Studio Bruny Island
I made it a priority to explore the world in my 20s.
I scratched the surface of 26 countries in the 12 months of my first trip.
I have stepped foot in a few more different countries and returned to some of the same ones since then.
I thought, in all of that I would find a sense of home, a place, a city, a village, exotic with a beautifully exotic partner to match.
It may be impossible to find your true home until your body and mind are ready for it, even if you have visited your true home earlier when it didn’t feel like your home.
When I was much younger I asked myself…How can I feel settled somewhere as home if I don’t have a comparative measure of other places that could be home.
Decades past after that first trip until I found my home and community at Adventure Bay on Bruny Island.
I should have known I would find home on an Island. I’ve been magnetised to them wherever I go. I paddle to them, fly and sail to them.
They’re contained and defined with a clear frontier. The people on Islands are generally lovely, friendly and accountable for their actions.
I love my island community.
Photography.
You can come to Bruny Island and I can shoot your project in a big studio that even has a commercial kitchen and 100 year old floorboards. In between shots you can walk 100 metres to the ocean and stand on the white sand and look at the blue water and sky when the weather is like it is today.
There are so many beaches and varied backgrounds for outdoor shoots too.
You’ll probably see a white wallaby and stuff yourself with the best oysters, fish, cheese, bread, beer and wine too.
You may bring your work crew or just the talent and yourself, then you think about it and you know your family should experience this plump, tax deductible paradise too.
Homelessness
Our housing crisis is worse now than during the Tasmanian winter of 2019 when 24 year old Ty looked into Scott's 49 year old eyes and wondered if he was looking at his own future. We found Scott living in his tent in the bushes near the Bridgewater bridge. Ty just happened by. He described his own situation, living rough, just up the road behind McDonalds. I pulled all of my lighting out of the car. I knew the symbolic potential of these photographs. People will only have an opportunity to care about something if they notice it. I wanted people to notice these photographs. Later and at the time, I wondered if the photographs were too intimate, too revealing but then focussed on the plight and the potential for change. What is my place in all of this and is it folly to think photographs can change things for the better? Did these photographs show something that once was and has changed, something that the subjects have moved on from and would never want out there or would they too feel they could help others by bringing attention to this issue? When it comes to Scott and Ty, I may never know. I have tried to contact them unsuccessfully several times, especially Ty, he has time on his side and a sparkle in his eyes with potential for a bright future. I don't know about Scott, I hope he's well, he was going in for some serious surgery.
Please let me know if you know these guys, I would love to hear how they're going.
I've done several homelessness stories over the years and have been surprised at how many people in that situation don't understand it is a societal human right to have safe shelter, food and water and they do think they are a burden on society and therefore become silent.
Can good governance effectively solve social problems like homelessness? We will, and should be judged as a nation by the way we care for our vulnerable people. If you google famous people who were once homeless you will see there are extensive lists of them. Beautiful souls like Archie Roach were once homeless. Imagine the tragedy of losing him before his light truly shone?
Meriem
“She’s been bullied, suffered anxiety and an eating disorder, but that hasn’t stopped a Hobart oncology nurse from becoming one of the state’s finest distance runners – and now she’s using her ability to overcome adversity to help others.”…Linda Smith’s longform Tasweekend front page story.
It was dark, wet, cold and windy. My light was wrapped in a large plastic bag to shield it’s tender Swiss engineering from those elements. There was no shelter for Meriem though. She’s slight, angelic, probably not built for those conditions. Wet, cold, soaked through. Never did she mention it or complain. She saw the whole shoot through. I hoped she was okay. Not just because of the weather. Her bright, kind eyes have seen things, probably not all good.
Meriem Daoui is good, inspiringly good.
Holidays with loved ones.
There’s a growing trend for Australian’s to take all of their loved ones on holidays, especially now, DC, (During Covid) where holidays are usually home-state based.
When Liza-Jane and her partner go car shopping, they walk past the whizz-bang engine bay, past the front seats with all the tech, bells and whistles, swish past the leather upholstery and safety features, straight to the back door and open it. “We’ll take it, Taxi and Zorro (dogs) will love it!”
