What better time than winter to dream about the seaside? It’s at the core of Wildlight’s identity as we’re reminded with this edition’s focus on our shimmering shores. The beach still evokes the strong emotions it did in the mid-80s when Wildlight started, as evidenced by Rennie Ellis’ Life’s a Beach library additions. It reveals that prior to the present era of slip, slop, slap*, the yarn mills of the Pearl River Delta got little joy from the Aussie beachwear sector because there wasn’t all that much going on. For once, enjoy this imbalance of trade that saw a lot of people down under soaking up the sun at maximum exposure.

*modern-day UV protection

Short Back and Slides - Our Quarter Century

Wildlight Photo Agency is celebrating it’s 25th anniversary in 2010. Look forward to stories and images of our history in coming LightVision editions. Wildlight has been the standard bearer for real Australian photography over the years, realised in our amazing library exceeding 30,000 top of the line images from 50 great photographers located in every corner of the country. We invite you to share memories of your own association with Wildlight since 1985, by posting a comment on the LightVision blog.  Whether the good old days were long ago or last week, we’d like to hear from you so we can all share your recollections.

No Collars or Cuffs and Little in Between

Enjoy a bonanza of more than 400 iconic archive photos from Rennie Ellis, the late Melbourne photojournalist and renowned master of the Australian outdoor idiom, whose work occupies a whole chapter in the annals of Australian photography. In this new collection, you can relive the Australian shoreline at its colourful best with the sunny disposition of Rennie’s lens revelling in images of people, places and events. You’ll find plenty of party-ready eskies and idyllic beach cricket matches, confronting fronts and sandy rears, that will be as memorable as the time you first remember seeing them. We promise.

Think Big With Environmental Graphics

The built environment becomes all the more grand when decorated with big pictures from the Wildlight library that astound and delight. Firms all over Australia have found a place in their breakout areas, corridors, staff canteens, client waiting areas and meeting rooms to put images of Australia front and centre. Hang Australia up on your walls with Wildlight graphics that boast the high resolution needed to enlarge the image size massively without losing a single pixel of detail. Click here to see how companies are tapping the power of the big Australian picture to release the poetic emotion of our majestic land.

Reflecting on Earlier Visions

We’ve scanned in the third edition of the original lightVision magazine with Robert Besanko’s no-country-bumpkin cover, dating from the dawning days of 1978, to remind you what the photographic scene was like way back when. Although it pre-dates Wildlight, some of the players are still around, like our partner and intrepid technical guru Jean-Marc Le Péchoux, who was at the editorial and publishing helm of this earlier industry publication.  Find out what subjects were on the minds and retinas of our industry associates in those days (like sneakers and photographic equipment auctions and garden nudes) and take a moment to reflect that as much as things change, they somehow remain the same. Reassuring isn’t it!

Photographer Central

Water Magic Exhibition in Sydney

As we write, Richard Woldendorp has just descened after a weeklong aerial photoshoot over the magnificent Western Australian coast gathering spectacular new bird’s eye matierial. You won’t have to wait long to see the results, which will be on show at a new exhibition entitled ‘Water Magic” at the Boutwell Draper Gallery, 82-84 George Street, Redfern in Sydney from 26 August to 18 September, 2010.

Penny Tweedie photo to become a Rolf Harris artwork

Wildlight photogapher Penny Tweedie, long a chronichler of the indigenous Australian landscape, is having her picture ‘Christmas Sunrise’ transformed into an oil on canvas by noted Australian born artist Rolf Harris, CBE, AM

The work (shown here before its final iteration) will appear in Harris’ A Life in Art show at the Clarendon Fine Art gallery in London’s Mayfair from 2 to 19 July 2010, after which it will go on nationwide tour of Britain.

