Burn Worship – Experimental Edit

A photographer contacted me and asked if I needed help that night with taking photos at a Sean Feucht concert. He’s the director of the prayer ministry ‘Burn’ and was taking part in a worship jam night at my church Crestwood Vineyard in Oklahoma city.

I captured some thirty minutes of footage on my DSRL, then later that night went up to the studio piecing a rough cut together. Decided to upload it to Facebook after a few minor tweaks and within twenty-four hours it got nearly a thousand views and countless comments.

I handed my photographer friend a camera and told him ‘just to go rapid’ with any creative shots. In conjunction with taking photos, I used another camera for video. In the few hours that the concert played, we bobbed from one direction of the church to the to other trying to find the best angle, view and other spots to get perspective.

I was shooting to edit, and my thought process was wanting to look raw, gritty and un-polished.

Cranking up the ISO at the maximum that the 5D could go, shooting at 1080, and also timing the worship music with slight camera moves back and forth knowing the final product would be mostly in slow motion. We used no camera stabilization, just all hand held.

Two things came to mind as I was getting shots. I wanted to put the practice into play of shooting through objects and making almost an out-of-focus gradient.

The other, was studying the room, seeing the flow of always keeping the camera moving..

Wanted to capture how big the sanctuary was, the windows, the ceiling, and get across the idea that these people had been here for hours, gathered in fellowship, and didn’t care what time of day it was, even in the middle of night, and just engulfed in the mystical presence of the electrifying worship. I looked at people raising hands, bowing, praying et. in timing and rhythm of the rest of what was going on. then walk back a few paces and focus the camera onto one subject in the room and pan to the real action I was after.

As I was studying the bongo players, the burn worshipers started their progression in front of the stage holding giant flags of colors waving around in a circular pattern worshiping with the musicians on stage. These flags were really cool to shoot through!

The entire night was sporadic, and really no pre-planning. Just a keen eye and good imagination!