It’s a new Volvo station wagon, so they should be pretty safe too.
; )
An away game.
"Do you know how few people come up here?" He asked as we sardined into the skeleton lift barely ample for one of us. "We've had to knock back so many requests to come up here, even some from the big bosses." I was glad he said that because now the opportunity to work 120 metres above the ground on top of a modern wind turbine felt even more special. We waited in the head of the turbine as the lift descended for the other two. There are so many new things to see in a new environment, buttons, bolts and dials, the smell of expensive machinery and machine lubricant so there was much to talk about whilst we waited.
Outside, on the top of the turbine was mind lightening and breathtaking on such a bright and still day.
Being on site was only a part of this assignment. I also shot some portraits in a makeshift office studio. I love how everybody owned their session, especially the fella shown below. I can easily see him in a Vanity Fair feature about the wind industry’s movers and shakers.
Grace.
A Forester pulled up and parked in a space near me. If you live in Tassie you would know how Tassie that is. There was movement in it, a figure, busy within the reflections of the windows. The stark 2pm summer sun revealed the paint had seen a few years of stark 2pm summer sun. The driver’s door opened to reveal a true smile and heart that beamed right back to that sun.
It was the first moment I met Grace, two weeks ago on the 12th of January 2021. Her being was neither above or below you, it was at eye level, disarming and playful. We spent most of our time together talking, funny stuff and deep stuff and general stuff n that, familiar, like we had been friends forever in some other life. I wondered if she makes everybody feel like that, a gift, her super-power?
I was already set up. The wind threatened to undo my work of pre-bending, pre-modifying and pre-shaping the high, contrasty, Tasmanian sun. The stage was set, set for a superhero. Grace owned everything she did.
There was a quiet communication when we were shooting. There were many words and ideas exchanged, some were wise, they all came with ease within the spaces and for a fair bit of time after the shoot. Grace said goodbye and walked back to her trustworthy station wagon, climbed in and drove away. People walked by, couples and dog walkers, nautical people too. I hadn’t noticed them when she was here. I was alone with thought, sound, the sun, the wind, my lighting equipment flapping in the wind, our conversations and the images of a beautiful meeting in my beautiful camera.
Nature is the Godly we can see and touch.
The Tasmanian Land Conservancy, TLC, protects nature by buying land for nature conservation. People make donations for new land acquisitions and to maintain property already held by the TLC. You can leave a bequest in your will.
Dr Helene Thomas is a red-hot, top-of-her-game audio producer and my loving partner. : ) We work on projects independently and collaboratively. We were honored to spend two days of field-time and a few days of edit-time together for the TLC’s newly acquired Brockley property at Buckland.
We walked many kilometres each 12 hour work day carrying lots of equipment through the bush. I’m not a chick magnet, I’m a tick magnet. I had two ticks on my body. One was attached to my scrotum. I bet you’re glad you just read that. A leach, big, bloody and pulsating was attached to my ankle. It released itself and spewed blood all over the floor when it was confronted by our salt shaker. We were lucky to have each other to do full body inspections at the end of each day. The morning starts were early, with freezing conditions, sun and fog, they created beautiful atmospherics. The rotor blades of the drone were coated in ice during flights on the first morning. The property flooded the day before our shoot. The frogs were pleased. Each species had their own call and they were loud, the sounds combined and enveloped your mind in a beautiful way. The frogs were everywhere but I never spotted a single one apart from tadpoles, the makings of frogs but not quite frogs. For me, a place gives a feeling for a seemingly inexplicable reason. I wonder if it’s a resonance, earthly energy, spirit/s perhaps? This place made both of us feel really good, at peace. Wildlife and the rhythm of life was all around us. Don’t even get me started about my sweethearts, my adored Yellow-Tailed Black Cockatoos, three on a tree, two up to mischief and one lookout.
The opening footage of the film, that tree, that most magnificent tree in the fog overwhelmed my body with goosebumps. The trunk and branches seemed luminescent. It was gentle, graceful and life giving, a symbol of life itself.
