As you can see, there was basically no light whatsoever, easily the worst set lit of the whole event which turned the photo pit into the Pit of Despair™.

  
 

( Bigger and more )

More of I Am Immune and Chaos Engine next week, the rest will move to the back of my photo backlog.

While most of it was backlit, there was at least some fill from the sides so the faces aren't completely in the dark as for Deathboy *grump*

Read a short blurb about what I thought about the bands here and the "monitor incident" here.

Got up, had breakfast and sent _ebb_ her photo preview. Left for the station, found plenty of free parking and no queue at the ticket machine so managed to catch the train I wanted easily. Spent the journey reading my Pyrates character but couldnt take notes as I didn't have a pen... Met up with Heidi and Maria (WANOLJ) in Angel for lunch (Yo! Sushi at the N1 centre), chatted and handed over Maria's birthday present (a "model portfolio" from our shoot earlier this year).

The Yo! was convenient as I only had to go downstairs for the BC venue. There was a delay opening the doors but we got in eventually. I soon ran into jasontheknight (who was off again quickly to sort out his things) and echo_echo (cool to finally meet you!). Things were delayed a bit but Modulate finally kicked off and I joined kneeshooter in the pit. The lights weren't too bad to start with and I got a few reasonable results.

Wandered around a bit afterwards and soon ran into zenmeisterin, faerierhona and Martin, civi and jonny_eol.
I Am Immune were great fun to shoot, too and the lights worked fine.
Deathboy were next and the lights turned shit (very minimal backlighting with just a few scanners) so trying to get decent photos was a real pain. It wasn't their fault and they were definitely not happy with that (and other backstage issues), either. :o(
I think it was after this that I was approached by lineoutrecords (so many people I've never met in person recognise me in dingy venues, it's scary) so we chatted a bit and I got a free promo CD out of it. ;o)
Still miffed that I didn't see all of Knifeladder's set but I did need something to eat.

As I was waiting in the pit for Chaos Engine to start, somebody waved at me from the front row and it turned out to be kissycat1000 who was there with ev1ldonut and somebody else whose name I don't remember. That's two more LJ friends I have finally met in real life, too bad they had to leave straight after the set... Chaos Engine rocked a lot and I hope I managed to capture some of it in my photos, we will see. I loved how they started their set with the "Remember, remember the 5th of November" bit from V with a Vengeance and came on stage wearing V masks. Shame that their first gig I saw might have been their last for real. :o(

Wandered around again after the set chatting to a few people and then took more shots of Psyche. If an act consists of an overenthusiastic singer and a bloke on synth/knob twiddling duty, there isn't much scope, especially if the light's too poor for capturing the singer's antics properly. For what it was, I enjoyed them, though and they had a good connection with the crowd.

More wandering and chatting and then the stage was set for XPQ-21 in their mad, Clockwork Orange inspired outfits. I really enjoyed them and the lights were a bit more friendly, too so I should have a good selection of pics from them. Fab.

Some frantic deleting of crap from my memory cards later, I was ready for Suicide Commando and now I wonder why I bothered. OK, I got some good shots but he doesn't deserve them, really. Oh well, let's see if I'll get around to them at one point. They won't be my priority.
At least I left before their set was finished so I could get out and to Kings X without hassle. Just too bad that I missed that train. Oh well.

All in all, it was a good Black Celebration for me.