Arch Weigh

It's All About Looking At The Big Picture

Photograph copyright: DAVID McMAHON

For a bloke who’s fairly observant, there are some things that completely escape my attention. I can multi-task, but sometimes – just sometimes - my powers of speech desert me while my brain nimbly juggles several equations.



Take Wednesday evening, for example. I was marshalling about six different thought processes on a very busy, very gusty, very cold, sub-Arctic evening when I announced to the beautiful Mrs Authorblog and the Authorbloglets that I was going to put the pork steaks in the washing machine and that I had already put the swimming gear and wet towels on the barbecue.



They trust me. No, really, they trust me.



All Mrs Authorblog did was to raise one eyebrow. And yes, I assured her the swimming gear HAD been correctly programmed in the washing machine. And yes, the pork steaks DID get sensationally cooked on the barbecue, even if the wind chill on the summit on Everest was considerably less cruel than it was in wintry Melbourne.



The same sort of thing happened when I shot these photos a few days ago. Let me just ask you this question – do you, like me, think through your lens when you have a camera in your hands? Is your thought process governed by what you see through your viewfinder? If you answered yes to both of the above, then you’ll empathise with what I’m about to tell you.



I was walking down Elizabeth Street when I noticed these graceful arches on the side of a building across the street. I liked the weather-beaten effect on the building’s façade, and the intricate work on the horizontal columns. So I shot the first frame (above) in a tight composition governed by the shape of the arches.



Then I thought it would be nicer to get another point of reference into the shot. Without putting the camera down, this is what I did next. I kept looking through the viewfinder. I had the camera in my right hand, comfortably gripping the stock of the Pentax. At the same time, I used my left hand to manipulate the focal length of the 18-125 lens. It’s kinda standard practice for me.



As I opened up the frame slightly, working the lens anti-clockwise, I saw a yellow-and-orange signboard below. Yup. The colours were the perfect foil for the grey exterior of the building, as you’ll see from the shot below.



``Bookstore,’’ I thought to myself as I hit the shutter. It was only a split-second later that the light came on in my brain and I realised what kind of bookstore it was.





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