Surprisingly the camera exposure settings remained constant throughout the sequence right through from the ground to the bright sun above the fog. It was like going from night to day in the one movement.
I truly believe that nature is the Godly we can see and touch.
You can see our film here if you’d like to.
Tasmania Police…Film and stills.
Tasmania Police Commander Mark Mewis exuded authority, calm and trust. He is responsible for the smooth implementation of the new electronic intelligence system, Atlas by Brisbane tech company BDNA. He tells it like it is and when he’s telling it people are listening. Luckily the message is good, positive and successful.
BDNA’s Justin Collins assigned creative, Jess Lange and I to bottle the goodness of that message through effective visual storytelling as it will help win more work for the company. This all translated into a day shooting stills and two days of filming for me. Jess had everything running like clockwork because of the time she invested in preparation. She produced, directed, scripted, edited and drove the creative direction of the project alongside Justin. My roles were stills photographer, cinematographer, lighting and sound capture. We all worked hard as well as having a tonne of fun on the way.
Tasmania Police, were immensely accommodating, patient and professional. The highlight for me was crafting the Police chase alongside Jess and Justin. I guess it’s been a boyhood dream to shoot such a scene and doubly good as these actors were real Police women and men.
If potential clients don’t know about your company’s success, that’s lost opportunity. If you’re telling potential clients about your success in an amateur way, that delivery may cheapen and distract from your message and your brand. If you’re communicating in an engaging and professional way your message will be effective and will reinforce your brand’s professionalism, trustworthiness and quality.
To Protect Sacred…A new short film.
An opportunity to join Graham Furness and Rebecca Kissling (forest guardians), Charles Wooley (60 Minutes Journalist), Amanda Ducker (Hobart Mercury Associate Editor), Dr Helene Thomas (Audio Producer) in the Styx Valley, Tasmania came up. The Styx is just down the road from Maydena and Mt Field National Park.
Alarmingly, Tasmania’s pristine, ancient forests are still being clear-felled and burnt. This problem adds fuel to the climate-change fire and should be one of the biggest Australian news stories of our time. The fury of climate change will make Covid 19 look like a playful pup. Wild places like these forests play so many important roles like being our lungs, climate stabilisers, sacred churches, habitat, biodiversity and hold treasure that scientists have discovered and are yet to discover. They also make us feel so damn good. You cannot experience what we saw and still think that clear-felling and burning these stunning, important sacred places is reasonable under any circumstances. My heart is broken, smashed into fragments.
It wasn’t an assignment, there was no plan or obligation. I took a couple of bits of equipment with me just in case, and was moved into action. The resulting film is a blessing from the goodness of the day and the yellow-tailed black-cockatoos that flew above us and the scorched earth upon which we walked.
It would be laughable for Australians to criticize Brazil’s Amazon deforestation policy whilst this is still happening here today. You can see the film here.
Community, storytelling and healing.
Thank you to our community, Richard Jupe, Tim Martain, Brad Petersen and the Sunday Tasmanian for recognising the importance of community, storytelling and healing today.
The Resilience Project, Photographs and Audio.
There’s an audio and photographic component to the Stories of Resilience Project. My goal was to shoot a film with a single still portrait frame for each story. Helene’s audio captures are all so beautiful and vivid, I had a high bar to match. Sometimes I had her audio to reference, sometimes we captured the words and images during the same visit and I would just listen in. We worked so hard and intensely on these stories during capture and during hours of post-production that it felt like we knew our subjects like old friends, we didn’t though, we could only imagine the darker moments they navigated. I have chosen key images from the stills collection and Helene has chosen short grabs of the more in-depth audio. I’ve put them together in this condensed video so you can have a sense of the stories quickly. I hope you enjoy engaging with their worlds. You can also click on any of the images to go straight to the video.
A film about resilience.
A film collaboration with Audio Artist and Multi-Media Producer Dr Helene Thomas.
