I’ve been spending time in the studio working on a new series, Echo Chamber. Playing with literal “smoke and mirrors” and exploring the illusory echo chambers people find themselves in, in an online world of information overload. Let me know if you can spot the skull. An ominous, but fitting, happy accident!

I managed to shoot a few fun self portraits within the setup as a test to see how I can further incorporate portraits into the series. They love the way they turned out and can’t wait to further develop and refine the results in upcoming shoots!

I had an incredible time bringing this project to life for Spicers Australia. The goal was to highlight their RC Kraft Packaging series — a versatile, multi-layer coated kraft board with endless packaging possibilities. ⁣To capture its unique features, I created a combination of still product photography and animated GIFs that showcase the packaging’s functionality and design. The stunning packaging was designed by Contain Design Studio, in collaboration with Studio Wilson and printed by Adam’s Print. From capturing it’s intricate details to demonstrating how the packaging works, this project was a joy to shoot.

I’ve put together a few more of my favourite product photography projects here.

I felt extremely honoured to have an old friend Lars Wannop ask me to photograph him at the studio earlier this year. As an art director with a genuine curiosity for all things creative and beyond, he was such a pleasure to collaborate with in creating a portrait that would represent him best. He had sent me a reference of an image from my “Echo Chamber” series (on Instagram) and wanted to incorporate a “light playfulness”, with the idea incorporate subtle details to further prompt a curiosity about who he is. We actually ended up including some of the same flowers and some smoke as a throwback to the original reference.

Earlier this year, I collaborated with AER design to create a set of hero images for Melbourne’s “Winter at Fed Square” campaign. We worked on producing 4 final artworks, that had the flexibility to fit different print formats, digital promotions, way finding, signage and an animation. I couldn’t have asked for a more iconic Melbourne location than Federation Square to have the work displayed. Special thanks to Stray Orbit for the excellent retouching work you put in to help me hit our deadline and 77 productions for the animation.

Here are a few images and final artwork from the shoot.

I recently made another visit to the United Stated to attend the Creative Mornings Summit in Austin, Texas.  We started our road trip with Creative Mornings crews from Oakland, Montevideo, Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur, Tijuana and Melbourne.  Following the event, I joined Phoot Camp friends David Worthington and Kristina Yamamoto for another road trip from Portland back down to LA where we drove, hiked and photographed some of the most beautiful spots in between. We had almost made it to LA, with coastal fog obscuring most of our Big Sur drive. Despite the poor visibility, it actually made for some dramatic photos which I hope to share more of soon. This was the Bixby Creek Bridge which apparently rarely ever looks like this.

I recently converted one of my old backup cameras into a “Full Spectrum” DSLR.  The process allows me to use the camera to filter out specific ranges of light using filters.  I was specifically interested in photographing in the infrared spectrum of light and brought my camera along to a weekend away with a few talented photographers in Mt. Beauty, a few hours drive from Melbourne.  This is one of my favourites from the weekend. Im thrilled with the results! I’ll update the “Projects” section of my website soon with a few more, once I get around to sitting down in front of it all!

Sharing a studio with One Fine Print has its perks. We had some fun filling up our massive office walls with some huge new prints! You can read more about them here and check out the little timelapse we made below!

A video posted by Mark Lobo | Melbourne (@marklobo) on Apr 21, 2016 at 8:21pm PDT

After wrapping up a shoot early last week, I decided to dump literally everything I had in my bag out and arrange it into a tidy flat-lay.  I think this could be the start of yet another series…

I recently joined a few Instagrammers out on Phillip Island, just under two hours out of Melbourne, for a tour of the beautiful coastline out at Cape Woolamai. There wasn’t much of a sunset like we had hoped for, but it made for the most peaceful night, shooting long exposures of the waves and seeing the silhouettes of thousands of Short-tailed Shearwaters flying above. It was so refreshing to get excited about photography outside of my professional style of work and just have some fun.  This is what I saw: