New beginnings.

Hello again.. It's been a while.. so whats been happening.. lost a job, no money, finished uni, need a job, need money.. nice how the world just goes around in a big circle and you end up where you started.

Got a degree, i take photos for a living.. what goods a piece of paper without a job... or a job without a piece of paper.. sigh.. who knows.. who cares.. anyways.. uni is done.. forever.. i hope.. its been a tough 3 years but everything is finished.. it feels weird.. no direction, no goal no objective to fullfil.. OH WELL... anyways.. back to what i was here to do.. got a new Macbook Pro.. is very nice.. 17" i7.. i like it.. need to give it a real work out.. but having said that.. Adobe premiere really kills it.. stupid Adobe..  well after taking lots of PJ doco shots i finally got the chance to take photos in which III wanted to take photos of.. was standing on my balcony this morning and noticed the small tree at the front of our house which was swarming with life. Bees, hover flies, wasps, birds.. everything..

anyways.. D3s, extension tubes, 50mm 1.8, speedlight. went out and took some snaps.

Can get pretty close to things with the extension tubes.. hardest part is tryna lock focus when you are that close to everything. luckily for a few shots it paid off. This is just one of those little moths which fly around fields and such like that. It was sitting on the head of one of those... wheat looking things.. i dunno.. next time you go for a walk you'll see them.. long bits of straw like things... yeah.. doesn't matter.. lol 

as mentioned earlier, the little hover flies.. you might have seen them around before.. te little things like dragon flies which just.. hover around and move shit fast. zig zagging thru the air.. hard to shoot these little bastards.. hard to focus on something that small and that fast. The extension tubes are tricky to focus with.. more like a magnifying glass and having to physically move back and forth to hit focus. Luckily he wasn't moving. 

Unlike this guy.. fluke.. i tell you that.. machine guy.. and wishful praying result in fluke shots like these.. got a few in focus in this sequence, but this one i liked the best, can see his wings. Have always wanted a shot of something in flight and with such detail.. was pretty lucky i guess.. but i suppose all photography is about luck.. well.. the amazing ones anyways.. Henri Cartier Bresson rings a bell.. luck, timing, patience.. whatever.. same shit.. uni's finished.. don't need to care anymore.. Had a bitta fill light in this to make him "pop" a little more. not bad.. will definitely try for more macro stuff later this year. love macro.. always have.. maybe should invest in a macro lens? 

And lastly.. took this one while taking Jack for a walk.. for those who are unfamiliar with Jack he is best friend. 4 legged, stupid faced big nosed and lanky legged best friend. WEll yeah... took this one while walking HIM and yeah... Jack likes walking but doesn't like waiting for me when i take photos.. lies there and barks at me if i don't walk around with him.. i thought this photo was too important to miss. This fly would have been.. half the size of a grain of rice in real life, if not smaller, shows to prove how close these extension tubes can get. Anyways i like the colour of it. so... nice.. 

Any hoo, thats all i had to show and share really.. have done some other free lancing work, one with an engineering firm, which i need to have screened before i can show you the images, and then another one with some architect wanting to start his own firm.. ah well.. we'll see.. anyways... that's it for now.. i'll blog a bit more soon i hope.. 

Ciao for now. 

P.s Jacks down there         

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Back from nothing..

Hello friends and whoever else reads this/.. yeah its been a while since i put anything up here, been busy working, and.. that's about it.. haven't shot in over a month which is NOT a good thing to do considering i'm graduating at the end of this year.. eek.. anyways.. this shoot was organised over 3 months ago, before i went on my trip to Japan. Had emailed Steg engineering as part of my series on industrial work places and thy were nice enough to reply and let me go down and have a shoot. Today was the day.. out in Hastings.. 65km out THAT way.. anyways.. photos.

First photograph i took was of this guy. Kevin aka Kev. top bloke, wanted to do a calendar shoot of the boys at Steg engineering after being inspired by the naked lady calendar hanging up at his work station. Felt strange shooting something.. i like.. after have a month off.. well.. since i got back from Japan really.. been doing a lot of video work.. but that's a different story.