We made a film for the Hobart City Council’s current, Stories of Resilience project. There was a premiere screening event. The engagement with our subjects was profound and heart-felt, the following words come from my speech to the audience that night…
“Thank you to the team of people who made this important project happen and for having us on board. Thank you to everybody here for showing support for your community, essential storytelling and healing by engaging with this event tonight. Tasmania is our much loved home and community, you're our community so it's natural that we care deeply about the courageous people that feature in tonight's presentation and the well-being of you and your home. We wish for you to be physically and mentally well. We also wish for you to recover from the trauma of your experiences. Some of you said that the very act of telling your story helped your recovery, so we're really proud to be part of that. We want your stories to be noticed, remembered and cared for. We hope the craft applied to your stories respected them and will help make them cared for as our community's recorded story and history. Kimbra and Volker both feature in our film. A friend, and dog lover, almost cried when she saw their film in her Huonville office and was very professional to not openly cry but she did walk away for a moment so she may have openly cried. We love Kimbra and Volker's ease with themselves, their warmth and authenticity to hold space throughout the film. We have combined audio and still images for the second part of the presentation. We would like you to engage your mind to listen carefully and to create your own images before the photographic portraits are revealed. Our intention was to give the portraits a film look through the use of content, colour, lighting and lens choices. A visual slice and hopefully the visual essence of each story. We believe engagement comes through allowing the story to shine beyond the craft of telling it. When we think back to the time spent making appointments, capturing content, editing, hours spent in the field carrying heavy equipment and dancing with the wind, rain and light, Helene and I both feel fulfilled by the results. So thank you for the effortless energy and inspiration from each other and everybody that contributed to this important project.”
I looked into the audience during the showing of our film. Two participants, who had only met that night, were comforting each other by holding hands. Participants of the project and others who were affected by the flood, met, swapped stories and bonded through their shared experience and the act of honestly sharing their humanity. Where does the healing come from? Is it from the simple act of telling the story or is it from from being heard? Maybe it was how it was allowed to be told or heard, acknowledged and woven into our community’s history?
There were also 12 portrait sittings and audio captures. I will show you these in a future post or you can see them here.
Kimbra and Volker are the stars of our film, their inspirational story, presence, relationship, love, courage, patience and of course resilience made it work.
My role with the film was as cinematographer, director, camera operator, gimbal operator, drone pilot, gaffer, location sound recordist, location scout and runner.
A big thank you to Dr Helene Thomas and the Hobart City Council for having me on board.
You can see our film here.
One frame, a story.
The University of Tasmania’s new Pro VC for Aboriginal Leadership, Professor Greg Lehman.
I’m truly grateful to be working with interesting people and on interesting assignments during Covid 19. My work, portraits, light and aesthetic have increasingly been influenced by film. One frame from a story that you’d like to know more about.
The follow on.
Dr Haneef arrived at new government lodgings shortly after my *photograph (Walkley awarded photograph of Dr Haneef being driven from the Brisbane Watchhouse) was captured. The media was in a ravenous frenzy. They sprawled all over the front of the Wolston Correctional Centre and my beloved Landrover. The centre is near nowhere, which is about an hour west of Brisbane. Dr Haneef was considered a terrorist, the Queensland Government announced he would spend 23 hours a day in solitary detention.
The media snatched scraps of development in the story. Peter Russo is a politician. Back then he was Dr Haneef’s lawyer. He held court with the media because he held the scraps the media wanted, and revelled in that fact.
Dr Haneef’s treatment by Australian governments and agencies was unlawful. He was freed nine days after my *photograph was captured. He left Australia for India and his worried family there two days later.
I was amongst the media pack at Brisbane Airport. It had become a swarm, photographers were on every window as Dr Haneef was driven past us just once before boarding his plane. I felt the pressure was kinda on me a bit, the other shooters knew I was that fella that got that *photograph. Was I under more pressure than the others? Would I get the shot again with so much competition, was I a flash in the pan or safe hands? Where I chose to be was a great call, lucky, because Dr Haneef was facing away from the two photographers on the opposite window and this time with his head up, smiling proudly at his cousin and towards my lens. Technically this was a very different situation when compared to my other *photograph. Just one tinted-glass window. The result, it was as good as I could have hoped for. Perfectly exposed and in focus from front to back with expressions that said everything.
