SALLY WALKER BROWN - PHOTOGRAPHER
Sally Walker-Brown has been a photographer for 30 years. She has a Certificate in Art and Design from Caulfield Institute of Technology, Victoria and a Certificate of Photography from the Queensland College of Art. Her photographic work has been within the media, working on numerous publications, notably the Redland Times for 30 years, Bayside Bulletin 24 years (since it's inception), The Sunday Mail and Courier Mail, The Brisbane Telegraph, and The Catholic Leader, as well as various magazines.
In the 1970's Sally was the first female public servant employed at the Police Headquarters in the Photographic Department as a darkroom technician. Then in the mid 1980's she was the first full time female casual photographer on The Sunday Mail. She also has been a lecturer in Photography at TAFE, then designed her own photography course for secondary schools that she proceeded to teach at Carmel College. She has also won 12 major Media awards over these years.
Click here to view the exhibition photographs for Within These Walls, photographs of Boggo Road.
1. Can you provide me with a description of your business?
My business is a photography business specialising in social documentary which encompasses media, weddings, and other forms of documentary such as my exhibition on Boggo Road Gaol.
2. What is your role in the business?
I am the owner and the photographer in the business; I do not employ anyone else.
3. What is your background? Education, Work Experience?
My background is a Certificate IV in Art and Design from CIT, Melbourne and Cert IV in Photography QCA, Brisbane. I have worked with the Redland Times and Bayside Bulletin; The Courier and Sunday Mail newspapers and Brisbane Telegraph; The Catholic Leader; and various magazines over the last 32 years.
4. How did you get the background and skills necessary to run this type of business?
My intertest in photography started when as a teenager, I had my own small wet darkroom, then my skills were honed with employment at Queensland Police in their darkroom and later with the Redland Times newspaper. My formal skills continued with my Cert IV at QCA and then I was employed by the daily newspapers in Brisbane.
5. What do you enjoy about the industry you are in?
I work as a media photographer, essentially a photojournalist. What I love most in this field is meeting many different people, and that every job presents a different situation which calls upon one’s skills and creativity. Basically as a media photographer you have to think “on your feet” and meet very short deadlines, and the constant competition to get the one shot that no-one else gets so it is more likely to be published.
6. What specific training did you do that has assisted you in your current work?
My specific training for this current work was at QCA which gave me the opportunity to embrace art photography and commercial photography, as well as allowing me to specialise in photojournalism.
7. How has the training helped you?
The training opened up other fields of photography up to me that I would not have experienced just working in photojournalism. It also allowed me to experiment more in that field.
8. What further training do you think would enhance your career?
Further training would encompass updates on current digital technologies because digital photography is changing constantly each year.
9. Describe some interesting projects/jobs you have been involved in?
Some interesting jobs I have been involved in are Expo 88, following Queen Elizabeth and experiencing British paparazzi and The Papal Tour to Brisbane in 1986; I was in the forefront in the media working for the Catholic Leader. A different experience was my personal photographic exhibition on Boggo Rd Goal in 2006. The interesting part about this was that I had been in Boggo Rd Goal in the late 1980s for news stories. It was decommissioned in 1991 and in 2004 and 2005 I went back to the prison and photographed it from a different outlook.
10. Tell us about your latest project/job
One of my latest jobs in the last year was for the Bayside Seniors’ Lifestyle Magazine. The story was about the first violin player of the QSO who is in his 70s and he had met up with a young violin player who was planning to join the orchestra. Both were interviewed by the journalist; then it came for the photo shoot; I asked them both to get their violins and basically start playing and totally ignore me. It transpired that the older violin player automatically started showing the younger player a few tricks and correcting her technique. Throughout this I kept taking photos. What I liked about this job is that the photos I took were not orchestrated or set up by me. Too often I have to setup photos for the newspapers and they lack the essence of the moment. The photo from this job won a national OPSO (Older People Speak Out) media award for 2009 for the best Intergenerational photo.
11. What advice would you provide to someone entering the industry?
My advice to someone entering media photography is to get as much work experience as possible; obviously it would maybe initially entail without pay. Not only do you get contacts; you learn where the industry is going and how it operates. This will allow you to establish your own style within the industry, instead of it dictating to you.
12. What specific skills do new entrants need?
Specific skills needed when entering this industry are: Camera skills; people skills; computer skills and a driver’s license with a reliable vehicle.
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