Lights, camera... /  by Mario Mirabile

My Christmas present to myself last year was my first pieces of studio lighting gear. Nothing fancy though - just two light stands, a couple of umbrellas and a few cheap radio triggers. Together with the flashes I already had, it's possible to create quite sophisticated lighting effects on a  budget. The obvious advantage of the cheap and cheerful umbrella is the soft spread of light it produces and the corresponding softening of shadows. It also has it's limitations though, particularly in the way it spills light into the background of the image. If you want to get really serious, there's an almost endless array of equipment (just try Googling "studio lighting equipment") to help you get the perfect shot if you have the money, space and inclination.  As I'm not about to leap headlong into studio portraiture I'll just have to make do with what I've got.

I'd been itching to give the gear a good workout out for since I got it. I have a request from friends to do some family portraits soon, so I wanted to make sure I understand how everything works. I've been doing some reading, but for me the information doesn't jell until I've actually put it into practice.  The other members of my household are always reluctant - at best - to let me use them as guinea pigs for my photographic experiments, but my friend Rob is always a willing subject.

Rob suffers from Stinson Syndrome. For those not familiar with the sitcom "How I Met Your Mother", one of the characters - Barney Stinson - is imbued with such awsomeness that it's impossible to take a bad photo of him. Rob seems to have the same problem. He has a naturally relaxed manner that just seems to come through in any photo of him. I'm really pleased with the results, and surprised at how little fuss was required to get them. Of course there's a downside. As a photographer himself, Rob's payback was that I had to pose for him. Unfortunately, I don't share Rob's affliction, so I won't be showing any of those shots here.

Timing is everything /  by Mario Mirabile

Street photography as a genre involves the observation and capture of people in public places. Because it's not staged it requires a keen eye - or  a good dose of luck - to capture an interesting and transient moment in time. Henri Cartier-Bresson, perhaps the greatest exponent of this art, called it the "decisive moment", the fraction of a second  which captured and expressed the significance of an event.

Like comedy then, timing is everything in street photography. We can't all be Cartier-Bresson, but we can keep our eyes open, our wits about us and hope for a dose of luck. You could perhaps set your camera on high speed multi-shot mode to improve your chances of getting the shot, but I think that's cheating and not faithful to the traditions of the craft. 

You have to be prepared for the fact that it won't always come off. The first shot demonstrates a shot that was nearly sensational. I was watching the young man on my favorite steps and saw the girl approaching, but wasn't quick enough to adjust my zoom, framing and focus. Even so, had I hit the shutter just a second later, the juxtaposition of the boy, girl and the direction of his furtive gaze would have resulted in what I'm certain would have become an iconic image of the genre. Instead I have a shot just like the ones taken by your aunt which always had peoples heads cut off.

In the second photo, what caught my eye was the window and the way it framed the interaction of the two men. The woman inside the cafe, who was clearly not part of the conversation, gave a secondary point of interest to the scene. I got off a couple of shots, but as I was focusing on the men, I didn't notice the woman had hidden behind the magazine until I reviewed the images on my computer. I don't really know why - perhaps it's the implied indifference of the magazine reading woman or expression of the boy on the cover - but I think it's a more interesting image that the shots where she's visible. A a bit of observation, a bit of timing, a bit of luck. It all works.

Iced tea /  by Mario Mirabile

The stairs at the Bourke Street entrance to Southern Cross Station make a great photographic location. The symmetry of the steps and the bold lines created by the handrails create a strong backdrop which can transform relatively simple subjects.

I was outraged last week when I saw that my subtle studio backdrop had been transformed into a garish advertising hoarding. After staring in disgust at the brightly colored stickers that had been applied to the stair risers for a while, I figured I might as well go with the flow. Every subject I've shot on these stairs till now has come up really well in black and white, but the real in your face effect of the new color scheme screams out for a full blown dose of high saturation.

I suspect that having discovered this new source of income, the station authorities won't allow the stairs to return to their pristine unpolluted state. Anyone for iced tea?

Quick change /  by Mario Mirabile

 Melbourne is renowned for its changeable weather. An old joke suggests that if you're not happy with the weather, just wait ten minutes. While that's a slight exaggeration, when the weather does change, the changes can be rapid and quite dramatic, particularly in summer. Days of searing heat can be ended by a south-westerly  wind change which will drop the temperature 20° in 15 minutes. Storm fronts can dump flooding rain and whip up destructive winds and be gone in 15 minutes.

