Gold Coast event photography, a night at The Island

2 Sept

We shoot corporate events, conferences and parties across the Gold Coast, and this is what one of them actually looks like. Five hours of coverage at The Island in Surfers Paradise, 239 photos delivered through an online gallery, and a client who wanted their Christmas party to look like people enjoyed it rather than posed for it.

The venue

The Island sits in the middle of Surfers Paradise, with a rooftop entertainment space and a penthouse-level bar on level 12. There are several spaces available depending on the size of your event.

Our client hired the penthouse level for a Hawaiian-themed Christmas party and asked guests to dress accordingly, which most of them took seriously. The room itself is a photographer's friend: white walls, gold shelving behind the bar, and enough hard surfaces to bounce flash off rather than pointing it straight at people.

That matters more than it sounds. Bounced light is the difference between event photos that look like a night out and event photos that look like a passport queue.

What five hours of coverage actually covers

For a party like this one it means arriving before guests do, photographing the room while it is still styled and empty, then working through arrivals, the speeches, the group shots people ask for on the night, and the part of the evening where the dance floor fills up.

We walk the run sheet with your event manager when we arrive, so the formal moments are known in advance rather than guessed at. After that we stay out of the way.

Where else we shoot on the Gold Coast

The Island is one venue among many. We have covered multi-day conferences at the Gold Coast Convention & Exhibition Centre, from keynote through to the trade floor, and the finish line at the Gold Coast Marathon.

The work splits roughly into corporate functions and brand activations, conferences and expos, awards nights, milestone parties, and sporting events. We have been photographing Gold Coast events since 2013, for groups from 3 people to over 100.

What you get back

Edited galleries are delivered in 3 to 5 business days as standard, with express options on request if you need images while the event is still news.

Photos arrive through a private, password protected online gallery, downloadable in the sizes you need. This job came back as 239 images.

We carry $20 million public liability insurance and can provide a certificate of currency, which most Gold Coast venues and convention centres ask for before they will let a photographer work on site. Only the cowboys that don't know what they're doing don't have it.