 Kev asked if i wanted to hear something scream.. let this thing whirl for a while and it made a God awful screeching sound. i think he was enjoying himself.

 it was only a small workshop, would have been about 7 people in there max. They make most of the things for the steel company up the road, OneSteel i think it is.. oh well.. whatever.. they'd never let me shoot with them.

not so happy about this portrait.. sort of rushed it, probably should've taken more time with this one before i took it, most probably wont be using this one, i think the first portrait is a lot stronger and tells more than this one. But, we'll see. 

Quite like this photo as well. the series will be made up of about 4 images, so... i guess it'll be 4 out of these 8.. if there's 4 to be chosen.. i hope there is.. i think there is.. you cn make up your own minds on which ones you like or don't like.. anyways.. sent off like 10 emails last night.. got 1 reply.. "thanks for the email, great photos but we're not keen" sigh.. thanks for that... oh well, 1 down 9 to go.. lets hope i can get more before i graduate and time runs out.. need to print them too as well as other shit assignments.. ok... till next time..

Changas.

now that i'm back in the land of Oz

Hello all and now I am back home! has been a fantastic trip and i hope that my photos are enough to justify the beauty and essence of Japan. The assignment was initially to go and document the cultural and traditional heritage of Japan and the continual essence of their culture and history in a modern era they live in. Having an idea which thought to be, at the time, an easy and simple idea to complete, it turns out that Japan, although a country which still cherishes and harnesses its culture and traditions, is not completely enveloped with Geishas and girls in Kimonos. 

There were lots of Kimonos, but didnt see any geishas. My assignment took a slight tangent and ended up being a documentary on the cultural differences Japan has to Australia, a documentary on the life and the way the Japanese live their lives. Broad topic but... hopefully I had enough to cover it all.

just some random image which i quiet liked. Was outside the gates of Osaka castle, which you will see photos of soon..

What i found to be quite interesting about Japan is their continual interest and belief in traditional cultures and heritages. Yes, all the silver there is money.. i'd say alot of money.. in Japan the silver coins are 1, 50, 100, and 500 yen.. so... i wonder how many coins are of which amount haha i wanted to steal some of it...

Kimonos were everywhere.. everyone wears them and its amazing how its such an accepted style of clothing in Japan. in western cultures indifference is considered strange and unwanted, in Japan it seems this is acceptable and welcomed.  I've actually lost track of these photos.. so i'm just gonna put some random ones up in no particular order..

At Osaka castle there was a lantern festival, absolutely amazing, i'd say atleast 30000 candles where lined up all over the premises of the castle grounds, every candle had a wish written on it, its believed that if you write a wish and put it over the candles the spirits will take your wish and grant it for you.. was something to behold.. just amazing..

I could go on forever with these photos.. i'll leave it at that.. but it was amazing.. great night, great place.. wish i coulda taken a few people with me and experienced it with them.. sigh..

oh before i leave on Osaka castle, they had this awesome lantern walk. awesome.. the balloons were filled with little LED lights in there, amazing. 

Bikes everywhere in Japan, even ride them in shopping strips..

Not much to day tonight.. but that's enough of the images.. enjoy.. i'll post some more soon!

Chris.

Konichiwa?

Hello all.. so i've been in Japan lately for those who were wondering.. It's been a very interesting trip and its been very, VERY hot... mid to high 30's with high humidity.. good fun.. been sweating like i'm in a sauna, just drenched with sweat. Drinking a lot of water and my sweat just tastes like water.. maybe thats not good? hah who knows.. But yes.. hot and interesting.. In Kyoto at the moment and moving to Osaka soon, hopefully I get some good images and this trip has not just been a holiday.. The snaps i'm getting are alright but nothing has been amazing yet.. probably my expectations are too high.. Wont post too many images today.. just a small sample of what's been happening.. in no particular order..

Right... So that's a quick glimpse of the stuff i've been up to in the past.. 3 days.. time certainly flies.. Need to get a move on and start heading this doco into a more refined direction. The main idea was to focus on the traditions Japan still retains in this modern age we live in, it's a broad topic but I don't know.. we'll see how it goes.. I'm feeling okay after 3 days.. I should have something.. Moving to Osaka tomorrow and hopefully I can take it to the next level. 