Modern weather radar can give advance warning of some of the more dramatic and photogenic weather events. Sunday's forecast warned of a windy change about the middle of the day, so I kept an eye on the radar with the intention of going down to a bayside location I'd scouted a couple of months earlier to catch the action. I could see a rain band approaching mid afternoon so I took off with my gear. It didn't look too severe, but I was still hoping for some dramatic shots.

Red Bluff is an aptly named feature on Port Phillip near Black Rock. At around 30 metres high it's not very big, but very prominent due to its color which makes it stand out from the surrounding cliffs. This was the first time I'd been to the base and I scrambled around getting some shots before the show started. Within half an hour, the blue skies and fluffy clouds were replaced by leaden overcast, strong winds and threat of rain. I was hoping the front would roll in at a good angle to allow a good composition of both rocks and weather, but it came in over the bay to the west and I couldn't get a position from which the juxtaposition was possible. The line of ragged low cloud made for good shooting in any case, so I grabbed a few shots before retreating up the beach in time to avoid being soaked.

A tale of two stations /  by Mario Mirabile

Melbourne has an extensive suburban rail system, and despite the best efforts of a string of  governments to corporatise, privatise and generally run the system into the ground, it remains a pivotal part of Melbourne life. The network radiates from central Melbourne like a giant octopus spreading it's tentacles to the outer suburbs, and at the centre of the beast lies Flinders Street Station.

A railway station has existed on the site at the corner of Flinders and Swanston Streets since the 1850's, although the current building was completed in 1910. A classically decorative building adorned with elaborate facades and domes and a clock tower at it's main entrances, it quickly became a Melbourne icon. Successive renovations, the addition of modern technology and the invasion of retail outlets have eroded it's classic appeal, but it retains many fine features such as the portico at the Swanston Street entrance. For more than 100 years, Melburnians have arranged to meet "under the clocks" at this entrance, and although the clocks are no longer an accurate indication of train departure times, they still make a fine meeting place.

At the other end of the style scale sits Parliament Station. Constructed in the 1970's as part of the underground loop built to extend the rail service to other parts of the central city, it's style could best be described as utilitarian. It works well enough, but I've never heard anyone express any affection for it, and certainly no one meets there unless they absolutely have to.

Room service /  by Mario Mirabile

I've been doing longer walks as part of my hip rehab, and I'm determined to try to get in at least a 2 or 3 kilometer walk each day. Now that I'm back at work after the Christmas/new year break, I'll be looking for back streets I haven't explored yet, however even familiar paths can turn up interesting sights if you keep your eyes open.

I spotted the guy showing off on his new mountain bike but wasn't ready to get the shot. Fortunately he obliged by doing another loop just to make sure his suspension was properly dialed in. At 333 Collins St, an eatery I haven't noticed before occupies the portico, and looks a very nice place to enjoy a meal on a fine day.

The strangest thing that caught my eye however was a dilapidated pair of shoes outside a building in Little Bourke St. It used to house a power station, and while the front of the building has been redeveloped while retaining parts of the original structure, I don't know the current purpose of the rear part where these shoes were. This section presents an imposing, if odd face to the street. There are several sets of tall basalt columns, each supporting a short flight of steps leading to a portico with a blank steel door. There's nothing unusual about a discarded pair of old shoes, but these were place neatly together, the laces undone, just next to one of the entrances. They seemed so carefully placed that my first thought was that they were a permanent part of the grill on which they sat, some sort of bronze street art.

They were, however, just shoes, left perhaps in the hope that room service would collect, clean and return them pristine for the owner's first meeting of the day. 

The daze of Christmas /  by Mario Mirabile

After the mad pre-Christmas rush and the pleasant excess of Christmas Day, the period between Christmas Day and new year is a time to let the year unwind gently. OK, you may be unfairly burdened by having to work, or foolishly caught up in the post-Christmas sales mania, but there are rewards for those wise enough to take it easy.

A pleasant brunch at Rickett's Point followed by a walk and spot of bird watching is a good start. If you have the time and inclination to drop a line in the bay, you'll find it quite relaxing as you're unlikely to be burdened by the tedium of having to clean any fish. After all, it's called "fishing" and not "catching" for a reason.

By the time new year's eve rolls round, you'll have recharged the batteries and, with luck, stay awake past 10:00 PM.

Have a great New Year.

