I’d been wanting to get into doing band promo shoots since going freelance back at the start of 2010. While I hadn’t made much of an effort to get out there and drum up that kind of business, it was definitely something on my to-do list. Last week, I got my chance to dip a toe in thanks to the guys at Australian Hysteria magazine.

OK, so perhaps shooting an international band like Gojira (from France) is a little more than a ‘dip’ into the promo shoot waters! being my first band promo shoot and being a fan, I was pretty nervous about the shoot in the lead-up, so I made sure I wrangled in an assistant (thanks to Jackson for his time and help!)  for the day and got there early to check out the location and set up some lighting options and test them before the band got there.

I only used simple two-light setups for all these shots, taken in two different parts of the same location for different looks. I ultimately had the band’s attention for no more than 10 minutes, which I would assume is normal for this kind of shoot – but I got what I needed. I also got wrangled into shooting the band with their equipment for another section of the same magazine, which was cool. it also meant we got to watch Mastodon’s sound check while waiting for Gojira to arrive.

You can find lighting into on each image’s caption and be sure to check out an upcoming issue of Australian Hysteria magazine for the published shots when their new album comes out. Don’t worry, we’ll let you know when it gets published! CLICK HERE or on the image above to check out the shots. One of them is a FREE desktop wallpaper. Enjoy.

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