Brothers Grimm and the Blue Murders, 2011, The Corner

25 March 2025

A reflection on my time in the “photo pit”

6 min read

If there is one shot that I specifically think of as ‘the end’, it’s this one.

As I snapped this photo of the Brothers Grimm, my belly pressed against the stage at The Corner with punters pushing at my back, I knew it was time to call it.

I was 6 months pregnant and just shy of my 33rd birthday. After hundreds of gigs prowling dirty band rooms wielding an SLR , I knew in an instant my time as a music photographer was over.

It’s telling that among my earliest childhood memories is learning to gently place the needle on a record and then playing make-believe with an old Brownie camera as I listened to the tunes. I worked through my dad’s vinyl collection, wearing over-ear headphones and singing along at the top of my voice until my mum begged me to stop.

Back then I really wanted to be a rock star. I had the name, but not the talent or attitude. 

An actual rockstar… Tim Rogers, at the ‘Blue Atlas Winter Ball’, The Corner Hotel, 2009

My first real dip into taking photos was during my final year of high school when I dropped maths for photography (something I still can’t quite believe my parents agreed to). Instead of algebra, I learned basic photographic technique on an old Pentax film camera and developed the film in a ramshackle school darkroom. Shooting at school meant the grounds became our rather dull and static muse – rows of metal bars around the canteen an exercise in depth of field, and the flowering gum near the basketball courts a case for shooting macro. It didn’t feel at all creative, but I enjoyed the science of it—the acrid chemical smells and (ironically) the mathematics of aperture and exposure.

The moment I remember most from that class was watching a classmate’s photo slowly appear on paper in the chemical bath—an image of someone performing, a singer screaming into a microphone with a sea of people in the background pumping their fists in the air.

For a moment, I was in awe.

Then I realised it was just a shot she’d take of an Eddie Vedder poster on her bedroom wall.

The illusion was shattered, but the idea was an endearing one —that you could capture that moment on stage, an atmosphere, an energy. 

A decade later, I’d moved across the country and into Melbourne’s massive music scene. In 2006, I took money I’d earned working on a forgettable Marvel film and bought a Nikon D50 digital SLR.  A week later, I took this photo of Murray Floyd at a gig in the basement of The Limelight Lounge in Geelong… and was officially hooked.

Austin Floyd, 2006. The Limelight Lounge, Geelong

In the years that followed, I took my camera with me to every gig.  

Front bars and grubby band rooms became my favourite places. I became adept at juggling cameras and beers, hiding my camera bag on the side of stage and perfected the fine art of squatting in jeans. Within five years I had thousands of shots and a comprehensive gallery of Fitzroy’s music scene in the first decade of the new millennium.

This was the era just before phone cameras were widespread (yes, I’m old) and social media had just taken off (yes, I’m THAT old). Back then ‘building an audience’ was never the goal – I just wanted to see great music and take great shots, and was thrilled when people liked them or artists used them for promo.

Spoonful in the front bar at The Labor in Vain, Fitzroy, circa 2008

Those first digital cameras were clunky and terrible in low light, but I learned to work with it. For front bar gigs, a pool table is often moved to create a “stage,” and lighting consists of simply turning off any lights not directly above the band. I bought lenses that gave me the best chance in the dim conditions, and all those techniques I’d learned while roaming the school grounds as a teenager were suddenly put to good use.

A bit of a geek, I only ever shot ‘manual’ (and still do, mostly because I’m a control freak). I also focused by hand, which is a particularly hard-earned skill with fast lenses and wide-open apertures. Where the difference between sharp and blurry is a hair’s width of focus. I learned tricks to predict movement and anticipate when a big moment was coming in a performance. Part luck, part instinct… but mostly just practice.

Wellyn, The East Brunswick Club, 2008. 

It was clear back then that there was limited space for women in the pit, which was dominated by blokes with superlong lenses. Whenever I had a photo pass to bigger gigs, I would brace myself for the assault – elbowed, physically shoved or simply ignored and blocked.

Still, there were some good photogs and many who made names for themselves with bright, sharp, but heavily edited shots. Sometimes I felt they caught the image but missed the moment. I’ve been thinking about this again recently when it comes to AI. That perfectly crafted story or manipulated image that feels “off”. Too smooth and too perfect to be real, unlike that grainy Eddie Vedder shot from 1992, with all its atmosphere and nuances. Telling a whole story in a single frame.

Nearly fourteen years have passed since that last Brothers Grimm gig at The Corner. And while I’d made peace with it being the end, circumstances in the last few years have led me back to the photo pit occasionally. I still love it.

Things are definitely better in the pit these days with the arrival of some incredibly gracious and artful humans – a community of music lovers and camera nerds. Importantly, there are also some incredible women doing cracking work—not just bringing their elbows to the fight but bringing their heart and art to the business of capturing musical moments. (Check out the work of the likes of Lucinda Goodwyn, Brittany Long, and Ruby Boland, and you’ll see what I mean.)

I must be a sign of my age – to get so excited when I see the work these fine women are doing. And maybe in a weird way, I’m even a little proud.

So, while I’m not much help to my now grown-up baby when it comes to her algebra homework, and I find crouching in jeans a whole lot more challenging these days, I’m still pretty chuffed when I get some time in the pit. Anything for a chance to lean up against the stage and capture the moment, the atmosphere, the energy of live music.