Category : Editorial photography Toggle

Photo shoot for Gold Coast muso, Alby Carter

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Gold Coast musician, Alby Carter, recently contacted me to shoot a fresh suite of publicity photos. I’d met Alby before when I shot him during his studio session at Bignote Productions on the Gold Coast.

We decided that casual urban locations would be ideal for Alby’s highly relatable music, so headed to Burleigh Heads for an hour of  shooting in various venues until asked to leave – proper old school production that took me back to my old days of shooting on film and dodging security guards! Heh….

After a nice old time strolling and chatting with one very nice dude, we came away with some great shots that work together really nicely around strong black & white compositions and a theme of reflections. I’d chosen this approach for two reasons; the first being the nature of Alby’s pensive song lyrics and his serious return to music after a hiatus. The second reason being the lack of architectural charm on the Gold Coast meant that a more creative approach was going to be needed for this kind of urban environment.

You can find out more about Alby’s music and gigs here. I recommend listening to his sample track titled ‘Maze‘. Pretty damn sweet…

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Album cover photography for the Gold Coast’s ‘Green Room Project’

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Recently I was asked to photograph the album cover for The Green Room Project – the Gold Coast’s live monthly cabaret talk show.

The brief for the photography was to allow the personality of each group member to be shown, so a wider shot with a range of interesting poses allowed this, while also allowing the models to interact with each other. The striped marquee on the shoot location leant a theatrical feel to the photos, with some great wardrobe and props completing the styling!

Host, Matt Ward created The Green Room project as a novel way of showcasing emerging and undiscovered music talent, combined with mentoring by industry professionals. Recorded at Bignote Productions, six of Queensland’s most talented musical theatre and cabaret performers who have been featured on the show came together for the compilation album and were accompanied by musical director, Brad Rush, on a baby grand piano.

If you’re in the Gold Coast / Brisbane region, you can check out more details of this great concept here, as either an audience member or musician!

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Brisbane barbershop lifestyle photography by Paul Williams

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The photography side of the business for me was amazingly busy for the last quarter of 2014 – and this blog very much fell by the wayside!
One of the best projects that I worked on over the manic year-end was the brand identity that I designed for a hip new barber shop south of Brisbane, named ‘The Harbour Barber‘.

I designed the logo and full identity for the client, from brand strategy through to all of their print collateral and web design. A subsequent photo shoot followed (naturally!), the results of which are featured here and have featured in 4 or 5 national magazines and newspaper supplements since.

I intended this shoot to be art directed in such a way that was a nod to the nostalgic brand essence that I’d created. Hence, the semi-sepia colour treatment gives a real sense of the old school customer service, while respecting that this is a contemporary business. I also love the confident ‘tude of the models which finds balance in the right amount of approachability. If you’re near the Cleveland area of South Brisbane, why not check out The Harbour Barber? It’s an excellent barbershop, very funky interior decoration and they’ll serve you a free beer with your haircut! Get in!  🙂

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Photo shoot for Gold Coast fitness celebrity, Sam Wallace

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Last week I shot Gold Coast fitness celebrity, Sam Wallace, for his new website photography. Sam needed some quality fitness shots that showed him training a client as her Personal Trainer.

The shoot had a few restrictions to overcome; we could only access a gym with a very low ceiling, making it tough to control the light. We were also restricted to landscape format shots, which would fit the format of the website’s UI.
Regardless of these, as well as space restrictions, we had an extremely productive evening and got a range of shots that I’m really happy with – and importantly, Sam is “pumped as hell” with the shots!

Lighting from overhead is often what’s needed to flatter a male physique, but side-lighting to allow for such a low ceiling managed to give really nice definition to the models’ muscles and also give them both great separation from the cluttered background.

My fitness photo shoots will be getting more popular now that summer is on it’s way here on the Gold Coast and in Brisbane, so get in early if you’d like to shoot and email me at paul@pwphotography.net!

Until the next!   🙂

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Portrait photography of Elijah Cavanagh, Gold Coast Videographer

Gold Coast Videographer, Elijah Cavanagh asked me to shoot his portrait this week.
Elijah works here at the Burleigh Heads studio and this photo of him is as honest as the man himself. I shot with a very narrow depth of field to keep Eli’s eyes nice and sharp, with focus falling off quickly around his hair and jacket. Tidy.

Elijah leaves us for a month today on assignment in Canada (shooting music videos – sweet gig)!
You can check out Elijah’s excellent showreel here, if you’re interested in booking a fantastic Videographer for your next project, anywhere in Australia (or canada, evidently)!

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Photo shoot for Government ministry

Brochure samples arrived in the mail last week from my client, who I shot the below job for.
I was shooting for a great Singapore design agency named DPI and their client was the Ministry of Social & Family Development.

Shoot day threw me a few curve balls when the Art Director was unable to attend and I was asked to art direct the shoot myself (which is no problem – my comfort in doing exactly this, is why many of my clients hire me). The curve ball came when I was informed by their client that I wasn’t allowed to photograph the faces of the children who I had been sent there to shoot! The kids were all from troubled homes or were juvenile delinquents, so their anonymity was important for privacy reasons.

I quickly decided that more abstract and ‘arty’ imagery would be needed to meet this brief, so I utilised the sunny day to backlight the kids and have their faces drop out to silhouette. Tight shots, low key shots, obstruction and shadow-play were also utilised during the two shoot days, to gather the body of work needed for the brochure.

The client was extremely impressed with the solution to a tricky brief and the brochures look fantastic – props to DPI!

 

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Photo shoot for Scoot Airlines

On assignment in China.

A while back I was flown to Beijing to shoot for Scoot Airlines.
I was to cover the city of Tianjin, an hour or so on the bullet train from Beijing.
This is my ideal gig – wandering a foreign land with a very open brief and a camera in hand. This very thing is what took my photography from ‘hobby’ to ‘obsession’ so many years ago and these kind of shoots for me, ironically, feel like coming home.

I had an amazing time shooting the city – sitting regularly as inspiration took hold, to write the feature article passages that would accompany my photography.
The piece was well-received in the in-flight magazine and once again, I counted myself very lucky as having had another international shoot of this kind.

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Old local practising Chinese character calligraphy with water on the dusty morning pavement.

Old local practising Chinese character calligraphy with water on the dusty morning pavement.

 

A friendly social dance group in a Tianjin City park.

A friendly social dance group in a Tianjin City park.

 

The serene Tianjin River by night.

The serene Tianjin River by night.

 

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During my stay, I was put-up at the stunning St Regis Hotel, which was a most welcome sanctuary after some very long days wandering the many landmarks and quaint hutongs. Upgrading me to one of their finest suites after some friendly chat, I felt it only right to return the favour by snapping a few interiors of the hotel for their marketing. Appreciating such beautiful interior design is again, one of my favorite aspects of what I do.

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Before I left for Tianjin, a client at Fitch Design in Singapore heard that I was headed to Beijing briefly, so booked me to shoot for Dell computers while I was in town. Our team was wined and dined after each day at some of the cities best restaurants and I tacked a couple of days onto the end of the trip to visit the Great Wall and of course the Forbidden City. The trip was over all too quickly, though a taster of China in this way was, as a Photographer, as good as it gets!