The Batblog by Photobat | Portrait and Wedding

It’s Brad and Elisha, you remember their wedding don’t you? (click here to know what all the cool kids already know)

Little shoot with the newest addition to the family, the very funky Willow. She is as awesome as her parents.

Another preview image is living on the Photobat facebook page, go check it out and like it if you wanna.

She’s 7. Can you believe it? I took some photos of her Humans too, will post them soon.

When I first read that there were Turtles in Vanuatu I was excited, I really wanted to get as close as possible to an animal I hadn’t seen before. I like turtles, but it’s been at a distance. That all changed on Moso Island.

We read that there was s Turtle Rookery on Tranquility Island (also known as Moso). We wanted to get there but really didn’t want to do the half day tour and see things that didn’t really interest us before we got to the rookery. After mentioning this to the guys at Havannah (the best place we have ever stayed) they arranged a trip for us on their little speed boat across the harbour to have our own look at the rookery.

I didn’t know what to expect, and after trekking through the jungle from the jetty we emerged into the rookery. Essentially it’s a heap of big white plastic tubs filled with turtles. The turtles are collected by local villages when they hatch and are bought to the rookery where they are paid for and then looked after until they are big enough to have a better chance of surviving in the wild.

The Hawksbill Turtle is critically endangered meaning that the species numbers have decreased, or will decrease, by 80% within three generations. So that means there isn’t that many about. To be in a little area with over a hundred of this amazing and beautiful reptile was fantastic.

The little ones are fragile and not able to be handled, but as you go down the tubs they get bigger and bigger until you get to the 2 year old turtles in the final cement tanks. These larger turtles are ready for release. The rookery relies on tourists coming by and sponsoring the turtles and releasing them. Of course, we had to do this. We picked up, measured it up and Vikashni walked it down beach and released it. TM (As we called it) was tagged and each time it is seen thy researchers will send us an email to let us know how it’s going. Very cool.

I hope TM is out there having a great time in the sea eating lots of jellyfish

We spent a little time at a village called Saama, it is located on the top side of Efate about 40 minutes drive from Port Vila. There are more photos to come from the village itself, these images are from the Chiefs (last image) chicken farm. It is encouraged for the men to stay and work in the village, and if possible to create some money. The chief is leading by example and has set up a chicken farm up the hill from the main village. It is only in start up phase but there are a heap of chickens running about and strangely, a cat. It seems that the cat does not each the chickens only the rats who try to get the eggs. He does love a treat of coconut, which is fed to the chickens in these photos by Irene the chiefs wife.

If you think people are nuts about the world cup here, you should head to a developing country. Vanuatu was World Cup crazy when we were there. There were flags everywhere, some real flags some home made, the bakeries had flags on cakes, stores were decorated, soccer balls everywhere and people had wrist bands to show their team. Even the rubbish trucks had flags on them. We stayed in an area called Seaside, the suburb included the poorest area in the city. Most of these shots were taken around the streets there. Not everyone has TVs, we discovered many community TVs were set up and left on all night so that the locals could gather and watch the games. It was great to have something to discuss with the locals, sometimes we didn’t have a choice, it was the first thing they asked us. “What do you think of Harry’s red card?”  I’m not a football person but did pay attention to all the news so i could join in conversations. These conversations lead to some amazing things including a tour of the slum like area of Seaside. More on that soon.

Each year the APPA’s come around, and each year photographers hold their breath and wait for the judges to give their prints a score. I had to hold my breath right till the last minute as all my prints were in the last category to be judged. The brand new family category. I had no idea what to enter, the aim of this category is all about a portrait photographers regular day to day work. No spectacular multiple image photoshop compositions, just straight shots of more domestic commissioned portraits.

The results, 2 Silver with Distinctions for these images. The one of the Bird boys above did nothing at the Tasmanian Awards a month but it’s another one of those shots that I believed in and was really happy that it got up. Sometime you just have to believe in the print, even when it’s been stomped on by a previous judging panel! The one below of Olivia did pick up an award in Tasmania too, so it’s now multi award winning, but i like it because it was just something different that i wanted to try and the first pregnancy shot i’ve picked up an award for.

With the APPA’s gone, it is pretty much the end of award season for another year. That means it’s time to get started on next years prints! Well done to all my photo friends (too many to mention) who seem to all have had a great award season too.

Sid’s a bit cool. I like him heaps. Why? Not only because he has cool parents, who’s wedding I shot a few years back, but also he just has a heap of personality. Big eyes and smiles, that what he has going on. He’s going to be one for the ladies to look out for… that’s my prediction anyway!