There's a lot of sadness in the New Zealand theatre community at the moment, as news goes around of Willem Wassenaar's passing in Holland on the weekend. I met him a few times around town and at the New Zealand International Arts Festival, and photographed him at least once - leading a SchoolsFest workshop with a group of actors from The Walworth Farce in 2010.
Read MoreJust wanted to mention I've posted a new essay at the Kage Collective blog, Chronicle; I elaborate a little on a post I did here a couple of years back about the Hasselblad X-Pan (still one of my favourite cameras!), and the potential I could see in the Fuji X-Pro series expanding to include a super-wide panorama camera - this time though, I'm looking at a few different shapes & formats I've used over the years, and the benefits of trying different frames! Have a read - hope you enjoy it!
Read MoreToday's Lost & Found is another Canon 85L f/1.2 test with the 1Ds Mark II - I happened to walk through Miramar one afternoon when there was a rugby game on, and got to the corner of the field - just as they finished. I'm not sure now if they won or lost, but he looks happy enough with the result!
Read MoreToday's Lost & Found is another testing outing - this time with the Sigma 12-14mm lens, which was relatively new in 2004. Of course, this is on a slightly cropped camera body, the 1D Mark II, so it's effectively more like 16mm - I shot a few on film (remember FILM?!) that day too, just to see what the difference was like. 12mm is quite wide, it turns out!
Read MoreFunny how many of my lost & found images are from trying out gear - often I'll get something new, go a bit mad with it testing things, and then move on to using it for work without ever really giving much attention to the test shots. But some of them I really like, now that I do look!
Read MoreThe Skipper. The Mysterious Lady. The Tiger. A...unicorn? A concert by Melbourne band The Bombay Royale is always an interesting event, so when I heard they were going to open for Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings recently, of course I booked right away!
Read MoreA little while ago, I had the idea of doing a series of posts of photos I'd found on my hard drives that had, for whatever reason, never seen the light of day - the lost & found photos, some of which I barely even remember taking!
Read MoreI was sad to hear of motorsport writer Eoin Young's passing this morning; I can't claim to have known him long, in terms of his illustrious career, but I first met him twelve years ago when he brought the recently-retired voice of Formula One, Murray Walker, on a book tour of New Zealand. They were a great pair on stage, prompting each others' memory as needed (with a bit of assistance from his great friend Michael Clark), and made for a very enjoyable event.
Read MoreThis weekend saw thousands of Australians take to the streets of cities across the country to protest the Tony Abbott / Liberal coalition government's cuts to Federal spending in areas like education, health, the public sector, science and the environment, as well as their stance on immigration. Sydney was no exception - and the march, starting and finishing at Hyde Park, featured a brief concert by local band The Jezabels at the conclusion of the event...
Read MoreJust wanted to say congratulations to Belvoir Theatre for their nominations in this year's Helpmann Awards for their production of Angels In America, which I photographed for them last year - well, I did Part 1: Millennium Approaches, anyway! I really loved this production a lot; oddly enough, I wound up seeing Angels two and a half times last year, having booked tickets for the full show at Belvoir before finding out I'd be photographing Part 1 as well, and when I found out it was on in Toronto a month later, I went to see that as well. I know, I got carried away - but honestly, I enjoyed everything about Belvoir's version better: cast, costumes, set, sound design, lighting, the lot. So, I'm glad to see it make the list this week.
Read MoreThis one's pretty self-explanatory - just a frosted window in the Opera House before the show the other night. Not exactly a prime example of how sharp this lens is, but an interesting shot I wanted to grab, anyway!
Read MoreAll right, I finally bit the bullet and got the Fujinon 56mm f/1.2 lens I'd been thinking about for six months or so, to replace my 60mm f/2.4 Macro. That's still a great lens (and I have one spare, if anyone's looking!), I just prefer something with a little more speed & easy focusability in low light for the kinds of things I tend to use it for. I also just really like shallow depth of field - or at very least, I like having the option if I want it...
Read MoreGreat show tonight by the young Kiwi band Broods - very impressed with them, I can see why they're touring with Ellie Goulding at the moment (and she's a fan, too). Be proud of them, New Zealand! They're going to get very big, very fast...
Read MoreSo...this is a concert I went to on the weekend, featuring J-Pop superstar Kyary Pamyu Pamyu in her first Australian appearance. In fact, the first time she'd crossed the equator, she said!
I had just been intending to go and enjoy myself - I'm a bit of a fan of SBS PopAsia on a Sunday afternoon - but once I got there and started seeing the fans in costumes (who apparently had been queuing since 12:30pm for an 8pm show!), I couldn't help getting my camera out for a bit of it...!
Read MoreLast one! It's the closing day of the New Zealand International Arts Festival in Wellington, so I'm wrapping up this series here. Hope it's been interesting!
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