Hope you enjoyed the sample. The main will be out soon!

Ciao ciao.

Chris. 

On a side note.. i've realized a lot of my work is looking more... martin parr-ish... as much as i hate to admit it.. maybe Donald was right.. 

Car Wreckers

SO as part of my ongoing assignment with the industrial portraits, I went to visit a car wreckers the other day and got a few snaps there. It turned out okay I suppose.. nothing amazing and i'm starting to think that this series may just be a lost cause... but we'll see how we go.. Had a chat to the teacher about my series and he suggested I do them as like.. mini series of images and not just to focus on the portraits.. different but we'll see how it turns out.. 

So I tried it out at the car wreckers and I'm not sure what I think yet but maybe as a collaborative it'll look better..

I really wanted a nice portrait of this guy, but too bad he was camera shy and refused to have a photo taken of him standing there.. woulda looked really good.. but what can you do.. take what you can.. bit annoyed.. 

Pile of these cares stacked up which I thought was quite interesting.. was a miserable wet and muddy day as you can tell by the mud all over the place.. it's hard to capture whats there.. so much going on it's almost too much visual information to absorb through the camera, which is a bizarre thing as a photographer to experience.. not good.. 

This bad boy was pretty cool. It's amazing how powerful these things were, just picked this car up and threw it around, punched through it like nothing was there, absolutely amazing. Snapped away at this bad boy for a while watching him dispose of cars and pick out parts from the car as skillfully as a surgeon would. 

Wish i was really good at editing photos.. this photo reminds me of an almost... Crewdson-esque photo.. okay maybe not.. no where near.. i lack his talent, lighting and editing skills.. and most importantly the big budgets.. but anyways.. if I have time i'd edit this just for lols.

Probably the best lot of the series.. which isn;t saying much about the quality of my portraits.. shit.... this was a really nice guy, he offered to be my model which made me happy, save me from busting my balls and getting rejected by people, top bloke.

Not a fan of this portrait.. there was a lot in this shed which I wanted to document, but having uncooperative people does not help when you want to take portraits. They just wanna shoot and scoot, no time to fix anything up.. I wanted portraits.. I tell the people at these places.. I want portraits.. set up shots.. nice lighting like I did at the boat builders.. these guys... they all expect me to walk around and get a portrait within 20 seconds.. fkn ey.. I should probably demand more.. I need an assistant to hold lights for me so I can have nice lighting instead of always having to rely on natural lighting.. I like flash.. these people don't give me the time to do so.. shit.

I quite like this image and it's probably a pretty good image to finish the series on.. I wont use all the photos for these mini series, Jerry (teacher) reckons 4 images max for these minisodes.. 1 portrait, 1 working, 1 detail and 1 overall image.. I hope i've covered everything in my shoot on the day and I'll just have to go back and sort out the onces i want.. sigh sight.. more to come.. hopefully.

Chris.

More portraits..

Its been a busy few weeks. Writing emails, getting responses and then.. they decide not to help me anymore.. not very good.. bit annoyed about that.. I need to chase people up and make them give me an answer.. are you helping me or not.. don't say you are then stop writing back to me.. whatever.. I don't care.. well.. I do.. Anyways..

Went to Harrops today, some engineering company who specialize in car parts, making all this stuff which I know nothing about but.. yeah.. Was a pretty quick shoot and not exactly what I wanted.. I was after a more.. how we say.. structured style of shooting like back at the boat builders, these guys were a bit rushed and some of them didn't want their photos taken. It was ok, I got a few images. A lot of the people were like"why are you taking my photo" "who are you?" "where are you from?" all the typical shit.. Sorta walked around the factory floor with a guy and he walked around asking people if they wanted a photo or not, and when they agreed they were nervous and timid, left me not time, shoot and scoot. Hopefully some of them worked, didn't use any external lights, all natural lights.. well... natural artificial lights, which leave a disgusting colour cast and some shit weird colour banding.. 