News from the Rennie Ellis Archive

Apart from the collection that incorporates our current Life’s a Beach retrospective, which has recently been acquired by the State Library of Victoria, you can catch two great exhibitions of Rennie Ellis’s work in Sydney and Adelaide:

Up the Cross: Rennie Ellis and Wesley Stacey Until 8 August 2010

Museum of Sydney

Cnr Phillip & Albert Streets, Sydney

Rennie Ellis and fellow photographer Wesley Stacey spent the summer of 1970-71 in Kings Cross, getting to know the locals and delving behind the scenes. Together they captured the sights, sounds and pulsating rhythms of life on the streets, in the clubs and residences of Sydney’s infamous red light district. It was the ’summer of love’ and the Cross was as much a magnet for long-haired pilgrims and avant-garde artists as it was for US servicemen on leave from Vietnam. This exhibition of their photos reveals moments of joy and pathos, the surface glitter and what was going on backstage, providing a fascinating portrait of life ‘up the Cross’ at a unique moment in time.

Candid Camera Australian Photography 1950s – 1970s Until 1 August 2010

Art Gallery of South Australia

North Terrace, Adelaide South Australia

A survey of Australian documentary photography from the 1950s to the 1970s, Candid Camera comprises more than eighty photographs by renowned Australian photographers, including Max Dupain, David Moore, Jeff Carter, Robert McFarlane, Mervyn Bishop, Rennie Ellis, Carol Jerrems and Roger Scott.

Head On Portrait Prize 2010

This portrait of Hugo and Ernst earned Wildlight’s Andrew Stephenson a runner-up spot in the Australan Centre for Photography show judged in Sydney in June.

Sushine Coast School of Photography in Yandina, Queensland

Running for almost a year now with over 200 sudents, Colin Beard reports that the school is planning an ‘In the Footsteps of Saint Francis’ exhibition in central Brisbane at Westpac soon. Check here for more details.

Tips for Blissful Holiday Touring

Australians are used to spending a lot of time behind the wheel, travelling great distances for work or play. Doing this frequently means the charm of the scenery may wear off pretty fast, but there are blessed diversions.
We’ve gathered a few such images here for your enjoyment and as a mental oasis for instant recall following that inevitable moment of holiday motoring when a chorus of little voices chirps ‘are we there yet?’ which might just about push you over the edge. Steady on, pull over, lie back and think of Wildlight!

Laughing at letterboxes

No matter how far out your outback is in Australia, there is a constant — the national sense of humour — a wry reminder that it’s unwise to take oneself too seriously. Bill Bachman’s recent collection of quirky mailboxes and roadside driveway markers can bring smiles to the faces of even the most jaded of road warriors.

Season’s Greetings and A Happy 2010

All of us at Wildlight Photo Agency wish you good cheer for the Yuletide Season and health and success in the New Year. We appreciate your business and look forward to working together again in 2010. Jean-Marc is in Europe freezing with family, and I’ll be roasting in country New South Wales. So, you can blow canon balls through the office over the holidays, feel free to use the website and hit the credit card. We’ll be back on deck around 11 January, unless it’s a beach day…

Photographer Central

Stand to Applaud!

A retrospective of the work of the late photo legend Rennie Ellis earlier this year staged by the National Gallery of Victoria was accompanied by the limited edition publication ‘No Standing Only Dancing‘ which won a Ruby award for book and slip case at the recent Victorian PICA judging in Melbourne reports Manuela Furci from the Rennie Ellis Archive, see details here for more info and orders.

16th Joop Swart Masterclass

Wildlight founder Philip Quirk informs us he is the local chair for this annual World Press Photo event held in the Netherlands. The Masterclass is a one-week session with a group of the best photographers, photo editors and agency directors from around the world. The award winners receive an all expenses paid trip to Amsterdam to participate in the Masterclass.
There are 12 places awarded to photographers from the nominations made by regional committees. The Australia/New Zealand committee will finalize its nominations by the end of January 2010. If you think you fit the criteria, contact Philip as soon as possible. You need to provide a current portfolio by CD or email, plus details of your web site. The committee in Australia comprises Philip Quirk, Michael Amendolia and Robert McFarlane. Check all the details as well as the criteria for Masterclass nomination at the home page for World Press Photo.

