About 15 years ago, in need of a break from running a busy assignment agency in Sydney, I suggested to my assistant that we travel about 600 km out of town to cover a country music festival. Bored with 35 mm and looking for a change of pace I borrowed a Speed Graphic and took a couple of Grafmatic backs with T-Max 400 in them. Arriving at the country town where this festival was being held, we drove around looking at all these boring cowboy hatted line-dancing types and country yodellers but couldn't get excited by the subject. Nothing seemed to capture our imagination.

Driving past one pub however, we noticed that it had been made the headquarters of two or three biker gangs. It looked positively dangerous and the air vibrated with excess testosterone. "What do you reckon, Frank?, I asked. He said, "I'm game if you are!" So we parked the car and nervously insinuated our way into this very rough and rowdy crowd. They were busy commenting on the performance of one country singer by hurling the occasional beer can at the stage. Frank and I tried to look as tough as we could.

After about half an hour of trying to get up enough courage to take pictures, some burly bikers confronted me, eyed the Speed Graphic and demanded, "What the f**k do you call that camera?". I felt a surge of adrenaline as I sought an appropriately conciliatory response. I was not, I hoped about to find out what it was like to be beaten up with a large press camera. As nonchalantly as I could and trying desperately to conceal the quaver in my voice, I weighed up my chances of using the camera as a weapon and immediately though the better of it. Suddenly I had a moment of inspiration! I said, "I guess you could call it the Harley Davidson of press cameras", It's a Speed Graphic". Their response: "Shit mate, that's cool. Take our photo!", they ordered. I did not hesitate. Trying not to show my trembling hands while unlocking the focus and cranking away at the rangefinder I got away a couple of frames. They ended up buying me a beer.

This is the picture:

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