Keane

Fleming Point | Albany State Marine Reserve | Albany, CA

“Are you still going to make a calendar this year?” my Mom asked the other day. The question came from the assumption that Covid, and the lack of travel, would “prevent” me from pulling together my “best shots” from 2020.

Sure, trips to Europe, Tahoe, and Sonoma were all cancelled this year. There was no work-related travel. But we did indeed get to Florida in January, Park City in February, attended a concert in March (that may have been sketchy). And for a change of scenery, we spent the summer in San Diego, and took local trips in the Bay Area that did not require getting on a plane.

So yes, there will be a calendar.

In fact, I think I may have had a harder time this year compared to the past. It’s not easy narrowing down the best 13 to include in calendar (12 months plus the cover shot). In fact, I intend to write an additional “honorable mentions” blog post as I felt really bad for the photos that got “left behind” this year.

19 Years and Counting…

Every year since 2003 I have been making a calendar of my “best of the best” photos. (I wasn’t sure what year I started this, so I needed to dig them all out!)

I give them to my family at the holidays and include all the birthdays and anniversaries and the like within them. Since I started this Web site last January, I have set a goal of trying to get all those photos on to the site…at some point.

Aside from tracking all those old photos down (I have been through a few computers since 2003, including a Dell Desktop and IBM laptop), it takes time to title, describe, and link to the places in the photos. But “re-telling” those stories of the photos adds a new element to them - and I’ll enjoy the walks down memory lanes. And with Lightroom, I may even “remaster” some of them.

So far, in addition to this year’s, I’ve only got 2020 and 2019 up, but I’ll get the remaining 16 up there by hook or by crook as my Mom likes to say. She’s probably one of my biggest fans of these calendars (of course).

What about you? Do you make annual calendars from your best shots? What’s your best shot from 2020?

Click on the 2021 Calendar below to see my best from 2020.

Check Out

2021 Calendar on Shutterfly

2020 Calendar

2019 Calendar

I’ve been meaning - and wanting - to write this blog post for weeks now, but the world turned upside down. Between work never being busier, working from home, helping my wife recover from surgery, and having the kids homeschooled to at least May, it’s been hard to find the time for creative outlets. But I am glad to get at least one post in this month - and judging from the length, this one’s like three!

Keen to See Keane

It was last September when I received an email from Bandsintown about Keane performing in Oakland in March. Minoo and I have always been fans of Keane going all the way back to 2007 when we asked our wedding band to learn how to play “Is It Any Wonder?” - which they did in fine fashion!

Maybe you’ve heard their other hit Somewhere Only We Know, which was featured in the 2009 star-studded, yet under-appreciated He’s Just Not That Into You. (P.S. He’s not.)

But I didn’t pull the trigger on it until late January, and by that time I had to resort to purchasing them on SeatGeek to get decent seats.

Just a few weeks later, during ski week in February in Park City, Minoo had an unfortunate skiing accident and tore her ACL. With the concert just over two weeks away from the time she tore her ACL, it seemed unlikely that we’d be able to go. But I wasn’t ready just yet to sell the tickets. I was thinking as long as Minoo could sit down and have a little bit of space for her legs, maybe she’d be okay?

The Dawn of Coronavirus

On the morning of March 1st, I received a text message from my boss. “Sorry to bother you on a Sunday morning, but I just sent you an urgent email…” It was the beginning of the end of business as usual - the beginning of Salesforce’s approach to managing through the Coronavirus (we were early adapters!)

With the uncertainty of the growing public health risk mounting just a week before the concert, it seemed less and less likely that we were going to go. We vacillated throughout the week, but by Thursday, just 4 days before the concert, there was so much fear and uncertainty about the threat that we decided we weren’t going to go. It was time to put the tickets up for sale.

Countdown is on

It’s never easy trying to sell tickets four days before a concert, but with the news of Coronavirus - and the fact that Keane is not necessarily a household name - the pressure was on.

First I went back to SeatGeek to list them at $200 for the pair. (We paid $229. Alright, maybe I was being a little ambitious.)

Next, I thought I could persuade some hip Salesforcers to get in on it as well on our For Sale (or Free) Chatter group.

Not even a single like.

As the weekend wore on, I lowered the price down to $63 per ticket (SeatGeek’s recommended price), but I was pretty convinced no one was buying. And then I wondered (Is it any wonder?), will the show even go on?

Coronavirus Cancellation?

So what does one do? Well here were my five ideas:

I asked the Fox Theater in Oakland where they were at with the concert.
They did respond with “Hey Robert! Keane concert tonight is occurring as scheduled” along with an extensive message about how they were monitoring the situation, all the precautions they were taking, and the precautions I should take.
I posted on the Keane Facebook page which sparked a 31 comment debate about the virus and whether or not it was safe to go. Keane themselves did not reply.
I asked SeatGeek if they’d refund the money. You can imagine where that went.
I put in a disputed charge with American Express. That’s easy enough to do and believe it or not, Amex will often have your back.
Finally, when all else fails, what do you do? You ask your Mom…via text.

Now I knew for sure what to do!