Sharing Stories online

Liz Thompson reports on a new cyber medium for children in remote locations and tells us, “We’ve just launched the new SharingStories Digital online site www.sharingstories.com.au and the young people would love to hear that you’ve looked at, listened to and enjoyed their work. Please take some time to check it out  and leave them some comments. For more information about this novel eCommunity you can contact Liz.

News from Hermit Park

Andrew Rankin who flies the flag for Wildlight in far north Queensland, tells us he’s just published a book from a bi-annual shoot that he does for Catholic Education in Townsville. It’s a 292-page hardcover tome covering images from 30 schools. See a preview here. More info from Andrew Rankin Photography.

Turning back the hands of time - old bromides make cool reading

As Summer rolls into frame we’ve reprinted for your reading pleasure the second edition of the original lightVISION magazine published at the end of 1977. Download it here. It proves that photography is not bounded by time, as the material was just as fresh and interesting then as it is now. Thirty-odd years ago, Beatrice Faust was ruminating about the state of visual awareness in Australia (a country of 13 million people); William Clift contributed an engaging collection of photos in his US Court House series and film maker Paul Cox is interviewed by Paul Turner in conjunction with his exhibition at the Australian Centre for Photography. It’s great to turn back the hands of time; we know you’ll enjoy this snapshot of the business as it was over three decades ago.

The greening of Ernie

Our resident Pug and highly paid photographer’s assistant Ernst Graf von Schmeckle, is always looking for alternative avenues to fame. This month he’s become particularly attracted to our new studio green screen, especially when it rains down juicy bones. The good news is there’s no carbon emissions and no waste (well almost none). The virtuosity of virtuality. How green can you get Ernie!

Kill Bill collection

Kill Bill! is  the momentarily unkind sentiment we photo-editor types tend to whip up when Bill Bachman, our stalwart contributing photographer from leafy Camberwell, Victoria, sends us a folio of over 800 new images that need to be prepped and published for your use. But we know you appreciate great new material representing a smorgasbord of pan-Australian subjects; you have them in spades here, in his latest montage of everying from portraits of smiling young women and miners to grapes and vineyards, some quirky aerials and abstracts and dazzling close ups of native plants. Thanks Bill, we got over it and of course we love you!

Is Uluru receding from view?

It depends where you stand. The new Talinguru Nyakunytjaku sunrise viewing area for tourists erected at a cost of some $20 million, which opened recently at Uluru, reminds us that we at Wildlight have had a close eye on the famed rock for what seems to us like eons, even though we count in years rather than millennia.  Grenville Turner took this shot of the south face in 2008 from the exact site of the new vantage point, which marshals visitors to a place well back from the monolith. We thought you’d like to see it with and without the coaches. David Moore, more famously took the images below in the 1960s, long before the trampling down gathered pace and when Uluru was called Ayers Rock. Appropriately, Wildlight was once again up close and personal we can report, as Parks Australia contracted Grenville to shoot the October 8 opening ceremony with The Hon. Peter Garrett AM, Federal MP and Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts, many Australian Aboriginal traditional owners, other dignitaries and local Anangu people.

With over 40 photographers located all around Australia, Wildlight is fortunate to have a network of bureaus acting as photographic listening posts in the four corners of the country. Here are some reports from our photographers on what’s happening photo-wise across Australia.

Rodney Hyett, who maintains a shutter eye from wave height for us down on the Mornington Peninsular of Victoria, brings us news that he’s returned to his original theme with a just released “The Great Ocean Road” Calendar 2010, after focusing on “The Surfer’s Coastline” for 2009. Plus, he has produced another new calendar called “Above Melbourne“. Buy them here.

