A while back, in fact in April of last year, I wrote about my frustration at my local council for a parking fine I recieved in error. See the original post HERE! I just received an email yesterday from my local members stating that the Parking Infringement Notice will be revoked and all monies paid will be reimbursed.

Here is what I did…

1. Wrote to my local member of council
2. Included all my previous appeal information
3. Begged him to have someone with half a brain look at it

So in the most professional way possible…

I WIN, I WIN, I WIN!!!!! DAMN MONEY MAKING PARKING INSPECTORS….

We now return you to your regulary scheduled program…

“don’t give up your day job”, could I now please direct you to the donate link on the right hand colomn.

>>>> >>>

So as some of you may know I have been working on the Melbourne International Arts Festival this year as a secondment student. It is a requirement of my 3rd year studies at the VCA. I have been periodically posting updates of my work on Brightkite and Facebook, but thought it would be appropriate to give a little wrap up of my time, here on my blog. (this is kind of a prologue to the 1000 word report I have to write for uni anyway, but more interesting!)

My work started about a month out from the festival, at the festival office on Flinders Street in the city. I was inducted into the office by Russ Snelling, the production coordinator for “Outdoor Events, Fed Square, and the National Gallery of Victoria (NGV)”. Russ was to be my direct supervisor alongside Genevieve Cizevskis, the Stage Manager for the “Opening Night Concert”, and Rus’ assistant (of sorts). I was quite literally introduced to every member of the team present in the office that day, and I mean everyone. I met Pru in the Publicity department, Pia in Marketing, Rachael in Artist Liaison, right up to the director of the festival, Kristy Edmunds. The office is very well equipped, and is on the 5th floor overlooking Federation Square. Russ and Gen were situated in ‘the fish tank’, a room lined with glass bricks next to Reception. I was given my own desk in the Operations end of the office. The other end of the office is the Publicity end. I was signed up to the network, given an email address and encouraged to look at all the documents on the server to get a better understanding of how the Festival runs.

Longing Belonging Land - Birrarung Marr

My first week consisted of me sourcing quotations for various equipment, adding information to the Festival’s database (DataFest), and learning the ropes of the office. DataFest was a big learning curve, but it was created in house, so tech help was never far away. It is essentially a very tailored and amazingly useful database, that is given a massive amount of information, from crew contact details, venue specifications, supplier quotation information, right through to the flight information of the incoming artists. It is all based off a web server, so staff at the festival simply open an Internet browser (in this case only Internet Explorer), log in and are greeted with the home screen, with database news and a number of quick-links to useful places. There are then tabs on the navigation bar to the left of the screen that give you access to the other areas. The power of DataFest is its ability to generate very specific schedules and reports. After a week of data entry I was able to see the efficiency of the system when I was asked to produce a schedule for one of the drivers employed by the festival. It was as simple as clicking, typing her name, selecting the date range, specifying how much detail to use, and then clicking print. It took me under two minutes including the time to walk to the printer. I wasn’t alone in my learning curve on DataFest as this was the first year that Operations had used the system. Each year they port another department onto the system, next year it will be publicity.

The start of the Chris Doyle Ecstatic City Bump In

I was nearing the end of my 4th week at the office, and the festival was rapidly approaching. As the days counted down, more and more people were appearing in the office. I lost my desk about 4 days out from the opening to one of the artist liaisons. We were set to have a very full first few days, and alongside the preparations, we had our first event. It was part of the Ecstatic City project, by Chris Doyle, due to be constructed out the front of the National Gallery of Victoria. The performance piece involved photos of local people, and this filming day was to do just that. We set up nice and early, out the front of Champions Racing Museum, in Federation Square. It was the day before Grand Final, and as such the Square was also hosting a number of other events, such as a live sunrise filming. Our setup consisted of three sets of satellite uprights and black curtains, to make the backdrop for the photos. The camera gear was supplied by VCA Art Students and a hire company called Borges Imaging, and was operated by the artist and VCA Student assistants. Our job for the day was traffic management, making sure the curtains didn’t blow over, and feeding people to the site.

Workers work on a miniplex - National Gallery of Victoria Moat

Chris Doyle’s Ecstatic City Installation was our first day of “real work”. We started at eleven thirty on Sunday morning, securing the parking spaces, starting to set out bollards, and marking up the site. It was interesting to be on site that morning, and just watch the passers by. I never quite comprehended how many people there are in that precinct on a weekend, I am normally charging through there to get to uni on time. We were in for a long wait, as the first set of contractors wouldn’t be arriving until five. The contractors included Element Rigging, who were constructing the scaff towers (projection towers), and OnSet Arts who were building the walkway and the miniplexes (little projection rooms) on the water. Hede Electrics had already installed a catanery wire, and power box in the days previous. We were also to expecting a signage company to install signs on the towers, but it was to be confirmed, as the length of construction was an estimate.

