Suburbia
(Credit: Gemma Deavin)
Photographer: Gemma Deavin
Speciality: documentary, reportage, portraiture
Biography: Gemma was born in the US and spent the first three years of her life in Johannesburg before migrating to Sydney. As a teenager Gemma lived in the Netherlands, where she developed a love of travel and different cultures, going on to spend eight months working in and travelling through Nepal, India and south-east Asia when she finished school.
While at university, studying a BA (Media and Communications), she spent two semesters on exchange in Scotland and Sweden. Gemma has written for The Sydney Morning Herald and worked in Cambodia as a reporter and photographer for The Phnom Penh Post. Photography, specifically reportage and portraiture, is something she has always pursued independently.
When she finished her degree 18 months ago she started her own business Tellwell Communications, an integrated communication service for non-profit and community organisations, and socially informed campaigns. She is passionate about people, their stories and using words, photography and video as vehicles to incite change and action.
Equipment: Canon EOS 50D, Canon EF-S 17-85mm f/4-5.6, Canon EF 50mm f/1.8
Want to ask the photographer a question? Leave your comments and questions below!
Every April, Khmer New Year rolls around and Sydney's biggest Buddhist temple, in Bonnyrigg, is home to the festivities. Here, a suburban house is framed with the atmospheric light of the annual Cambodian celebration.
Exposure: 1/6, f/5.6, ISO 800, 85 mm
Who's in?
A two-up game outside the Australian Hotel in the Rocks, Sydney in full swing.
Exposure: 1/4000, f/5.0, ISO 800, 17 mm
A Christmas wish
Family and friends gather to sing carols days before Christmas in a Sydney home.
Exposure: 1/20, f/5.6, ISO 3200, 35 mm
Kitty
Walking through Windorah, a small south-western Queensland town, I saw Kitty playing in a wide puddle as the sun was setting. Dressed in her best pink outfit she spent hours splashing about until it was time to go in for tea.
Exposure: 1/250, f/7.1, ISO 320, 17mm
Bedourie's Joe
Joe spent most of his life working as a stockman on the cattle stations of south-west Queensland. He now calls Bedourie, a town on the edge of the Simpson Desert, home.
Exposure: 1/250, f/8, ISO 100, 80-200mm
Andy and Harry
Andy Jenkins is the only person in Australia who has a licence to deface coins. Inside his Silverton 'coinery' shed he creates interesting pieces of jewellery. He is also the proud foster parent of some orphaned joeys.
Exposure: 1/250, f/4.0, ISO 1250, 17mm
Smoko time
Rex and his co-worker walk up and down King Street, Newtown, collecting rubbish for the City of Sydney Council.
Exposure: 1/10, f/5.6, ISO 1600, 17mm
Abundant smiles
The House with No Steps recycling factory outside Newcastle, NSW, employs 43 high support employees. Workers are responsible for, amongst other things, packing 14 tonnes of cardboard a day.
Exposure: : 1/100, f/6.3, ISO 1000, 47mm
I challenge you
This characterful young boy was intent on demonstrating his best 'action' moves along the boardwalks of Mabul Island, Sabah, Malaysian Borneo.
Exposure: 1/250, f/11, ISO 800, 43mm
With each day
Two young girls smile in a world where each day they scavenge Phnom Penh's Steung Meanchey Dump for recyclable material to sell. Expatriate David Fletcher visits at least twice a week with a flat bed truck full of food and medical supplies. They are, otherwise, a forgotten community. For more information, click here.
Exposure: 1/1600, f/8, f/8, ISO 400, 18mm
Hard brow
A young girl waits with hundreds of others for food at Phnom Penh's Steung Meanchey Dump.
Exposure: : 1/640, f/8, ISO 400, 28mm
Sri Pada prayer
As the sun rises, a young boy stands in quiet prayer at the top of Sri Pada, Sri Lanka's most sacred mountain.
Exposure: 1/250, f/5.6, ISO 100, 50mm
Shady respite
One of the four young boys finding respite under a small tin roofed structure after playing a robust game of cricket in between the tea plantations of Nuwara Eliya, Sri Lanka.
Exposure: 1/100, f/7.1, ISO 400, 61mm
Crunch
A young boy in Fiji loses himself in a moment of amusement and hilarity.
Exposure: 1/200, f/8, ISO 400, 85mm
Puddles
This was taken on a plane flying from south-west Queensland to Brisbane. The waterholes, filled by unseasonable but welcome rain, look like puddles in the red earth.
Exposure: 1/500, f/11, ISO 500, 85mm
Tributary
Creek lines bleed across the channel country.
Exposure: 1/500, f/11, ISO 500, 85mm
Milky plains
One lone track bisects a plain moving with colours and shapes.
Exposure: 1/640, f/13, ISO 500, 85mm