Well, finally, after months of holding out, I can blog my Slash pics!

We shot this down at the Street Press Australia HQ in Melbourne. Slash was in the middle of a media junket, I was prepared for anything. I wouldn’t have been surprised if he didn’t show at all. Well, bang on time his tarago rolled up. Enter Slash, and his manager, and minder. It was all very professional. Everyone had to leave the room while I shot, but aside from that, there were no rock royatly demands. He was polite, fun, quite au fait with the whole process. I wanted to shoot Slash with a couple of hot models, them yearning for his attention, he, completely disinterested, been there, done that. My darling Melbourne counterpart Rhys Ripper helped out, bringing his talented crew along. Adam Nash, stylist extraordinaire arrived on set, cape in tow, with a menagerie of black black black. The gorgeous Jessica Crema was on makeup, while Jamie Richardson was on hair. Two of the three models didn’t show, interesting. Maybe they were too young to realize who SLASH was??? Well, model Alexandra Ford made up for it ten fold. Anyway, enjoy the shots.
Wailing on his axe.

Once Slash had left the building we continued shooting Alex, she was just too beautiful to let go. Rhys and I have used her for a spread in the next Academy For Men. Keep your eyes peeled. She is one hot lady.

Heaps more pics. Have a geez.

Daniel. Daniel Boud standing in for Slash. Who can say no to a ring flash?

Me and Mr Slash. This is what I look like when I am star-struck.

I gotta say, I don’t know if SPA and Drum were more excited about the Slash shots, or these ones of Alex.

Once again, thanks to all involved.

Slash. The one. The only.
Model: Alexandra Ford @ Chadwicks
Prodcuer: Rhys Ripper, Academy for Men
Make Up: Jessica Crema Represented by Studio Arts
Hair: Jamie Richardson Represented by Studio Arts
Stylist: Adam Nash Represented by Studio Arts
Photography: Cybele Malinowski, Blue Murder Studios
Assistant: Daniel Boud

Continue through to take a squizz of the socail snaps from last night. (Thanks Deckland @ Hobgestapo)

And once again, thank you to those who made this happen. Mel @ Mart Gallery, our thirst quenchers at Becks, and Oasis Charity, for your endless great work. And thank you Sarah Norris! Once editor of Drum Media. I hold you responsible for my foray into rock photography. One person I would like to give special thanks to is my brother Justin, for all his support, advise and hard work in the lead-up to the show, and every day, every shoot that he has helped me on over the past five years. Without Justin, I could very likely be an architect right now. So thank you Justin!

And Daniel! My love, my life! THANK YOU! and CONGRATULATIONS! We did it baby!

Daniel Boud and I have a joint show opening this week at Mart Gallery. It is a collection of 24 magazine covers we have photographed over the past 5 years, featuring the cream of Australia’s music industry. From Ladyhawke to INXS, The Grates to Tim Finn, our images have been printed on the covers of magazines and streetpress such as Jmag, Drum Media, The Brag, 3D World, Mess and Noise and Time Out. Our work will be displayed as it was intended, as magazine covers, in an enlarged version of what appeared on the magazine racks and streets of Australia.

Images will be for sale, in limited edition, with all profits going straight to Oasis, an incredible charity based in Surry Hills who supports homeless youths through counseling, training, jobs and education programs.

Here’s an interview Dan and I wrote with our pals at Pedestrian TV.

Here is a sneak peak of some of my pics, if you want to see the rest, get yourself down to Mart Gallery from Friday 5th. The show will be open for two weeks. Viewing by appointment only (so give Mart a call if you want to pop by).

Exhibtion Details

Mart Gallery
156 Commonwealth St, Surry Hills
5th- 20th February 2010
Open Tues- Sat, 12-5pm

Client Jmag
Photography Cybele Malinowski
Assisting/Retouching Justin Malinowski
Hair and Make-up Felicia Yong

A funny little anecdote to the shots-

Jenny Valentish, editor of Jmag, sourced these birds from a taxidermist and couriered them up to Sydney for the shoot. She funded these herself, and was planning on placing her prized avarian (lame Family Guy joke) possessions on her mantle.

So, the shoot went swimmingly, we had a great time, I raced off to another shoot, came back 4 hours later to a scene of despair. As I opened the studio door a bright yellow feather flitted to the floor. A trail of feathers and Styrofoam (the taxidermist replaced the body with a Styrofoam double) lead to a neat puddle of cat vomit consisting of what was once the birds Sarah held so delicately in her hands. Pushkin, the hunter that she is had sniffed out the neatly packed birds and ripped them to shreds. She has not attempted to hunt since.

The wonderful stylist Sibil Alpsal came on board with some wonderful pieces. Her interiors know how coming into play, sourcing some delicious props such as the thick tarnished rope, the worn-out satchels and the beautiful lamp bulbs on page 108 (with the star of the day Bob Ellis.

Sean, one of our models did an incredible job not just modeling, but as groomer. A multi-tasking model.

We focused on over sized, utilitarian clothes, casting fresh faced models from Pricillas, as after researching most of the men who built the bridge were mere boys. Boys with mens’ bodies after years of intensive manual labor.

Credits

‘A Man of Steel’

Photography: Cybele Malinowski
Assistant: Justin Malinowski
Stylist: Sibil Alpsal
Grooming: Sean @ Priscillas (thanks Sean!)
Models: Sean, Danny Pratt and Tyson @ Priscillas

Here are links to the shoots in the past two issues of Academy for Men.

Issue One: Optical Illusions

Issue Two: Innocence Lost

We all sat around my lounge room with New Scientist magazines, googling ‘physics maths equations theory,’ scrawling them over a green paper-roll. We went through 4 silver sharpies.

Look! It’s Pushkin. Again She is quite the celebrity!

This was shot at an amazingly retro diner on the Pacific HWY near Mascot called Dino’s.

We also had free reign at a cargo yard near the airport. It was amazing. Planes flying right overhead. Definitely coming back here for a fashion shoot. Quite breathtaking.

Naturally much more time was spent in the preparation for such a shoot. To-ing and fro-ing between Drum, the label and myself, coming up with an idea that we were all happy with. We settled on a dark and moody shoot, moving away from the seaside references in his previous press shoots. I needed to do something simple, elegant. Something that conjured up his creative journey.

Once that had been agreed on, then it was off to the prop shop, (conveniently located next door), to find inspiration. I found a typewriter and smoke machine. Perfect!

It wasn’t until the morning of the shoot that I came up with the idea of dropping pages from an old book from the background sky. Not of course implying that his ideas come from thin air! So my assistant (Cara) and I raced to my bookshelf and carved up a Daphne Dumaurier book. Thanks Daph.

I’ll put some older Josh pics up soon.

I also recently shot Charlie with Tim Rogers for a Drum Homebake cover.