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SInce the first Portuguese trading and missionary outposts sprang up there in the late 1500’s, Macau has been known for it’s church architecture. On every postcard, every travel guide, every map, there’s the famed facade of St. Paul’s Cathedral. Actually, the flamed facade is probably a more apt description as it seems this edifice is all that remains after a devastatingly spectacular fire in 1835 .

The Ruins of St. Paul’s Cathedral 1854 by Wilhelm Heine

More recently, Macau’s other houses of worship have undergone their own transformation creating a new explosion of coloured lights across the night sky. Huge casino franchises from Las Vegas and Australia have built enormous gambling palaces which since 2007, have raked in more revenue annually than the entire Las Vegas Strip.

Literally standing out from the crowd, not only because it doesn’t have a casino, is the newly opened Mandarin Oriental Macau, part of the One Central mixed use development designed by Kohn Pedersen Fox.

With subtly angled bay windows scattered across the facade, the passing clouds emulate the broken reflections dancing on the rippled  lake, set in motion by the wakes of a dozen distant dragon boats warming up for the afternoon’s tournament.

Usually wishing for less clouds in the Asian skies, I found myself that evening in the the perplexing position of wanting just a few more to bring a certain spontaneity to the unfolding scene. Evidently, the local deities were all too busy with requests for guidance from the blackjack tables to intervene on my behalf. The wind dropped, the surface of the lake turned to glass and well, I guess I can live with that….

If the notion of a civilized society is one that seeks to provide an esoteric platform, intellectual or otherwise, from which one can clearly view and appreciate the world at large, then the appearance of yet another window cleaning rig must surely be the portent for a brighter future.

As some readers will have noted, I like to figure out the days shoot around the café table, using whatever props may be at hand to create some three dimensional representation of the project. This process somehow reduces even the largest of problems into more manageable, dare I say it, bite size chunks.

Replicating the awe-inspiring engineering prowess of the Burj Khalifa was a challenge in itself but as some say in Dubai. nothing is impossible. The three entrance lobbies, hitherto known as Strawberry, Apricot and Marmalade echoed the Residential, Hotel and Commercial entrances. The colour  and finishes in each providing a different sensory experience to those passing through.

After shooting several less than satisfactory snaps out through the dusty windows of my hotel, a few dangling ropes the following day signaled that perhaps some relief was on the way.

Indeed this proved to be the case and I waved gratefully as my sudsy saviour slipped slowly out of sight to bring a little more sunshine into the lives of those on the floor below. And the floor below that. And the floor below that.

Perhaps the hardest thing to explain to people about photographing architecture is the notion of one being entirely at the mercy of the prevailing elements. There’s none of this taking your time, adjusting the lighting between caramel latte’s in the studio, opening the morning’s mail and then maybe finishing up after a sit down lunch.

On location, everything is in flux. From before the sun is up until well after it is down, the shadows are moving, the conditions are changing around you, requiring an engaged and spontaneous response to capture images that will serve to tell the story at hand. In my experience, assuming you’ve understood the brief, one generally knows what the end result needs to be, just not the exact path you will take to get there.

Most times, the commercial preference is to photograph a project in pristine conditions which in most regions of the world, except perhaps for parts of Europe, would be considered blue skies, crisp sunshine and maybe a few “Simpson’s” clouds to keep it sweet. In Germany, if the much-lauded Dusseldorf school’s output is anything to go by, an ideal day would be flat, shadowless overcast. I mean, shadows are just so subversively opinionated, don’t you think?….. But I digress.

On a clear day, especially in places like California, you know exactly what will happen and while this is certainly good for commercial productivity, it can be limiting creatively as there is always a known, predictable, expected outcome, often well before the images are captured.

My feeling is that unless you are prepared to put yourself out into conditions that are less than optimal, you will never get rewarded with something special, something unique, something unexpected. This somewhat opportunistic approach still requires a deep understanding of the subject, still requires a technical precision and respect for craft, but all in order to respond on a more instinctual level to the unfolding scene before you.

While I’ve long ago given up on the idea that I might manipulate the forces of nature, I’m certainly open to getting out there and mixing it up a bit when the opportunity presents itself. Of course, the majority of what I shoot on assignment is done to show the building in its best light.

Sometimes though, I would argue that it takes the worst light to do that.

It would seem that not everybody who purchased apartments in WOHA’s award winning The Met in Bangkok was keen to move in straight away. For the first time, the building exterior was clean and devoid of the maintenance gondolas that had plagued our earlier visits. From a distance, one could see that many of the windows had been covered with brown paper to keep the low winter sun from directly hitting the floor boards.This somewhat killed the sleek verticality of the lines.

Access to the individual apartments was impossible (and on a 60 story tower, insanely impractical), so there was nought to do but knuckle down at the computer for a few days going window to window and cleaning off the paper. Unlike a flat, glazed facade, this could be no simple cut and paste job as the random patterns of the balconies, cladding and landscaping all needed to be taken into account.

While it got there in the end, there were times whilst sitting glued to the computer with an aching wrist, that I thought I might just….erm, go blind.

As always, the prevailing weather plays a big role in the success of each day. The Bangkok forecast that day was for passing showers in the afternoon. Dutifully the clouds thickened, the air seemed to thicken and the breeze picked up, carrying with it the smell of the impending rains. And right then, the moment of truth….. that moment when you must decide “do I stay or do I go?”

It’s only a quick shower, right? I mean, it will blow through soon enough?

When the first enormous drops began to pound the pavement, it quickly became obvious that I had made totally the wrong call in electing to stay. But we were a hundred meters from decent shelter and further still from the safe confines of the hotel (where our cumbersome umbrellas lay resting). Weighed down with camera kits and laptops, simply running for it wasn’t an option. As a result, we spent the next hour and a half cowering in a nearby row of public telephone booths to remain, even if only partially, out of the torrential and relentless storm that ensued.

There’s always another way to do something.

And we seemed to have tried them all.

I recently helped a friend update his point’n’shoot camera and was pleasantly surprised by the advances being made in the technology and general ease of use. We celebrated the purchase in a local Montmorency cafe where the resident barista was well known for his decorative prowess.

After reading that the camera offered face recognition technology, we came to same conclusion at the exact same time and did the only thing possible under the circumstances.

And it worked!

Oh, if these wheels could talk….

They could hopefully tell me just how far we’ve walked together these past few years. More likely, they’d hurl abuse at me for the the terrible conditions I’ve at times literally dragged them through. Snow and ice, water and mud, parquetry and pavement. We’ve done them all.

Mercifully, after valiantly hobbling along for a month or so, the end came rapidly for this battle weary pair. With a defiant spray of sparks, the last vestiges of tread slipped off the rims and into the gutter as we headed for the car at the close of a particularly grueling day.

A quick call to the ThinkTank people saw a sleek new pair of wheels arrive in the mail. It would be smooth sailing again in no time. For the moment at least!