Winner!!!

{Commercial Photography}

Sometimes one of those jobs comes your way you just can’t pass up. For example a day at the races is always going to be a winner. What a day! The photography brief was met, the clients were happy with the results, everyone had a great time, and I even managed to pick the winner!

Yep, I love my job!

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APSCON 2014 – Grampians Photography Tour

The Australian Photographic Society’s annual Convention (APSCON) was held in Ballarat this week. For those that read my post from a fortnight ago will know I was invited to be part of this year’s line up of presenters with the presentation The Grampians – A Photographic Wonderland.  No one fell asleep and I was assured it went well.

The guided Photography Tour of The Grampians (with yours truly) the following day was a raging success. All the attendees lucky enough to sign up for the day got to witness the Grampians first hand at its best on a sensational clear spring day. Due to the tight timetable the midday light wasn’t ideal photographically speaking but no one was complaining. The odd passing cloud helped compositions and long lenses were call of the day to capture that neat little landscape nestled within the broader landscape.

Thanks everyone for coming along and be sure to come a visit us again in the beautiful Grampians region. Here were a few shots I managed to sneak in on the day…

APSCON 2014 - Grampians Tour with Marty Schoo

APSCON 2014 – Grampians Tour with Marty Schoo

 

APSCON 2014 - Grampians Tour with Marty Schoo

APSCON 2014 – Grampians Tour with Marty Schoo

 

APSCON 2014 - Grampians Tour with Marty Schoo

APSCON 2014 – Grampians Tour with Marty Schoo

 

APSCON 2014 - Grampians Tour with Marty Schoo

APSCON 2014 – Grampians Tour with Marty Schoo

APSCON 2014 - Grampians Tour with Marty Schoo

APSCON 2014 – Grampians Tour with Marty Schoo

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Marty Schoo Photography – Welcome!

You’ve found my Personal Photography blog. Its where you’ll find all my photography related News, Views, Reviews and Vistas. In other words you’ll find everything of a general photography nature here that’s happening in my professional life as well as my landscape work that I squeeze in between my client based work.

Because my photography work is of a broad nature my client based Wedding and Commercial photography posts can be found in their own blog categories which you can access via the drop down menu or links on the right. Enjoy!

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GOLD!!!

Today was APPA day (Australian Professional Photographer Awards). Quite excitingly I somehow managed to score one of the highest scoring prints for the day in the landscape category! The image below scored 95 out of 100 receiving a relatively rare Gold-with-Distinction award. Exciting much? Sure is!

For those interested I shot the image in a single capture early in the year at Hollow Mountain in the Northern Grampians just 5 days before bushfire razed most of the forest in the foreground. The shoot location still remains closed today due to the damage caused. The image was converted from colour to a toned black and white, the aspect ratio was changed to square and contrast was selectively applied to bring some extra punch to the final result.

95 Gold with Distinction at APPA 2014

95 Gold with Distinction at APPA 2014

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Exciting Times!

In just over a week’s time I’ll be guest speaker at APSCON 2014, which is the Australian Photographic Society’s annual convention, which this year is held in Ballarat, Victoria. The attendees from Australia wide are about to find out how fantastic the Grampians region is to visit and photograph. Bring it on!

The Grampians - A photographic Wonderland - APSCON 2014

The Grampians – A photographic Wonderland – APSCON 2014

 

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Music Group Shoot

The beauty of being a multi-genre photographer is the unique jobs that pop up out of the woodwork. It’s not my first band gig but this one was a blast! I don’t think a serious word was said amongst the boys during the whole shoot haha. The brief was pretty open with cruisy backstreet locations with natural light. Hope you like the shots as much as the boys did. If so, and you know anyone looking for their own publicity imagery then swing them my way peeps! Anyway keep your ears peeled for very talented Trevor Petrie and the War of Ideas!

Trevor Petrie

Trevor Petrie

Trevor Petrie

Trevor Petrie

Trevor Petrie

Trevor Petrie

Trevor Petrie

Trevor Petrie

Trevor Petrie

Trevor Petrie

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Project Platypus – Landcare

{Question}

If you could mix your own work with happy people, winter sunshine, rainbows, fun, great food, campfires, amazing music, and volunteering for a great environmental cause then would you? I certainly did over the last two weeks with a series of shoots for Project Platypus with their super-impressive themed “Plantouts”. Check it out!

 

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It’s all about the drama

When I’m out and about I’m always for the lookout for some dramatic weather. I just love drama like this (as long as its not during a wedding or commercial shoot haha). This little spot near Hopetoun was about to get very wet last week as we were travelling through.

Storm clouds threatening over the Northern Wimmera - Victoria

Storm clouds threatening over the Northern Wimmera – Victoria

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Don’t be gloomy

There’s always light at the end of the tunnel. Even gloomy weather parts eventually.

Sunbeamss

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Photography preferences

Wedding Photography preferences are often directed from the bride but I always ask if there is anything the groom wants captured as well on the big day. Here the groom and the boys were car guys and wanted some shots with the cars and the car theme. And why not? It was a super fun day. Here is the “poster” shot…

Catherine and Andrew-130poster

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Fungi Time

Because I’m a “fun-guy” I thought I’d share these three little squirts from yesterdays forest photo walk. The tallest Fungi here is only a tiny 3cm!

Fungi

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Simplicity

Often the simple things in life are the best. Who agrees?