Paper Tigers Book And Exhibition.
It’s a massive honor to be included in the above book and the current Head On Photo Festival exhibition.
“A celebration of the best of Australian photojournalism, the Paper Tigers exhibition features sixty images from sixty of the best Australian photojournalists. The need for truthful journalism has never been more critical. It is through the lens of these photographers that we understand and experience much of the world's events. Look back at the most critical moments through recent Australian history, and the images by which we remember them.”
I was interviewed about my photograph by the ABC and the Guardian has featured the exhibition too.
The following is my personal experience… It was the photograph that the nation's photojournalists and news editors were hungry for that day and for the days prior. I had spent cold winter nights and days shooting through the windows of every likely vehicle that entered and exited the Brisbane Watchhouse. My job didn’t usually have me chasing moving vehicles with a camera although I soon became increasingly proficient at shooting through vehicle windows after learning a little more from each encounter. The challenge, apart from the danger of engaging with moving vehicles on the road and driveways was that the windows in some vehicles had clear or heavily tinted or multi-layered glass or combinations of clear and tinted and varying shapes and sizes of glass and perspex windows. The prison vans were the worst with a small, high window for each of the many separate cells. I refined my technique with lighting, exposure, hyperfocal distance and lens to achieve a usable image from any vehicle. A few days before capturing this image I was chasing vehicles along side about 16 members of the media, on the evening before this photograph, there was just a Court Photographer and I at the Watchhouse.
It’s a great risk to leave the media pack. What if they got the shot and just the two of us at the Watchhouse got nothing? It was my call to be there, you have to trust your experience-honed instinct otherwise what’s the use of having it? Another unsuccessful day of chasing vehicles almost passed when a police officer chatted to us, he was looking after Haneef in his cell and said Haneef was a thoroughly nice guy, then said he thought a car would leave the Watchhouse with Haneef in it the next morning and he gave an approximate time. It was just the two of us there again the next morning, other members of the media were sniffing about for the same story elsewhere.
A Police vehicle with two cells in the back finally drove down the Watchhouse ramp about 40 minutes later than the tip off time. We were both onto it, shooting frantically through both of the small rear windows whilst trying to stay safe. The first layer of glass was untinted scratched and dirty, the second layer, a few centimetres inwards was heavily tinted, scratched and dirty, technically it seemed an impossible shot. It was soon apparent that the rear right side of the vehicle was empty and the left rear side held a man in a brown tracksuit with his head between his knees so I concentrated all my effort on that window as the car continued moving onto the street and then made a right turn before waiting for a few moments at a stop sign. The Court Photographer was hot on my heels as I sprinted about 50 metres to the police vehicle to continue photographing briefly at the stop sign.
It was just me and the Court Photographer standing in the middle of the road reviewing images as the Police vehicle continued its journey. I was soaked with perspiration, my heart was pounding from the physical activity and adrenaline. Several successful images were captured as the vehicle came down the ramp and at the stop sign. Haneef flicked past my gaze on the small screen, miraculously all images were perfectly exposed. I felt their weight, and knew the power of that one extra special photograph. It represented the gold medal outcome of what I had signed up for as a photojournalist, with a strong sense of social justice.
The injustice, indignity, posture, brown prison suit, padlock and starkness of bare feet on a cold metal floor during mid-winter. The scene that may never have been witnessed by the world was published all around the world including in Haneef’s country of origin, India. I hope the image made a difference to achieving a fair outcome for Haneef and showed Australia how important it is to handle such matters impartially. I’m glad it was me who created that image but if I hadn’t I would hope that it existed just the same. Even without context it is an ethereal, near impossible photograph that asserts its stand alone independence.
A big thank you to Brian Cassey and the people at Head On for this wonderful honor.
Eddie Safarik