By Tim Wimborne
Since mid-March I have developed a new habit. Not a bad habit but a pretty regular one, about three nights a week, driving down to a local park near the harbor’s edge and parking by the side of the road, looking for a woman under a street light. Not any woman in particular but it’s always the same street light.
It’s a bit like being a John searching out a good time with a lady of the night. Not that anyone would suspect that – I’m in a ritzy part of town.
After testing a new kit weeks ago, one evening, at the middle of the Sydney Harbour Bridge, a potential picture far below caught my eye. A simple frame with a composition that symbolizes the phrase “less is more”; a woman and her personal trainer boxing under a lone street light. Just the two of them, their gloves and their shadows, surrounded by nothing else but by the time I got into position they’d moved on.
It’s a popular place for personal trainers taking their nine-to-five office worker clients through their paces so I figured these guys were regulars. And so started my evening sorties. These evening forays would see me sitting in my car, on park benches, walking around the park, up on the bridge above, bringing my kids, stopping by after laps at the local swimming pool – every time with a camera over my shoulder, exposure set to make that image. I’d see folks exercising in groups, walking their dogs, taking evening strolls, joggers, the list goes on. After a while I’d chat to the personal trainers who worked in various part of the park, find out who worked where, who gave solo lessons, how the weather dictated who trains where, when, how. I narrowed down the best days of the week and target times.
(Click here for a large format version of the image)
After between 15 and 20 attempts I got it. They were there. I dragged my four-year-old up the bridge with me and got him to count the peak hour traffic passing behind me while I waited for the two boxers to move into the light’s beam – which they finally did.