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Soar like an Eagle

Yesterday I went for a drive with a friend to one of my favourite spots… Wallaby Rocks. It got damp and miserable quite quickly and we contemplated turning around and heading back to a warm fire instead. We decided to continue the drive and made the walk to the top just as the weather parted and the eagles soared around us. I fired off about 15 frames and came home with one keeper. This one! Do you think it was it worth it?

Wallaby Rocks-5583

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Solo Explore

Last week I managed to get out of the office and do a solo trip throughout the Victorian Deserts. I tried to avoid the bitumen as much as possible with the aim to capture the best of the remote open spaces of the region for my   i s o l a t i o n   project. This is Wembulin Track being lit with warm pockets of dawn light on the first morning. The track skirts Lake Albacutya and the surrounding wheatbelt.

Meandering Track-5408

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I s o l a t i o n

Some more images for my ongoing   i s o l a t i o n  project.   I’m getting closer to desert country by the hour now. Space to think, space to move. Love it!

Tracks-5424b

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Art is…

A few friends encouraged me to enter the photography event at the wimmera’s ART IS… Festival running at the moment. The theme was “Layers of Time”. Turns out my photograph of Taylors Lake filling from flooding rains took out the top gong! For more on the festival check out the program right here at http://www.artis.wimmera.com.au/index.html

Art Is - Winner

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No Awkward Poses

Just have fun and be yourself; My guarantee is for your wedding day to be awkward-pose free, just the way it should be!

No Awkward Poses

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Victorian Photographer of the Year Awards

Well VPPY (Vic Pro Photographer of the Year) is done for another year. My two fave entries managed strong silvers (84 & 83 for those in the know) which is nice and the other two missed silver by one solitary point each (79). I’ll take that for 2014. Now its time to sort out two new ones for APPA nationals later in the year.

VPPY-martyschoo

My entries in Victorian Photographer of the Year (VPPY).

 

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Can the Bride and Groom meet before the Wedding Ceremony?

They sure can!

Many couples nowdays choose to have their portrait photographs done before the ceremony. It’s naturally a personal preference and doing so can certainly lead to having more time after the ceremony with family and friends when the party starts.

What’s more is that the first reveal of the bride to the groom can be a far more intimate and fun experience.

As a photographer I’ve never witnessed one wedding the same. Relax, be yourselves, and ensure the biggest day of your lives is done your own way.

Congratulations Emily and Sam! … Haha, mind the lipstick there Sam

 

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Sneak Peek

I couldn’t keep this one to myself any longer. Congratulations Emily and Sam, your whole day was a blast from go to whoah!
How is this for a wedding venue peeps? TeePee marquee under the stars… WOW!

 

Emily&Ben1

The amazing TeePee wedding venue

 

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Leather = Awesome

{Wedding Packages}

Leather leather leather. How good does it look!

All my albums are archival quality (100+yrs) with thick “lay-flat” pages and are expertly finished with one of 50 cover choices. Emma and Ben wisely chose the sumptuous Tan coloured Genuine Leather option which I’m sure you’ll agree has come up brilliantly.

They also chose the extra option of the memory vault containing a high-res backup of all their wedding photos. The vault is fire and water proof and is one of the few archival rated digital storage devices on the market. In my packages it arrives to you in a classy presentation box beautifully cover-matched to your album.

Emma and Ben were thrilled with the photography on their wedding day and were pretty stoked to say the least with the look and finish of their album package when it arrived.

Get in touch if you want to find out more on all the package options and see some more samples.

Leather Album and Memory Vault

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{Tip} Accentuating the Wind

Most people when they see the photo below say to me “wow, fantastic, how lucky were you with that streaky sky”. When in fact on this day I had regular white fluffy clouds and I was lucky I had wind (lots of it) and that I brought along my ND filters.

On a windy day the temptation is to use a faster shutter speed to “freeze” the movement of tree foliage, clouds and anything else that is flapping and drifting in the breeze. On this occasion I used a ND3.0 filter to allow me to capture all this movement, in this case the high and low altitude clouds whizzing across the sky in two different directions. You might also choose to capture trees blowing or a flag fluttering.

So what is an ND filter and what does it do? ND stands for Neutral Density, meaning it is a dark shaded filter that is neutral in colour, or just simply put… translucent grey. Like putting on a pair of sunglasses for your camera. They are commonly available in various strengths (darkness) from a 0.3 through to a 0.9 which allow you to extend your exposure by 1 to 3 f-stops. By extending your exposure time you can capture movement with easy, think flowing water for example. If you dig around a little further you’ll also find ND filters that are super dark right up to the ND3.0 which is a full 10 f-stops darker. This allows for exposures of up to 30 seconds in the middle of the day…. Awesome!

So in this situation pictured I had some gnarly rock, some recently bushfire-burnt trees (that due to no foliage weren’t moving in the wind), and lots of fast moving white clouds. With a ND3.0 filter I managed a 20 second exposure to achieve this result.

    Long exposure with ND1000 filter to slow shutter speed down during daylight hours

Long exposure with ND1000 filter to slow shutter speed down during daylight hours

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Fun in the Sun – Grampians Wedding Style

{Kate and Kevin}

What can I say about Kate and Kevin besides fun, fun, fun!

The whole day revolved around doing the things they enjoy in life and the mood was infectious. I didn’t hear the word “serious” once… seriously!

There is a lesson for us all in that… just have fun in the sun Grampians Wedding style.

 

 

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