As a commercial photographer based in Melbourne I have always enjoyed specialising in industrial work; certainly it is a challenging field, which definitely requires a solid technical capability combined with an adaptable approach to the visual problem solving inherent in every assignment. Whereas many photographers working today in fields such as wedding and portrait photography can simply work with available light, most industrial situations are in my opinion much more demanding of additional light sources. By their very nature, most factories, mines or industrial plants are mostly equipped with dull, flat, and in many cases inadequate (for photography at least) lighting. As such I will often deliberately overuse flash in order to achieve a dramatic and interesting effect, and then on the same day paint with the barest kiss of flash to rim light anything from a person at work through to an industrial machine or product.

All of the images from this recent shoot were of course captured and delivered to the client in colour, but I wanted to take them a little further into the gritty industrial feel with a black and white treatment. I have processed these on my Mac Book Pro while working in the UK, so I have not been able to judge them properly on my usual monitor, but they are just for fun after all…

As would be rather obvious from the following images, my client Rocla makes concrete piping and other related building products, hence the circular ‘theme’ tying the images together…

I cannot really explain why I enjoy this type of work so much (certainly I could make more money photographing weddings!), other than precisely because it is so challenging to produce both technically proficient and interesting images in often dirty, loud and stressful environments (for both the equipment and photographer!). All of the above images were taken with my workhorse Canon 5D Mk III, rather than my new 5DSR, as I simply did not need the increased resolution in this instance. As with most shoots of this type, it is necessary to keep in mind that the gear will need regular (and expensive) cleaning and maintenance.