I was going to put up a wedding from a few weeks ago, but I’m doing Sophie and Joe’s album at the moment. They are a good looking, modest pair of stylish individuals who ….. look on second thoughts I think I can just let the photo’s tell you the rest.
Brisbane Wedding photographer, artistic wedding photographer. Hillstone, Brisbane wedding photojournalism,
(Wednesday, 10 March 2010)
This little story and the photographs were previously published in the Sydney Morning Herald’s Good Weekend Travel Section in 2001.
Our luggage was being taken by someone we didn’t know. Four of us strung out in single file in a sweating procession along the hot and sleepy main street of Fang. Our Lonely Planet guide to Thailand told of the bus from Chaing Mai to Fang, the taxi from Fang to Tha Ton, and the boat from Tha Ton to Chaing Rai…but not about Mr Phing and his tricycle.
His initiative was admirable. At the bus stop he’d came up to us and said “Tha Ton” and when we nodded, he picked up our bags threw them on his trike and headed off.
He pedaled just fast enough to prevent us from catching up unless we broke into a trot. Over his shoulder he conversed in English that was better than our Thai…..
“which cunree you fhom”?
“australia”
“ahhh astaya nice…how many kangaroo astaya”?
“millions”?
“ahhh meeons…he your husban”?
“Yes”
“you vehy lucky….vehy hansome man?
Our new friends’ judgment was thrown into further doubt when he assured out of the blue
“John Howard nice man, I…love…John Howard”
On the edge of town the trike turned down a dusty side road, stopping only because we did.
“maybe you have some eat,…cool jink, some rets,….feewl better”
“No you said you take luggage…Fang Hotel, we follow…we wait Fang Hotel
..get taxi Tha Ton”
“yeh yeh first you feewl better…hod day…jink, eat”
“where?”
“my pace!”
Just in time the taxi pulled up beside us and the driver glared at Mr Phing who finally surrendered.
His eyebrows lifted as if he finally understood “oh you go Tha ton taxi ?!”
I liked his style.
Photo documentary, Photojournalism, Brisbane Photographer
(Wednesday, 10 March 2010)
I have to confess I love Moby Dick without being able to understand it. It’s mainly read as a rollicking sea yarn of a man’s quest for revenge which ultimately destroys not only him but everything around him. It’s worthy of great book status for the way it tells that parable alone.
Best of all though are the chapters in between the narrative that are contemplations on different aspects of whaling. Somehow Herman Melville manages to make each essay profoundly relevant to the experience of existing which is common ground to all.
The photograph below was selected for exhibition in last years Schubert Ulrich (the what? I hear you say). It’s a straight street photograph and I submitted the quote from the chapter called “The Fountain” as my artist’s statement. It’s basically saying seeing is not believing but Melville’s use of language, well it gets me in!
Imagine two people talking, and one asks the other to describe the spout.
“But why pester one with all this reasoning on the subject? Speak out! You have seen him spout; then declare what the spout is; can you not tell air from water?
My dear sir, in this world it is not so easy to settle these plain things. I have found your plain things the knottiest of all. And as for this whale spout, you might almost stand in it, and yet be undecided as to what it is precisely.”
Art Photography, Street Photography, Was Herman Melville the first Post Modernist without knowing it?
(Wednesday, 10 March 2010)
Phillip Adams often jokes on Late Night Live that he only has one listener and she’s called Gladys. I used to think it was just Gladys and me with this website. Ten weeks ago the site traffic began to be monitored.
Since then 170 visitors have been more than 15 times, 96 have been over 26 times and 34 have been over 51 times. One hundred and seventy three visitors have spent more than 30 minutes at a time on the site looking at 10+ pages.
I’m not sure what is usual but it was a surprise because I didn’t think you cared at all Gladys. So thanks but would be nice though if the relationship developed into a two way thing. I won’t get my hopes up, let’s just wait and see.
(Wednesday, 10 March 2010)
I usually avoid thinking of the wedding I’m about to photograph, but driving to Kristy and Steve’s it was different.
On the way through Tewantin I called in on a friend who I hadn’t seen for 30 years. She is the mother of a family I stayed with sometimes on school holidays and our lives were loosely entwined for pretty much all my teenage years. Rose showed me a photo album full of old photographs from the seventies and eighties. Amongst them where ones that were either washed out, contrasty, faded, scratched or out of focus. It’s funny though, they all had the same transporting effect and all bought up palpable feelings of long forgotten times and places.
Afterwards as I headed down to Perigian I thought that’s exactly what I want my wedding photo’s to be about. That humble little photo album packed so much emotional wallop and it reconfirmed with me the choices I make and priorities I have when shooting a wedding (and afterwards during editing). In thirty years I don’t want anyone looking at wedding photo’s I’ve taken and say “wasn’t the photographer clever, look how perfect everything is” or “what beautiful light”. I’d much rather they say affectionately to each other “look at us, that’s how we were”. Don’t get me wrong I value good technique and love stylish portraiture, but if I’m not getting the real stuff too, then it’s a missed opportunity.
Real wedding photography, Noosa, Perigian, Tewantin 2008
(Wednesday, 24 February 2010)