Colin Beard, a perennial ray of sunshine for Wildlight up on the Sunshine Coast in Queensland, tells us that following the success of his exhibition ‘Rock’n'Roll Odyssey’ at the Orange Regional Gallery in July, he is now puttng on a new one called ’Icons of Rock’n'Roll’ at the Main Street Gallery in Montville, South East Queensland. The photographs were taken between 1966 and 1968 for Go-Set Magazine and include pictures of The Rolling Stones taken on their 1966 tour of Australia, Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin at the Monterey Pop Festival in June 1967 as well as The Who, Cat Stevens and The Hollies, taken in London in 1967.
Colin has also started a school of photography on the Sunshine Coast. It offers a series of courses, one session per week, over a number of weeks, similar to the courses run by the Australian College of Photography. These courses are intended to provide an alternative to courses at TAFE and other educational institutions for busy people with the intention of maintaining highly professional standards of photography, surpassing the aspirations of TAFE. There’s more info on the following website, including informative newsletters on photography that Colin puts together every month: www.photolearning.com.au

When we launched our LightVision ezine last year, we told you that its source inspiration was a bi-monthly magazine of the same name that had its origins in Melbourne in 1977 under the editorial stewardship of Wildlight director Jean-Marc Le Péchoux. Then as now the publication provided a snapshot of the history and techniques of photography with an emphasis on people in the business. Back then, well known photographers like Philip Quirk, founder of Wildlight Photo Agency and Rennie Ellis, later a contributing photographer to the agency, were typical authors of the articles. The modern day electronic version carries on this tradition — co-incidentally, with both these photographers still represented in the library—with the added benefit that in its blog format we can receive your feedback and ideas. Who better than Jean-Marc to note these 32 years on: plus ça change… as much as the times change things stay the same at Wildlight, the standard bearer of high-quality Australian photography for almost a quarter of a century. After such a tangent of self-congratulation, you must be wondering, where’s this all leading to? Look here at the scanned pages of LightVISION #1 Australia’s international photography magazine, dated Sep/Oct 1977 (captured as a pdf with searchable text) and you’ll be comforted by the knowledge that nothing has passed you by, corduroys are still the rage and real estate in South Yarra is just as likely to break the bank now as it did back then. Relive that seminal moment on a summer afternoon in the 1820s, when the first photographic image of a French garden taken by heliograph process, introduced what was to become an all-encompassing medium. And to cap the retrospective, this stanza of verse by Minor White, surely will leave us with little doubt that things are bound to be the same in 2041 (but don’t hold your breath!):
“Count inhalations
 Count exhalations
 Count nothing
 Be Breath”

New takes on Suburbia

Refresh your stock of home soil images, covering anything from cliff-top washing lines to ferry commuters to perambulating mums to period pubs, by paying a visit to our new features section where you’ll see that we’ve recently been out and about in the burbs capturing the latest esoterica from everyday life. Remember, Wildlight is pure Oz with an emphasis on ozone (there’s a lot of sea air in our picture library at wildlight.net). Let the spray lash your face and rejoice that you’re experiencing the GFC in a sun-filled place.

Going for the Big Picture…

Ever wonder how a small tranny blows up for use in large format installations for offices, displays and so on? See for yourself: Eight massive scenics from large format Wildlight panoramas cover feature walls in the newly fitted out Hyundai Motors head office complex in Ryde, Sydney. The project was handled by George P Johnson, a specialist design firm that also causes big things to happen at trade shows and exhibitions.

Go overseas with Wildlight

Pictures from our library now grace two pages of the new ‘N’ Series Australian passport produced by Note Printing Australia. Colin Beard’s lively image (Page 10) of a stockman driving cattle in the Victorian highlands as well as yachts (Page 35) on the Huon River in Tasmania by Tom Keating are among images of Australia printed throughout the document making every visa page unique. This has resulted in a passport which is very difficult to falsify through page substitution or tampering, according to the Minister of Foreign Affairs, who launched the new document at the end of May.

