On Saturday night I popped out to a salsa dance event and I must say it seems like forever since I photographed any form of dancing so it was great to be back to capture the fun and enjoyment that is dance, but also see some familiar faces which I had not seen in some time.
Salsa on Saturday is an event that is run monthly to allow a salsa dancing community to get together and have a bit of fun and what fun they did have!!
If you don’t believe me have a look at this group shot. 🙂
SOS – Salsa on Saturday – SEVEN
If you want to know more about salsa on Saturday drop me a message will send you the organisers details.
On Sunday I had the privilege of going out and photographing I feel will be a moment in Australia’s history.
It was a walk to support marriage equality here in Australia, a walk together like-minded people for a common cause shape and change Australia’s future.
While the walk itself was not too different from many of the other walks I photographed what did made a different was that it was organised by the youth of Canberra. Now I’m a true believer at our future is in the hands of our young, it is them that will grow into adults and into our leaders of both our country and our immediate peers, and if Sunday is collection of young people is anything to go by we are really in good hands.
The weather was atrocious and I must say it was one of the coldest days that I’ve experienced in some time and by far one of the coldest events I’ve photographed. While the actual numbers of the participants in the walk was only a couple of hundred it was a dedication and drive for standing up in something they believe in even if the weather was totally crappy.
Canberra Australia 26th of July 2015 – Walk for marriage equality organised by the use of Canberra. The organisers been a procession across Commonwealth Avenue with the Australian Parliament house in the distance and a rainbow crossing the sky. A diplomatic car is seen passing the procession with the passenger giving the group a thumbs up as a sign of approval.
Looking at the faces that were in the crowd it got me thinking of the times in our history whether youth have shaped our future. One of the most prominent times is back in the 60s, and 70’s with the burning of the bra and the protests against the Vietnam War.
Is a look at this photo below see the young spirits that I feel encapsulated those times of what seems so long ago.
Canberra Australia 26th of July 2015 – Walk for marriage equality organised by the use of Canberra. This was a peaceful walk organised by the Canberra youth to raise awareness for marriage equality held around the foreshores of Lake Burley Griffin in what was it cold and windy day. Two young ladies watching over the choir as it sings to the procession of walkers as they exit off the offramp on the north side of the Commonwealth Avenue Bridge
It was good to be able to capture these kids and see the joy and determination in what they are trying to achieve.
What I really appreciate and I think everyone can, is that the organisers of this walk are just teenagers. Kids, not too much older than my daughter and they clearly have a vision of Australia’s future, a future that I feel is inevitable which is why I’m glad that I had the opportunity and time to photograph such an event.
Canberra Australia 26th of July 2015 – Walk for marriage equality organised by the use of Canberra. This was a peaceful walk organised by the Canberra youth to raise awareness for marriage equality held around the foreshores of Lake Burley Griffin in what was it cold and windy day. The walkers approaching the finishing point.
With love, passion and determination we can all change the world. It just takes us to actually want to make it happen.
Canberra Australia 26th of July 2015 – Walk for marriage equality organised by the use of Canberra. This was a peaceful walk organised by the Canberra youth to raise awareness for marriage equality held around the foreshores of Lake Burley Griffin in what was it cold and windy day. Two young girls using one hand of each to create a heart shape is a sign of unity and support for marriage equality at the end of the walk
Same is true within ourselves, we can do great things, things that we never thought possible and things that are beyond comprehension.
Just like these young girls had a vision to create a walk for marriage equality, they are in fact doing much more. Through their actions and determination they are changing the world, they are making a difference, and I for one am incredibly proud of such a feat. Not because it is about marriage equality but more that gives me faith in our children they can actually find the determination and drive within themselves to make this world a better place!!
What can you do today to make this world a better place?
NOTE: You can see the entire collection of photo by clicking on the Events on the menu on the left of this screen. 🙂
Being able to capture a fraction of a second of someone’s life might seem a little unimportant, however while this may be the case in some shots others hold a significant amount of personal connection with the people within the photo.
Has there been times in your life where you have been incredibly sad, excited, happy, mad or just in a special place, like when you meet someone for the first time or someone you look up to.
My job as an event and portrait photographer is to capture these moments, moments that pass at the blinking of an eye but a significant to the people that I photographed for and are in these shots.
I photographed equestrian events that involved a lot of children and in one case there was a child was bawling her eyes out as she was so frustrated with the pony at the time wasn’t doing what she wanted it to do. The mother of this child saw me snapping away and kind of shooed me off as she didn’t want to embarrass the young girl. My response to her was that the emotions and the tears something that her and her daughter would cherish for a lifetime. She heard these words, sat back and thought for a second or so and let me continue shooting. When I publish these photos in my online store you never guess who bought copies? 🙂
So for me sometimes it might be awkward or uncomfortable for some people to get the photo taken while they are in an emotional state, I know that once the tears dry and the excitement passes the only thing left be the special moments captured in time.
There are some days in this job that a fantastic, I get to meet lots of people, go to lots of parties and are generally surrounded by people that just really want to have a good time.
Unfortunately sometimes in this job there are days and events which are incredibly difficult…… When I say incredibly difficult I don’t mean technically, I mean personally and emotionally.
The event I covered today was incredibly sad. It was a celebration and a memorial of a young man that was taken in the prime of his life through a motor vehicle accident, leaving a shattered partner and a two-year-old boy behind. 🙁
I don’t know about other people or other photographers but for me being able to capture emotional images I have two put myself in their position, I try and feel what they are feeling be it sadness or happiness.
So today’s event drained a lot of internal strength and emotion, all of which I knew was going to happen beforehand, so I made a plan that after the event I would jump on my motorbike, take my camera and go to a quiet place to watch the sun go down and reflect about all the wonderful things life has to offer.
I think we will need one of these special places and while I don’t necessarily have a special place as the world is a spectacular place are ready, I do like to be able to see a fantastic sunset or sunrise so that is what I did. I raced against the failing light to get to a location where the sun was reflecting off the water and a place where I could collect my thoughts and regain the inner strength that I’d given up to the event I had just photographed.
As a sun was setting I was wishing it would never end. It was spectacular and beautiful. The calm across the water with the ducks and swans swimming in the shallows gave a nice background to the birds singing in the trees. It was a good way to end a day, a day that was full of emotion so I thought I would share last rays of my day today with you.
Be working through some photos over the last few days (for something different of course) and part of my workflow is to use face recognition within Lightroom to identify people within photos so they can be tagged and easily located later.
Most of my photos these days are tagged in this way since it was available in the latest version of Lightroom and in doing this Lightroom builds up a library of people which I photographed and when it evaluates a new photo it has a guess at who might actually be in the image so as to reduce the time and effort that it takes to do this face recognition and tagging.
While it does a good job at guessing I’m pretty sure that this gentleman is not Angry Anderson!!!! hahahahaha
Lightrooms guess at Angry Anderson
I guess it just goes to show the interesting people I have in my Lightroom catalogue and people that I photographed. LOL
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