A coolie steps off a wooden cargo boat gangplank. These magnificent Makassar schooners called Pinisiat at the port of Sunda Kelapa, Jakarta, Indonesia.

The right picture: Batavia, old harbour of Jakarta

August 28, 2019 / / No Comments

Sunda Kelapa, the old harbour of Jakarta, whispers tales of a bygone era.

Known as Batavia until 1949, the port was a centre of trade and cultural exchange; students of Captain James Cook are generally cognisant of Batavia’s prominence in the first voyage story. In this post I’ll take you on a visual journey through Sunda Kelapa, using this captivating location as a springboard to explore the art of choosing the perfect image.

The practice of self assignment can be one of a photographer’s most useful exercises. It is a highly personal experience in which the photographer becomes his own audience—there is no client to please, no specific requirements by which the photographs will be judged. It serves as a way to test your abilities should they ever be offered the “dream” assignment. This is an opportunity to make mistakes and learn from them. Some good images may be captured in the bargain. The purpose beyond any such practice should be to move beyond the ordinary, to break the photographic cliché.
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Auto Restorations website homepage after redesign, showing Automotive Dreams marketing slideshow and table of links to website feature articles and pages.

Energise an image heavy website

April 9, 2019 / / No Comments

Energise an image heavy website by design

AUTO RESTORATIONS, 52 STEWART ST, CHRISTCHURCH, NEW ZEALAND

Links to PDF of New Zealand Classic Car magazine cover story on the 1963 Ferrari 250 GT Lusso

Making it to the cover of Classic Car magazine, the superior quality of Auto Restorations’ work speaks for itself in this 6 page cover article  (linked).

Established in 1973 Auto Restorations has a story to tell. Every year it must mobilise new car restoration projects. To do this it relies on existing clientele, affluent, discerning people who might already know of the company by word of mouth, prestigious Concours D‘Elegance ‘First In Class’ wins, the publicity that generates in classic car enthusiasts’ media, their advertising, website and brochure—sales brochures, basically—designed to showcase the superior quality of the work they do. Showcase the process of restoration, the completed works, among them some of the most refined and rare cars in the world, and do it justice with advertising and promotional material that has the maximum effect and gives the impression to their select international clientele of an organization worthy of trusting one’s precious, valuable car to.

Well crafted and well made custom built motor cars, widely regarded as some of the most rare and beautiful, are the results of the restoration process, a process which varies.
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Four of Auto Restorations skilled workforce wheel a custom body Delage Roadster into position in the carpark.

Informal portraiture at work

April 6, 2019 / / No Comments

Informal portraiture in the workplace using available light

AUTO RESTORATIONS WORKSHOP, STEWART STREET, CHRISTCHURCH 2009–2012

When shooting informal portraiture avoid distraction from the most important purpose—getting photographs. These photos were shot and photo composites produced 2009–2012, they offer a historical profile of Auto Restorations during that time soon after Allan Wylie stepped up from the Mechanical Shop floor to the role of General Manager. Pictures of their employees on their redesigned website, and capabilities brochure in print helped Auto Restorations transform from a faceless company to people that their customers can relate to. The highly specialised, high value personal service that Auto Restorations’ workforce offer to customers is an advantage that they have over large companies, their multiple international Concours D’Elegance awards attest to this. Good photos of their skilled workforce reinforce this.
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Before & Aftereffects

May 2, 2018 / / No Comments

A picture is worth a thousand words but a good-looking picture is worth much more

Avoid the use of poor images for your promotions. The most successful publicity photos look lifelike, convincing, and are free of distracting clutter. Professional Photoshop retouching is a great way to correct poor photos to maximise the performance of your images. Being concerned with maximising image quality whether for reasons of pride if nothing else, is beside the point, because in the end everybody wants their pictures to look good on the web and in print.
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Southern DC3 Newsletter, Spring 2007, pages 2 & 3.

Southern DC3 Newsletter

July 5, 2017 / / No Comments

Issue 1, Spring 2007

The multicolumn layout makes for an easy read and a flexible format that packs in plenty of information per page. Photography, illustration and other graphics make the newsletter more visually appealing and encouraging people to either dip into the articles that interest them first or read the newsletter from end to end.
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Southern DC3 Charitable Trust donations prospectus, Help us reach for the sky, Front cover.

Southern DC3 Trust prospectus & promotional materials

July 4, 2017 / / No Comments

Patron Richie McCaw chats with Dave Horsburgh on the cover of The Southern DC3 Trust “Help us reach for the sky” fundraising prospectus I designed and published in 2006–7.

My role was as Creative Director of the Trust and Mac operator, providing all creative services, photography and the desktop publishing of all print collateral. This provision of goods, branding and brand management services was under the auspices of Pionair Adventures for whom I was in-house Creative Designer at the time.
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Cover of Case Study: Horizontal Infrastructure 01, TruLine Logo

TruLine case study docs

May 19, 2017 / / No Comments

The website Case Studies are published from pdfs for inclusion in tender bid documents as required. The case studies are focussed on TruLine Civil’s methodologies as applied to specific contracts. Between 2008–11 this involved documentary location photography of completed projects from Punakaiki to Arthurs Pass. Since 2011 the project manager shifted up the priority going forward, shooting TruLine’s workplace methodologies  in progress at selected works in progress. This open-ended project has progressively provided a high quality image library that covers the gamut of TruLine’s civil engineering strengths and capabilities.
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TruLine Key Personnel CV document, front cover.

TruLine key personnel CVs

May 19, 2017 / / No Comments

Tru-Line Civil Logo. Brands for New Zealand companies, Greymouth, New Zealand.A set of key personnel and management team CV documents have been prepared for the purposes of adding to tender bid documents in the appendices. They may also be integrated into the bid document proper depending on the specifications set out in the client request for information. The key personnel custom Word document template allows for the individual CVs to be recombined and re-ordered by the client on an ad-hoc basis then published in-house to suit the specific requirements of each tender bid.
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Case studies for Civil Engineering firms. Why are they so beneficial?

January 20, 2017 / / No Comments

Tru-Line Civil Logo. Brands for New Zealand companies, Greymouth, New Zealand.Two of my legacy clients merged to form TruLine Civil in 2011, I branded the merged civil engineering firm and developed a market positioning strategy in collaboration with the projects manager. To set TruLine apart from the crowd and influence the way their target audience perceives them we chose to emphasise the distinguishing feature of the firm, their methodology for completing civil works. Civil works methodology is a suitcase term, which when unpacked is the TruLine system of methods, this goes to depth and breadth of staff education, their training and hands-on experience, problem-solving skills, use of good judgement, creative thinking, and the ace up their sleeve, the firm’s exemplary level of employee retention. By creating their first website around that core of Civil Engineering case studies, including documentary photography, the meaning behind the brand’s mission “Excellence in Infrastucture” is shown to be backed-up by a reputation and ranking in the industry that is earned.

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