Wildlight standard bearer and Australian trade power broker, Ernst Graf von Schmeckle, was one of the first to be issued with the paw proof passports, he immediately headed to the ‘drome’ to attend the G8 conference.

Yes, yes,we know, we recently promised you that there was light at the end of the tunnel. And there is, even though regrettably, it persists as just a pinpoint. But take heart that during these tough times, there are good savings on offer to help the bottom line. Like Wildlight’s 30% discount on all image prices, which runs until the end of June. We hope you’ve had a chance to take advantage of the savings before now or will do so while they last in the month ahead. A penny saved is a penny earned!

We lift you up!

Using our superior knowledge of photography, we confirm that you can photograph a rainbow, although that pot of gold at its foot is a little more elusive to capture. It’s why we continue to build a library of thoroughly cheerful images that will gladden your heart and the hearts and minds of the people who see your work. After all, we all need some cheering up these days. We’re sure you can spare a couple of minutes for a good laugh out loud - so dive in here for a slideshow of 50 quick funnies from our archive.

Just in today - Water, water every where…

We’ve just received some fresh aerial images of waterlogged Lake Eyre (with a side trip to spectacular Wilpena Pound) taken by Grenville Turner, so lots to see now and to look forward to at Wildlight Photo Agency, perpetual visual chroniclers of things Australian.

New Collections

Be uplifted by Brian Eno’s wonderful image projections onto the sails of the Sydney Opera House that I recently photographed and which now join our large collection of pictures of this great landmark. Pip Blackwood’s new photos of camel racing out the back of Bourke will make you laugh and Dean Cox’s gallery of close up floral images from Australian gardens is sure to brighten your day. Dean is the technical sales rep for large-format printers at AGFA Graphics and a great font of wisdom for us here at Wildlight as he is for anyone seeking picture perfect solutions in print. Jeff Drewitz takes us off the road again with an energetic series of new images of motoring derring-do in the Victorian Alpine region, where the eagles cry, on a mountain high. There’s a memorable shot of Jeff fording the uncharacteristically swiftly flowing Murray River in his newly kitted out Land Cruiser. Take a spin through our library of all-Australian images at wildlight.net; seeing a folio of spectacular scenics like Shane Pedersen’s recent pix of Tasmania is bound to make you fall in love with dear old Oz all over again.

After editing 300,000 ‘trannies’ in December, I spent January denying that photography existed. We kept only 3% of the analogue library, the rest were sent, all 500 kilos, back to photographers. Moving the business to a smaller space couldn’t have come at a better time - significantly reduced overheads; getting back to core business - an online picture library, not a storage facility for analogue IP - hail virtualisation! We have thousands of premium images from our photographers around Australia in the production pipeline and outstanding new collections have recently been uploaded.

New Collection

Pilbara Paradox

It’s like having a great lawn and inviting a puppy over to play; almost certain physical carnage. That’s the paradox facing the Pilbara, one of Australia’s most pristine and remarkable landscapes and also the one with the most mining and developmental activity. We thought it would be a good idea to preserve the memory of the Pilbara before it becomes too full of holes.

Hugh Brown and David Bettini our intrepid photographers from way out west have done just that with this updated collection of some pretty amazing images. These two WA pros capture the region from different  angles. Hugh’s recent pictures shoot, for the mining giants, are now available online. Hugh has clocked many hours hanging out of choppers over Port Hedland, covered in dust in the open pit mines and lost himself in the boondocks looking for exploration rigs.

As he scans across the open plains, David has concentrated on the ancient beauty of the Pilbara, from the emerald green waters to the coast to the red ragged ranges of the interior. All his recent online images can be found in his latest hard cover landscape book, Pilbara, Western Australia.