I didn't use this photo for obvious reasons, but that's the shit banding thing or whatever you wanna call it from the fluro lights, I have a feeling its just the different wave lengths of light emitting from the fluro lights which gives crazy colours. If I shoot in quick succession you don't see the light, or if i over expose 1/3rd a stop its ok. Anyways, i'll show you some proper photos from the day.

I quite like this one but i'm not sure if it counts as a portrait considering you can't see his face.. I still like it. 

Shot a few more photos than these but I think these are the ones which probably worked out the best. I'm probably gonna have to re-edit a couple of those photos like the 2 in the middle, i think they might be a little hot and over-exposed a bit. But yeah.. I dunno.. Kinda wanting to do a few more portraits of industrial workers just to see how this whole series is going to work out. I'm really keen on the car yard to get back to me.. which he hasn't.. after i met him last week and he said he'd call me.. or the OTHER one who told me to call him, i left him 3 messages and still no call back... shit... it's too hard to organize these shoots, i've sent out like 10 emails to different places and only a handful have replied back... what can you do... i'll probs have to chase people up.. anyways.. that's it for now.

Chris.

Babies babies

So you're gonna think.. babies.. this will be interesting, and you are correct. It was probably the first time i've actually enjoyed shooting a baby.. strange i know. This family had contacted me months ago and I had never known how they got onto my website to send me a message to shoot their little baby.

I haven't shot kids since I first started shooting which was over 5 years ago now.. time flies.. i'm starting to feel old.. When I first started shooting babies I had no idea what I was doing and honestly.. I still didn't today, was very nervous to say the least. Arrived at the Doshi's and I asked how they found my website, turns out the mother, Dee, is now a stay at home mum who likes to surf the web and somehow came along flickr, and then RMIT photographers on Flickr... Found me and sent me a message.. what are the odds? 

But having said that, lovely family. Really, no bullshit. So like I was saying, nerves. Already being nervous and worried about how to shoot the "kid" I realized I left my trusty 70-200 at home.. SHIT! okay okay.. relax.. plan B.. use what I have.. 28-70 + 50 1.8.. this could work.. well.. it has to.. I have no choice.. 

So.. started with the 50mm wide open.. yeah nice look nice photos but foolish.. focus can be a little off. Luckily enough the out of focus ones weren't too bad that they were unusable, this being an example of that. We actually started shooting outdoors but.. I liked this photo, so I put it at the front.. sue me..

The weather was relatively nice this morning so we thought it'd be a good idea to get a few shots outdoors, as some of you know, I'm not a fan of.. indoorsy, staged looking portraits.. it's probably the doco photographer in me. Again another shot with the 50mm wide open. Love the shallow DOF on FX. yum. 

I really like this photo for some reason.. maybe its the framing, maybe its a sense of fragility in mothers arm.. I don't know.. it's most probably cos of the bokeh that makes me like it. 

Now before you go and start screaming child abuse.. Sidi enjoyed being up in the air hence the smile on the face. Really nice parents, really nice guys, been in Aus for 5 years. used to live in NZ, they were there for 7 years. Spoke english really well.. I thought he was gonna be a cab driver, my ignorant naivety, he isn't a cab drive.. 

I really like this photo, something very special about this photo. Bit of mother, child love. I like it. I wish I had a photo like this with my mother.. sigh.. oh well.. Really digging the 50mm lens, I think it works well as a general purpose lens, maybe be a bit short in some circumstances, but overall I think its a good 'go to' lens if you're out doing a few portraits. The 28-70 is good too but.. for portraits.. I dunno.. which is ironic cos I used the 28-70 yesterday with my other portraits...

Good way to finish off this post, a nice family photo. Great parents, great kid. Sidhant aka Sidi, cute kid, didn't cry, didn't hissy fit. I like that. Shot a shit load on this shoot.. 355 images in 2.5hrs.. I normally only shoot 250-300 when I do weddings.. eek.. something wrong there.. Always good when you get paid for a shoot    =]  

Anyways, no more shoots for a while I don't think.. unless those bastard industrial people get back to me.. it's been 2-3 weeks.. worst.. might have to make some executive decisions and just call people and force an answer out of them.. ANYWAYS.. till then,

Chris.