Photos from the Sydney opening night of the Heston Blumenthal tour are now online.

What a great night – a big buzz at the meet and greet party as Heston took time to talk to everyone as they came through for an autograph and their photo with the chef.

Looking forward to Brisbane and Auckland this weekend.  We are aiming to have the pix online within 24 hours of each event.

Wow – what a conference in Sydney this week.  SCEC can shut down now – nothing can top that. And a huge thanks to the SCEC staff, they definitely went all out to impress.

All the pix are now online – the conference and the fantastic awards dinner

That has got to be the most memorable awards dinner since the 1998 outdoor dinner in Darwin – who remembers why that one started late? Post your comments below (or send them in on a postcard).

And don’t forget to check out the Red Carpet pix on our Facebook site where you can go in the running to win a fabulous Holga camera if your “Like” us – which we know you do.

Once again EventPix will be sponsoring the photography for the annual MEA conference and awards.

This year we will be posting images from the red carpet events to our Facebook page and to encourage visitors to “like” our page we are offering a prize draw of a fabulous Holga toy camera.

So please say hello to us at the conference and show us your best pose at the welcome party at The Star and on the awards red carpet.

We had put together a promo product for Richmond’s major sponsor – Bingle.  Footy cards for the kids.  We were due to start at 10:30 AM but at 10:00 we already had kids (and parents) queuing up for our little product. Such was the popularity of our studio it didn’t let up until 30 mins after we were due to finish.

So what was involved?

We setup a green screen background where the kids (and some adults) had a few action shots taken by Shannon.  The files were then edited by our assistants to create a footy card complete with the subject’s name and the date. Then printed out and put into a presentation folder (with Bingle branding) for them to take home.

And what next?

Over the course of the season we will be on site again for each of the Tiger’s home games with a new design for the cards, so in the end the fans could collect five different cards.

Let’s hope Richmond get into the finals and we might just have to develop a few more designs…

and this is what they looked like…

The most moving acceptance speech in Sydney came from Anna Cesarano as she accepted the award for Cause Related Event of The Year for the Biaggio Signorelli Foundation.

The Foundation was set up by Doltone House directors Anna Cesarano, Nina Milazzo and Paul Signorelli, honouring their late father who passed away of Mesothelioma, a terminal asbestos related cancer.  They have committed to almost $1million dollars in just under 4 years; funded three medical scholarships; funded the national guidelines for treatment and cure of Mesothelioma, received two NSW Government grants as well as most recently funding an International Registry Scholarship.

EventPix sponsor the photography services for most of the state awards (along with national awards in April).  Photos from those events are now available here.

Stunning decor at the Sofitel Wentworth for the NSW state MEA Awards

Pretty straightforward job, however the crowd was well down on previous years due to torrential summer rain the day before and the threat of more rain on the day of the event.

MCA Director Elizabeth Ann Macgregor welcomed us and gave an overview of what the new gallery has to offer to both arts patrons and event organisers.

There were two concurrent highlights to the event – As the World Tipped on its own stage in Church St and The Barefoot Divas on the main stage.

In between showers (sometimes heavy) I caught Afro Nomad – on stage and on the street. And Briefs – very clever and very funny – and struggling valiantly in the rain, as you can see from this photo gallery.

My exploration of the event kicked off around 4 PM when I checked out the setup of the Troc Stage in Elizabeth St.  By the way this stage was in and out again within 24 hours, and it was a big setup!

The Elizabeth St stage at 4 pm

Then up to Macquarie St which was blocked off to accommodate a bunch of caravans arranged in little stage setups.

Macquarie Street

The fun though at this time was in Hyde Park and the Tangled Garden – very silly and lots of fun for the kids (and fun to watch them having fun).

The Tangled Garden in Hyde Park

Meanwhile a crowd was gathering to listen to Norman Jay play records.  Not for me, I headed back to the live music in Elizabeth St.

Electric Empire kicked off the entertainment in Elizabeth St – a very funky Aussie band.

Electric Empire

Then The Jolly Boys – these guys have got to be in their 80s and they rocked, funked and crooned.

The Jolly Boys

The highlight of the night was The Trocadero Dance Palace show featuring the 17 piece Sirens Big Band plus 3 girl singers and Dan Barnett on vocals and trombone.  Plus eight fantastic dancers who gave us a great performance of sexed up swing, lindy hop and a touch of Bob Fosse.  Not much room to dance but some around me managed to.

More pix from this event

Then caught a bus over to Balmain. The great views are from the park near the East Balmain wharf.

Here are some pix of the experience