Manual focus and concert photography, anyone pulled it off?

[kevinmanuel]

HI,

I really want an 85mm f/1.4 AF lens. I can’t afford an 85mm f/1.4 AF lens, but I can afford a MF one.
I want to use it for concert photography, which I’ve recently got hooked on (I’m currently using a 50mm f/1.8 AF)Question is, does MF have a place in the world of concert photography where the band is usually moving around? Has anyone here pulled it off successfully?

Please help.

I did not find the right solution from the internet.

References:-
https://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=1185038
Digital content production agency

Thanks

[will859]

If you treat it like sports or street photography, you can manually focus on a spot and wait for the band to come to you. Red highlight focus peaking in the EVF can be a help too (instead of the default white).

But to answer your question, I haven’t pulled it off. hahahahahha

[sebjjp]

Hey! It’s definitely possible, but just takes practise - I was shooting for a friend’s band recently and relied mostly on manual focus using my X-H1 and the 50mm F2. I found the autofocus really struggled win the dark and changing lights, but I just used focus peaking and predicted where band members would be! A few example shots:

Good luck with it!