean life always puts me under a love spell. I've spent hours looking at fish in tanks. One of my life goals is to learn to scuba dive so I can take underwater photographs. The octopus was very dimly lit and we almost didn't see it tucked into a corner, bein' all squishy. I have a rule that every time I see an octopus, I will take a photo of it. Jelly-fish, too. And unicorns.








I put my camera away for the Butterfly house. I was paranoid about the moisture. This gave me a chance to really be immersed and impressed. These butterflies are exotic, they are from all over the world, so we had to be very careful. They fly freely in a greenhouse to classical music while you walk in a big circle until you are ushered out the door. But while I was in there, I was convinced that I was a magical dream princess. The butterflies are so beautiful and colorful and plentiful. Sometimes the butterflies would fly right past my face and brush over my cheek or get stuck in my big hair, and they even made my eyelashes dance from their butterfly breeze. It was awesome.

Have some bees, if you please.



Monkey Island seems to have noticeably fewer monkeys than I remember, but the monkeys now share space with a few adorable, teeny-tiny antelope creatures called a Klipspringer.





My favorite part of visiting the Cleveland Zoo? The Rain-forest. We usually save it for last since it's closest to the parking lot. I love everything about the Rain Forest exhibit. I didn't take any photos because it's dewy and humid in there with the waterfalls and sprinkler systems. After the Rain Forest, we had enough time to take a trolley up the hill to walk the Northern Trek. The seals were missing and the wolves were sleeping in far, far away land and I didn't have my tripod. But we saw the three bears, the Malayan Sun Bear, the Black bear, and the Polar bear. And few minutes before we were told it was closing time, the seals came out to play :)








It feels like a new experience every time we go to the Zoo. Next, we want to see the Columbus Zoo & Pittsburgh Zoo :)

One final thought: This was the first time I had a chance to bring a camera to the zoo with me, and I tell ya, I thought Zoo photography was going to be a cake walk. What I didn't realize is, animals are animals. They don't respond like dogs and house cats. Zoo animals will turn their back on you and fall asleep, meander over to the shade at the farthest point of the map, hide from you and hide their babies, huddle together in protective groups, and urinate when you first meet them, and for a really long time. I also forgot about the dirty, scratched up plexiglas windows and sometimes unattractive caging systems. But it goes without saying, I love a good challenge. :) Also, thanks to my patient and amazing family, I was able to hang around certain exhibits long enough to get these shots.


Cleveland Metroparks Zoo | Cleveland, Ohio

[All Images and Content are Copyright 2010 by KellieAnn Reynolds]

A Fair Day in the Life of a Photographer

Ah, the mouthwatering aroma of carnival food. I followed that smell down the road with my loveyhubs in the passenger seat, his hand auto-planted on my thigh while I maneuvered our spaceship through the cute little town where we live. It wasn't planned, but we went to the fair!! I saw a child riding a magic bullet with the determination of an inventor, and took a sneaky peek at lovers cuddling on a Ferris Wheel eating candied apples like sophisticated wine drinkers, imagined the lonely Carousel living happily in my backyard, and left on the high note of seeing a really cute, really old couple sharing an Elephant Ear on a wooden bench and laughing, genuinely laughing as if the war had finally ended.

No care in the world. Wouldn't that be grand?

[All Images and Content are Copyright 2010 by KellieAnn Reynolds]

JayCee Fair | North Canton, Ohio

Hello? Hello Yourself!

[All Images and Content are Copyright 2010 by KellieAnn Reynolds]

[Photo taken by my husband, Chris]


When I started to write this first post, I had no idea where I planned to go with it. I don't know that any first-time bloggers would know exactly. Ideas are like kites, you gotta run with it! [Dude, did I just make that up? Awesome!]

Here you will find that I love to take photos and enjoy writing pretty sentences with lots of commas. I love to draw and make cool illustrations on my computer. And I simply have to Do It All, or else I'd much rather suffocate, drown, or be burned half to death than keep in all of my steam, man. Besides, I am far too inspired not to share my beans. Everybody has some beans they wanna share. Or at least, they should!

If you were to ask me personally, I would say that it's much easier to make pictures, than it is for me to explain certain things. I'm told by My Honey that I can go way far-out. But that's what makes me draw on ideas. It helps my brain feel like a muscle. I'm a dreamer. Anything is possible.

I bet if I worked hard, I could be a Jedi Queen and Warrior at a lot of things, good things. At least I'm not saying, Hey-ay! I want to be like Lady Gaga, Katy Perry and Meatloaf... As if a PB&J had TONS of personality. In that case, I'd only be 1/3 of my cool potential. I just want to be me. And I wanna be more than even that. I want to provide for my family doing what I love. Who doesn't want to do that? Only people who haven't asserted themselves. Even I could play the role of a Queen, on a confident day. And my version of Queen has by her side a King every day of her majestic life, and she can spend a lot of time with him while they totally rule together. :)

Back to why I started a blog. Since I have made the effort, I plan to post on my new blog as much as my schedule will allow. At least once per week, I'm just going to put myself out there, right here. Really! See all the scenes, walk some walks. I'll put up fun things to look at. The good, the bad, and the ugly.

Right for now, I feel like I'm the only one who will read this. This blog is like singing in the shower. ♫ ♪