Lighting Test - Chris Doyle

Once the contractors arrived, the work really started. Russ and NGV Security gave us all an induction, we signed the appropriate forms, the trucks arrived, gear was unloaded, and the structures started taking shape. First to be built was the walkway on top of the moat, then access could be gained to the miniplexes, a group of three small three meter by four meter viewing rooms that would feature visual work by local artists. The rooms were complete with external lighting, a data projector, speaker system and playback device, in this case a Mac Mini computer. I was sent home for a break overnight and returned in the morning to find that it had been a very productive night. Two of the miniplexes were finished, and the four scaff towers were almost complete. By Monday night most of the structural stuff was complete and it was onto the lighting installation, to be installed on the underside of the walkway. The lighting equipment consisted of 40 Dichroic Par 16 Birdies, and 24 iLED Multipar units. The lighting test was Tuesday night and was programmed into a DMX Streamer that would be active after 7pm at night. The projection rooms (Miniplexes) would run from 10am until midnight with the external projection starting up at 7pm. One of the highlights of the setup was showing my skills in Automator on a Mac. I programmed the computer to book up before 10am and run the DVD files, then if they didn’t execute, it would load the files from the DVD drive. Ecstatic City opened on Wednesday night coinciding with the Visual Arts Launch, held in the Great Hall of the National Gallery and was received exceptionally well.

Melbourne Ska Orchestra - Melbourne International Arts Festival Opening Night Concert - Fed Square

Our focus now shifted onto the Opening Night Concert, to be held on the stage at Federation Square. There were to be 4 musical acts, a speech from the Artistic Director and the Premier, before a procession heading down to Birrarung Marr for Margie McKay’s Longing Belonging Land. We started early that morning, moving supplies such as water, sunscreen, snacks, chairs, signage, water coolers, passes and t-shirts. We setup the two greenrooms, the side of stage tent, and received deliveries from Billy Hydes (Backline), Optical Audio (Camera Equipment). We then proceeded to sound check each of the bands, the FOH team was supplied by Microhire who are the in-house supplier for the whole of Federation Square. The sound check went well and the concert kicked off. My duties included assisting in the changeover, water distribution to crew and performers, escorting performers and maintaining the backstage area. The concert went exceptionally well, and I even got to escort the Premier from his car to the stage. Once the concert had concluded, I assisted in crowd management leading down to the Longing Belonging site. Once the Longing Belonging performance had concluded we commenced pack up, transporting equipment back across the road to the office and packing things away in the storeroom ready for the performance in BMW Edge and the Echolocation Installation, under Princes Bridge. We then headed to the MIAF Artist Lounge for some well-earned refreshments and some pizza.

Echolocation Rigging - Princes Bridge (Near Riverland)

Our next installation was Echolocation, a multimedia installation to be installed under Princes Bridge and manipulated via the Internet and control gear in BMW Edge. My role was quite simply crowd management, and there wasn’t much of a crowd at 1am. The project was very interesting though and I had the opportunity to have a good chat with Alex Stahl, the commissioning artist. The project centred around live recordings taken from under princes bridge, that would then be sent via Voice Over Internet Protocol to BMW Edge where they were manipulated and sent to multiple sites, including back underneath the bridge, the walkway between the Arts Centre and Hamer Hall, and the Fed Square Screen. It was an amazing project, but not without its delays. There was quite a large amount of soldering to be done to complete the circuit boards that would be mounted under the bridge, and due to the artist being unwell, he and the electronics didn’t get to Australia until very close to the bump in. It was no major problem, and in the end, the installation went up about 4 days late.

My workload during the running of the festival was decreased. I covered a few shifts at the Ecstatic City site, replacing Chis Sanders and Murray Dempsey, the permanent technicians. I also assisted on some events in the BMW Edge and did some office work in between. My role was gradually reduced due to several factors, including my involvement on the end of year dance season, and the decreased need for my work. I assisted on bump out of both Ecstatic City and Echolocation in a very similar role to that of the installation.

Overall, my time at the Melbourne International Arts Festival was an amazing learning curve, working with truly talented and very resourceful people. It showed me the inside or behind the scenes of festival operations, and gave me the opportunity to be involved in new media projects that pushed the boundaries of what art can be. I would like to thank Russ and Gen for being my guides through this time, and for mentoring me and showing me the better, or quicker or more logical way to do things. I hope to work on the Festival, and with any of the Festival staff, in the future.

