Melbourne Spring Fashion Week (MSFW) 2008 - Backstage

Make up, hair styling and choreography...
This is Kevin Murphy, responsible for hair styling. He has a whole army of people following him, taking instructions from him and learning from him. Likewise for make up, Napoleon. They only have a couple of hours (between 4pm and 6pm) to get both the hair and make up done before the parades.

First picture is Sally Graham, the face of Melbourne Spring Fashion Week and Kevin Murphy.

The choreographer (the one writing on her notepad) is hard at work in the last photo. Sorry, I don't know her name. I think she must have dancing background and her work is amazing.

Melbourne Spring Fashion Week (MSFW) 2008 - Opening Party

Spent a week photographing the Melbourne Spring Fashion Week. It was an unreal experience. I am still trying to work through the mountain of pictures I took.

These shots were taken at the exclusive VIP opening party at Silk Road, a very beautiful venue indeed. So much was happening I almost missed the first picture (and the food). I love the costumes, the colours and the flowers.

I felt so small standing amongst really great photographers. Thank you everyone who shared the platform with me and Caz for giving me such a fantastic opportunity. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.


This picture was taken across the bar which must have been at least 20m away. Thank God that it is still sharp. It is cropped obviously.

Don't they look absolutely stunning!

NAB Gala Ball 2008

This is the NAB annual ball I was invited to and thought I was to attend as a photographer... Thank you Jill for the invitation! What a great experience. It was much much better lit than the last time I was there (for the NAB's All Teams Event). All the tables are wired with optical fibre lights and they all light up together and changed colour together (or in waves), just like my optical Xmas tree, in a gigantic scale. Very nice. Just to show you the white balance on the camera was correct, here are a few photos taken at the same place.

The band was great. With four big subwoofers coupled in pairs on each side. There was an array of colourful stage lights, very hot colours, very electric - fantastic and led many to let their hair down and dance to their tunes on the dance floor. A wonderful photographer's playground.

I started shooting in front of the band at the start, then on the sides in front of the subs (and went partially deaf and physically shaking because of the earthshaking thumping bass) and eventually on the stage with the band... This was definitely the highlight to me for the evening.

She is perfect wife material. Just look at how she prepares the food for her partner as he quietly wait.
Very sorry to people who shared table with me because I was hardly there during the whole evening. I only managed to have the main course - Beef Wellington stew I think it was. Skipped entree, desert and everything else. Boy, the desert looked great but I had so much fun on the dance floor (photographing), I didn't even take a picture of it.

Who thought working for a bank can be so much fun?

Tasmania

Spent a few days in Tasmania (Hobart) with my dear wife and a few friends. It was cold and wet at times. Thank God that my camera stood up well against water amongst other elements. These are pictures of the piers around Sullivans Cove at dawn, mid-day and after dark. The after dark photo was taken from inside the hotel which has some reflection at the bottom right corner. Wish I noticed it before downloading it.

I was most captivated by the many sandstone buildings in Hobart. They are so pretty.

We stayed at the Hotel Grand Chancellor right in front of the Victoria Dock, a popular hotel for holding conferences. We noticed a number of "opportunities" for the hotel. Unfortunately, we didn't have the chance to name them. They were nice to offer us a portable heater when we reported the one in the room didn't work. And, it was fairly quiet after a while. 8*)

There are many attractions such as historical prisons like Port Arthur, Tahune air-walk, tessellated pavement (a natural phenomenon), national parks, waterfalls, curry scallop pie, tasty and fresh Blue-eyed Trevella fish, etc, etc. Start booking your holiday in Tassie! Suggest hiring a car to drive around with. Watch the speed limits. GPS works like a treat in Tassie especially around the many one way streets of Hobart.

Butterflies & Meerkats at the Melbourne Zoo

It has been over a month since my last confession (I mean post). Been sick with a dry cough for over a month, and I just came back from a short holiday in Tasmania (which helped me to recover a great deal). Anyway, want to post a few pictures to share with everyone.

First topic is Melbourne Zoo. Those of you who followed my blog would know that I went there in March. One picture I sadly missed then was picture of butterflies. This was my priority one this time. Unfortunately, I quickly learnt that it was not easy. I don't have a macro lens, didn't know how to follow these butterflies and other useful information (I later learnt) for this kind of photography. Anyway, here is one of them. Hope you enjoy it. It has been enhanced.

The tiger and dolphin enclosures were closed but there were a number of other really interesting attractions like lion feeding, female elephants fighting over a male elephant. Watch out for them when you plan to visit the Melbourne Zoo.

I love the look of these little meerkats. They are real exhibitionists. Enjoy.

Alfred Deakin Innovation Lectures 2008

Spent almost two weeks shooting Alfred Deakin Lectures 2008. Most lectures were held at BMW Edge at Federation Square in the CBD. There were a few held out of town and one at Melbourne Town Hall also. I must say I was skeptical at first thinking to myself how boring it was going to be shooting lectures and academics...

Well, to my surprise, they were (most of them anyway) were very stimulating lectures. For examples, exploring the possibility of regeneration which is only possible with liver and our muscles in human compared with such as worms, star fish and some lizards which have much greater regeneration power. Clear zebrafish being the new lab rat for the 21st century, being completely clear, makes it very easy to study... The topics were very diversified - biology, technology, computing, web, art, human rights, urban, transport, space travel, ethics, climate change, etc. Of course, sustainability is the buzz word on everyone's lips. There were international speakers, older respected speakers as well as voices from some of the smartest young people of this generation.

There were lectures as well as debates. To sum it up, I feel my mind has been challenged and innovation is working in me! Of course, I have learnt a few new things about photography also.

OK, about the pics, the first two are basically of the venue to show you how amazing looking BMW Edge is. The picture may look better cropped to give a more panoramic view...

The third picture is of former deputy prime minister of Australia Tim Fischer. He was great to photograph - so much expressions. Well, that's because he is a passionate advocate for rail transport that he was speaking on.

The last is one of the young voices, Larissa Brown. She helped to save a forest in Costa Rica! I will leave it as an exercise for you to find out more about her work if you are keen.

Sorry, no technical details on the pics... this post is long enough as it is. No post processing was made and most were taken at very high ISO to keep shutter speed high for sharp result.

Thank you NAB

Received a gift voucher from NAB as recognition for my photography work. A Michaels camera store gift voucher of a generous value. Thank God for it because it is my first financial recognition of my work. Thank God that I was able to bless a senior friend, Don, and he purchased a camera for his dear wife with it. Mum Beth, hope you take loads of amazing pics with it.

OK, what about these pics? I was the event photographer for a big technology event - All Teams Event 2008 - for NAB and Docklands.

Many hundreds of people were there and I was excited to be able to roam about without restriction being the official photographer. The even more exciting thing is that it was held at Peninsula, Shed 14 at Central Pier, Docklands. It is big and had been used for fashion parade/s and many other big events.

Unfortunately, it was set up to be much darker than in their website. You would understand what I mean if you compare the photo above and this. It was a challenging venue. Of course that was no-body's bad. Lighting was appropriate for the occasion.

Given that it was not a public event, all pictures taken are the property of NAB, I could only show you these two photos. Hope you like them.