some photos of gig last night

here some photos of the gig i went to last night

yea was trying not to bump the iso up so much.

I know that feeling, I would advise that you take your ISO up as high as you can before it gets noisy, you can sort that out yourself at home and find where your camera really loses it, (my old D2x was around 800) But the D3100 may well be higher. I have been trying this type of photography for a few years and its tricky and more than difficult to get good results especially at smaller venues, your pics look like they might have been taken in a working mens club or a bigger pub, but the lighting looks a bit poor. The only other advice I can offer you is shoot RAW as you can make more and better adjustments to your images without losing too much detail.

Mind you I do like the pictures although a little dark you have done very well with focus and and framing of the subjects, without being too patronizing, don't give up, you will want to buy faster glass (F1.4 50mm is great) and even think about using flash if you can get away with it, but I have just upgraded to D700 to give me the ISO I need.

Good luck and if you need any other help or tips giver me a shout (providing you like my photos )

I'm with folks on the darkness of the images. If you shot RAW you can likely do something with them. The colors are a weird, muddled mix to me. I'm thinking a combination of some adjustments in the RAW file and a good B&W conversion might yield some better results.

Just messing with the JPG, I lightened the image and did a B&W conversion using the method described in my blog post using multiple hue/saturation layers (top photo). Then on the bottom image I messed with that just a bit using the Grain filter in Elements 9 (don't have access to my Mac w/ Photoshop or Silver Efex Pro 2 at the moment). It's not necessarily "better" but I think it makes for a more coherent image for a band shoot. Access to the RAW file would allow a lot more fixing.

I think we worry too much about ISO noise. In the old days of film (yes I know some still use it) we'd use a higher speed film to allow a faster shutter speed.
Then we'd say we used the faster film for the larger grain which causes a grittier image, just right for this kind of subject matter.

Film media changes but we still talk the same bollox.
Do whatever is needed to get the best pic and then use a bit of artistic flair to "sell" the image.
e.g. "I wanted some noise in this image to compliment the style of photo".

I think John's right, and in a genre like Rock n Roll Photography I think that noise can often be used to your advantage.

And then there is Keith Richards whose photo even if taken with a D800 on ISO 200 will still be grittier than a piece of 80 grit sandpaper...LOL