The Show Must Go On?

So now it’s Monday, March 9th, the morning of the concert. Salesforce has just announced we’re officially going to work from home and the Coronavirus concerns are still heating up. It’s actually the morning that the Coronavirus cruise ship docks into the Port of Oakland!

What to do? What to do?

In times of uncertainty, you have to look for guidance from your leaders…

“Nothing is shut down, life & the economy go on.”

Well there you go…

…one other problem though. It’s Minoo’s knee. Can she really sit in a Fox Theater mezzanine seat for hours and/or have to stand up to see the show over other fans? That’s not likely going to work.

No problem! Shoot off a quick email to the Fox Theater, and boom! We’ve got ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) seats!

So by 7:00pm, with Lysol wipes and Purell in hand, we headed out to the Fox Theater in Oakland.

Neither of us had been to the Fox before, and we were so pleasantly surprised at what a beautiful, classic venue it is. It was built in 1928 and was apparently a movie theater before it was transformed to a 2,800 seat concert facility in 2009.

And the employees there was so helpful and nice. We went to the ADA liaison and they swapped out our Mezzanine seats for floor level ADA seating in standard chairs that allowed Minoo to stretch her legs and get up whenever she needed.

Check out the classic and unusual details…

So what about the concert? In short, one of the best we’ve ever seen!

It had been a long time since we had listened to Keane, so we weren’t sure what to expect. But did they ever deliver!

Lead singer Tom Chaplin has a beautiful voice - and was just a delight and so gracious throughout the night.

Keane’s a British band that hit it big around 2004 with their Hopes and Fears album. You can hear influences from U2, Coldplay, Queen, and Meat Loaf - and one of the things I love about them is the diversity of their sound, lyrics, and vocals.

shooting video

There isn’t a concert anyone’s attending these days where you don’t see everyone holding up their iPhones in unison to capture some footage. I’m sure most are posting snippets on their social networks. Some, like myself, are trying to capture our favorite songs to potentially edit and watch later.

Here are some obvious, but often violated, tips for shooting great mobile phone video:

Shoot in landscape. There’s a portrait orientation epidemic in this country which drives me crazy. There’s never a good reason to hold your phone upright when filming any videos. Do you watch any TV shows or movies with black bars on the sides? Take a look at your computer monitor and big screen TV - they all accommodate a landscape orientation. So turn that phone on its side and hold tight.
Hold steady. It’s OK to pan side to side as needed, but try to do it in a smooth fashion as not to make your video too jumpy.
Don’t zoom. It’s tempting to want to zoom to catch the lead singer bellowing the high notes. But unless your phone or camera has an optical zoom, you’re compromising resolution when you zoom. You can zoom and crop in post production when you edit your videos later.
Shoot B-roll. What the hell is B-roll? It’s anything else that provides context and variety to your video. In this case, I shot the marquee outside the Fox Theater. I could have taken some video of the crowd or some other details of the theater to add that extra B-roll flare.
Edit. That’s right, I said edit it. You can use iMovie, Davinci Resolve (it’s free!), or any other video editor. There are many you can use right on your phone as well. You can cut the waste, add text, transitions, crop, and zoom. On that last front, one of the things that can keep your viewers engaged is varying the crop and zoom throughout the video to replicate a change of camera angle.

So how do you decide just how much to capture? No easy answer. At this concert, there were a few favorites that I wanted to capture the entire song - and others at least the first verse and chorus run.

Here’s my edited video of the Keane concert. But there’s more to the story after it…

What about that Coronavirus?

So March 9th was pretty damn close to the Coronavirus becoming a pandemic. Keane had just performed shows in Portland on the 6th and, believe it or not, in Seattle on 7th at the height of the Coronavirus in that city! So they were quite aware of the Coronavirus risk as you can hear Tom Chaplin attest to here at the end of the night…

Lead singer Tom Chaplin talks about the Coronavirus cruise ship that docked in Oakland earlier that day. Check out drummer Richard Hughes reaction to this.

As it turned out, Keane traveled down to L.A. and performed at the Dolby Theater the next night. That would be their last show of North American tour. All told, they performed only 4 of the 15 shows scheduled.

And here’s the kicker from lead singer Tom Chaplin…

Can you believe it? He was never able to confirm for sure as apparently they would not test back in his home town in the UK unless you’re hospitalized.

Finally, here are some photos I grabbed during the show as well. One of the things I love about the iPhone is it’s fairly decent low light capabilities (iPhone 8 Plus) and the ability to take photos while shooting video.

In the End…

...was it worth it? Well, it’s been three weeks, so I am out of that Coronavirus incubation period. If I catch it now, it won’t have been from the concert. So what do you think? :-)

Even More

Keane, Live at the Dolby Theater. If you like what you heard, this guy recorded every song from the concert from almost the same perspective as me. I wondered how he got such great resolution when he zoomed. Turns out, he used this point and shoot camera (not his phone) which has a 10X optical zoom. Since it’s point and shoot, it doesn’t look like a professional camera - it blends in with the rest of people shooting on phones. Brilliant!

Rob’s Keane Spotify Playlist.