One for the pugilists /  by Mario Mirabile

Cricket is a curious game in which a match lasting five days may not produce a winner. It is a summer staple in Australia, and one of the great events on Melbourne's sporting calendar is the Boxing Day cricket test. On a day where people really people should be recovering from their Christmas feasts, tens of thousands routinely make the pilgrimage to the MCG to sit in the sun, consume copious quantities of amber fluid and cheer on their national heroes. When the adversary is the old enemy England, the numbers swell dramatically.

England had soundly beaten Australia in recent confrontations and seemed to have a solid grip on The Ashes (surely the most curious major sporting trophy in the world). They arrived in Australia expecting to continue the victory march, but by the time of the Melbourne test had already lost the first three matches of the five test series, and with them, The Ashes.

Despite the result of this match being irrelevant to the outcome of the series, a world record 91,000 people attended the first day. These images are from day two, attended by a mere 78,000. Over the four day course of the match, which Australia won to go 4-0 up, nearly 300,000 people marched through the gates. Just another average week for the Melbourne sporting fanatic.

The mad rush (or the city on Christmas Eve....) /  by Mario Mirabile

Christmas Eve in the city is a mix of furious last minute shopping, end of year celebratory wining and dining and school children let loose on summer break.

The retail store employees are a bit confused, caught between serving customers intent on finding appropriate stocking stuffers and preparing for the crazy onslaught of the post-Christmas sales. The Myer Christmas window display continues to attract large crowds with a queue more than 100 meters long patiently waiting their turn to get a close look at this year's spectacular: "Gingerbread Friends", a tableau loosely based on the tale of the gingerbread man. Dazed shoppers for whom the whole experience has become too much stare blankly into the street awaiting the excitement of the Boxing Day cricket test to snap them back to reality. Santa's elves, their toymaking tasks completed for another year, frolic outside his house in the warm sunshine before returning to the North Pole, and even one of his reindeer escapes to wander among the crowds.

Once your own personal rush abates, I wish you all the best for a happy and peaceful Christmas and a wonderful new year.

It's moments like these... /  by Mario Mirabile

Our friend Anne had been reminding me for months that I had been negligent in fulfilling my duties as official photographer to Minty, their two year old Japanese Spitz. I finally agreed to do a portrait session once my hip had recovered sufficiently and as we were invited to dinner on Friday, I thought it might be a good opportunity. The light was OK if a bit dull and Anne had recently mowed my studio (a very pleasant lawn area edged with a low box hedge and agapanthus in flower), so it looked like we might have a good session.

Minty, like many small dogs, is a very social and excitable creature and after our arrival it was a while before she settled sufficiently for our session to begin. Action shots were difficult as the light was fading and she was still quite active, but she managed to keep still long enough for me to get some good portrait shots.

For those of you not steeped in Australian culture and wonder what the title of this post is all about, see here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minties .

A backyard tragedy /  by Mario Mirabile

When I got home, Trish told me a fledgling wattle bird had fallen out of it's nest in one of our trees. It sat around squawking for attention as I got a few shots off. I was trying not to get too close, but it seemed completely unconcerned by my presence. It appeared healthy, and was able to fly short distances without getting too far off the ground, but certainty unable to fly back to its nest. 

Watching from a distance, the parents (assuming it was them)  were in a nearby tree, calling but not coming down. I offered it a couple of worms from the compost on the end of a stick, but it wasn't interested. Clearly a well bought up child, knowing not to accept treats from strangers. Eventually it flapped off behind the shed, and we flapped off to our dinner, hoping all would be well.

I had a quick look around the next morning before leaving for work, but saw no trace of it. Trish called later to say she'd found it dead near the shed. I hope our interest didn't scare off the parents, but I guess it's the usual fate of chicks in similar circumstances, either in the wild or in the back yard.

Friday 13th - not a horror story /  by Mario Mirabile

One of the good things about working in the Melbourne CBD is that there's an endless supply of photographic opportunities. It can be hit and miss as to whether I come up with something interesting and much depend on the light, my mood and just how well I'm reacting to the passing parade. 

I took to the streets on Friday 13th looking for inspiration for the first two club competitions of 2014 - "Alleys and Laneways" and "River Transport". I expect alleys to be swamped with street art, so I'm steering clear of that. River transport is a bit of a dry subject, so I'm looking for different angles. And, lets not forget that Christmas is coming. Have you been good?