This afternoon, I was at one of London’s best surviving jazz clubs, the legendary ‘606 Club‘ in deepest Chelsea (yah). Its stage has been graced by some of the genre’s finest since the late ’70s, so it’s always a pleasure to get close to the action in this very intimate venue. The subject of this shot is Tracey Campbell, the lead singer of the Gospel Jazz band that was playing, and the owner of an impossibly-accurate, tremendously powerful voice, captured in front of the club’s iconic backdrop, bisected by the piano’s brass-edged lid.

Apart from a chance to get some cool artistic shots of artists being artistic, I considered this my first proper road-test of the EOS 5D mk 3’s supposedly ‘exceptional light sensitivity’. Jazz clubs are dark at the best of times, but 606 has truly awful lighting – uneven, hot, patchy and ultimately unforgiving! With the proprietor preferring ‘no flash’, it was a tough ask! BUT I think the sensor has demonstrated why there’s a £1,000 step up between the mk 2 and the mk 3. Forgetting the autofocus upgrade and the video superiority, the just-invented ‘noise-to-light-sensitivity’ ratio looks awesome. Manageable noise, good contrast performance, no sensor blips, and a great preservation of detail. Victory – I will never again fear a venue for its lighting!

Shot on a Canon EOS 5D mk3, 70-200mm lens at 118mm, f 4.0, ISO 6400, 1/50 sec.