Featured Contributor: Fred McKie
This month, Brisbane-base photographer Fred McKie, shares with us some of his favorite images from Las Vegas to Sydney.
A black and white cityscape of Las Vegas, as seen at night from high above the Strip, has won an Australian travel photographer an award.
Brisbane-based Fred McKie’s print “Vegas Nights” collected silver in the Travel photography category at the Australian Institute of Professional Photography’s (AIPP) 2015 Queensland Professional Photography Awards (QPPA) late last month.
The photograph was
captured from the viewing platform of the Paris Las Vegas hotel and casino’s
half-size replica Eiffel Tower in late 2013 during a two-day stay in Sin City
at the start of a self-funded Southwest road trip that produced a few other
award-winning images also.
Fred shot the image, a 3.2 second exposure
time, on his primary camera – a Canon 5D Mark III – with his Canon EF 16-35mm
f/2.8L II USM lens squeezed through a small hole in the security fence.
Here he shares the story behind the capture.
“I was there as a tourist like everyone else and had no more right to stand where I was, but I’d been patient waiting for the chance to utilise the hole in the fence and I was adamant I would hold my ground until I’d captured what I wanted,” McKie says.
“I could only get one leg of my tripod firmly stabilized on
the floor, with the others strategically poked through the grill of the fence.
It was a logistical nightmare, with a high risk of it being bumped as people
jostled to get a better view.
“One of the Eiffel Tower
Experience staff even tried to hurry me along, to make way for the next group
of sightseers coming up the elevator, but the hole was small and it was fiddly
to make the precise focal length and focussing adjustments through the fence to
get the shot just right. Once I had the shot, I happily pulled back and let
everyone else in.”
He adds: “My appreciation of the photograph has grown over time, with its true potential being revealed through a recent conversion to black and white – not initially an obvious choice for showcasing the City of Lights.
“I think it really
works and the dominating casinos, the Bellagio fountain, the lights trails of
traffic and other cars sitting in long queues all help to reference the madness
that is Vegas from high above.”
By AIPP rules, entries in the QPPA travel
photography category must be single-capture images with no retouching that
materially affects the authenticity of the document. Camera technique and print
quality are considered to be important, with the judges also paying special
attention to composition, light and camera angle.
“My QPPA success also includes Silver
awards in both the Landscape and Illustrative categories, with photographs shot
in my native Australia: a Sydney Opera House abstract titled ‘Sails’ and a
spooky image conjuring a sense of paranormal activity titled ‘Supernatural
Portal’ which was captured in an old reservoir below my home city, the
Queensland capital Brisbane,” McKie says.
“Previous industry awards for myself include a Silver at the AIPP Australian Professional Photography Awards last year for a Monument Valley landscape, which is my most celebrated image to date having also been a finalist in the 2014 Head On Landscape Prize in Sydney - as part of the world’s second largest photography festival - and collecting Silver in the 2013 International Loupe Awards.
“In addition to celebrating these latest
awards, I am currently preparing for the first gallery exhibition of my
photography in Queensland, so it’s a nice momentum builder for me.
“I will be showing eight prints as part of
the SNAP15 photography group exhibition at Aspire Gallery in the inner-city
Brisbane suburb of Paddington from April 8th to April 25th, including a 45 inch x 30 inch print
of the Head On finalist ‘Monument Valley Storm’ finished in an exquisite
Italian hand-finished
and imported Bellini Fine
Moulding frame.
To view more work by Fred McKie, visit his site.