Editor’s Choice

Hope Springs Eternal

As history repeats itself with a season of horrendous bushfires, we at Wildlight are reminded of the recurring scenes of hardship, courage and heroism. We also see the benevolent signs of hope as  communities face the daunting task of rebuilding, in some cases starting over almost from scratch. This striking image by the late  Rennie Ellis taken six weeks after the devastating Ash Wednesday fires of 1983 near the Great Ocean Road , Victoria, is a timeless reminder of nature’s powers—good and bad—and a symbol of renewal in the face of destruction. Just add your masthead and gutter!

Early Australian Female Photographer

This month we feature Muriel Mowbray Stephenson, an early Australian female commercial photographer. Her interest in photography began in her native Tasmania at the beginning of 20th century and continued in Sydney, where she moved at the start of the World War I. She worked first in the Darlinghurst studio of C.S. Beers, who published under the title Carlton Series. In the 1940s, she took over the business and published as the Mowbray Series. Her studio was located right in the centre of Kings Cross, Sydney, next to the historic Darlinghurst fire station. Her studio was demolished in the 1970’s to make way for the tunnel. From the balcony she captured the changing face of Kings Cross over the years, including historic events such as the Queen’s visit in 1954.

Muriel’s distinctive cursive handwriting appeared as title information on the face of thousands of photographs and postcards distributed in Australia for decades.

Click here for a preview of her iconic images, now presented as the Mowbray Collection by Wildlight. These include historic Australian subjects; building stages of the Sydney Harbour Bridge, city trams and views of the Eastern Suburbs of Sydney. It is interesting to note that Muriel, who was my great-grand aunt, rarely took credit for her work in her own name; so I am pleased to now give her the recognition she so readily deserves.  Thousands more of her black & white images are still to be scanned. Enjoy a piece of Aussie history!

Wildlight Photo Agency (Exikon Pty Ltd) is moving from Redfern to Double Bay (a.k.a Double Pay) as of 23 December 2008. Editing the analogue library and sending back transparencies has advanced us further down the path of virtualisation. We don’t need the space and expense of a large office.

Please make a note of our new address and telephone number:

Exikon Pty Ltd
Wildlight Photo Agency

P.O. Box 1606
Double Bay NSW 1360
Australia

T +61 (2) 9043 3255

There will be NO FAX - hurray!

We are throwing our facial support behind Wildlight photographer, Dean Cox, as he participates in Movember. It’s a month long charity event raising awareness for depression and prostate cancer in Australian men. Participants need to grow a mustache of their choice. Which style will Dean choose? Handlebar, Dali, Fu Manchu, Imperial or Hungarian…so many to choose from. Most importantly, what will his wife say when he goes to bed with a snood on?
Dean, send a a progress pic, we need to see the mo!

Just like the stock market we are shedding stock as quickly as the Aussie dollar is going through the floor. Difference is we are doing a careful cull…of images and not a panicked sell off of ridiculous assets that no-one understands.

I was always proud and thought it impressive that the Wildlight analogue library contained a whopping 300,000 images. With some of the best names in the business, it’s an archive with great depth and top quality imagery. Despite this abundance of cellulose resources, we are hurtling towards a business model which embraces virtualisation. In these bleak economic times, automating labour-intensive business processes is a big saving for a small business like ours. So picture an office with loads of filing cabinets labeled ‘empty’. Feels good - my eyes are wrecked and at the end of the day, seeing or talking about image-making has me reaching for the Stoli. We are keeping the cream of the crop and sending the rest back to photographers. What do we do with the edit?…edit it again…and again - hopefully, we’ll have a few thousand survivors to scan - sigh.

We haven’t been the only ones hunched over a light table waiting for the chiropractor. The Rennie Ellis Photographic Archive has spent the last five years editing 500,000 images of the late Melbourne identity, Rennie Ellis. Wildlight is proud to represent his images in our collection, and now you can see them at a well deserved major retrospective of his work at the National Gallery of Victoria - it’s going to be very retro - I just finished starching my safari suit for the opening night!