DJ Spooky rocking out @ Meat Market - Melbourne International Arts Festival

April 1st 2009
I received an email today, (see post) informing me that the notice will be withdrawn and that all costs associated with this notice will be refunded as soon as possible. What did I do? Contacted my local member and appealed for some sanity. Please feel free to contact me for advice in this matter. Public: 1 Parking Inspectors (Revenue Rasers): 0
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Now we are all trying to do our bit for the environment, and increasingly people are leaving their car at home and taking public transport to work/uni/school. I would like to class me as one of those people, who is committed to reducing the amount i use my car. If I am going into uni, i try not to drive anymore. I either walk to the station and catch the train in, or if I am very late, I drive to the station and then catch the train in.

Today was no different… I was running late. So I jumped in the car and headed up to Moonee Ponds Station. The parking at the station disappears well before 8am, but that is another issue. There are a number of parking spots near my friend Kates house that are unsigned and if you are lucky some will be available.

I found one at the dog leg in Railway Crescent. I parked my car, popped off my radio face, and headed to the station. I went to uni, didnt have to look for parking there, had a few meetings and around 5pm headed home.

Driving in Victoria, Rules and Responsibilities” a publication by VicRoads, page 16

I arrived at Moonee Ponds at about half past, and as I was walking back to my car spied the worst thing you can ever see when you arrive back at you car… that dreaded white piece of paper. Yep, it was a parking fine, Code: 804 Section: 170 (3) Stopped – Within 10m of intersection. $110!!! At that price i could have driven in, parked in the valet service at crown casino, brought lunch on Southbank, about a kilo of lollies at Nutshack, and then on my way home, filled up the car. Okay, slightly over the top but you get the idea.

The first thing that annoyed me was that I knew that parking inspectors patrolled these backstreets like blood thirsty vampires, and in the morning I made sure I was clear of the dogleg. I counted out my steps and it was exactaly 10 to the front of my bullbar. The second thing that i noticed was that they classed it as an intersection, but my interpretation was that it was a dogleg. After checking on Google Maps and in the Melways, sure enough there is no intersection there, as an intersection is described by VicRoads as “where two or more roads meet”.

The dog leg of Railway Crescent

So as soon as i got home, straight onto the computer and post my info on this blog… hehe! But then I drafted up a letter to the council. Please find a copy of what i wrote below, and please feel free to use it as a template if you get a parking fine and want to contest it.

“To Whom It May Concern:
I am writing in regards to a parking fine I received on the 15th of April 2008, at 1:35PM on Railway Crescent in Moonee Ponds. The infringement notice I received cited the offence as Code 804 Section ROAD RULE 170 (3) – stopped – within 10m of an intersection, with a penalty of $110.
I would like to contest this fine for the following reasons:
I contest the definition of the intersection in question
I contest that my car was parked within 10m of the intersection in question
According to “Driving in Victoria, Rules and Responsibilities” a publication by VicRoads, page 16 states that “An INTERSECTION is where two or more roads meet”. According to the Greater Melbourne Melway (Edition 29, 2002), Google Maps Australia, and WhereIs Australia the intersection in question is not the meeting of two roads, but a continuation of Railway Crescent Moonee Ponds., which runs between Margret and Park Streets. Please find documentation below:
The Greater Melbourne Melway (Edition 29 2002), Page 29 H6

Google Maps (www.maps.google.com search “Railway Crescent, Moonee Ponds”)

WhereIs (www.whereis.com.au search “Railway Crescent, Moonee Ponds”)

After returning to Moonee Ponds from the city, around 5:30pm, I discovered the fine and paced out the distance from the front of my car to the power pole on the corner of the intersection in question. I did not have a tape measure or any other distance measurement device on my person, so instead I paced out 10 generous steps and from my calculations, believe that my car was parked outside 10m of the intersection in question. Please find photos of the car below.

If there is frequent confusion in relation to the parking options available in this street, proper parking and no standing signs should be erected.
I thank you for your time and hope to clean this matter up as soon as possible.
Regards,
Geordie Barker”

I will keep you all updated with progress as to the contesting of the fine.

Please post your experiences with parking fines below.

Cheers,

Geordie

I have just finished uploading a heap of new flickr photos, so please have a look @ www.flickr.com/geordieb

Cheers

After discovering the amazing world of podcasts (see the Wiki), and using my whole download usage in just a few short nights, I stumbled across the equally wonderful, and perhaps more functional and useful world of ‘podtours’. Now for those not so technically minded i might explain what these strange words mean.

A podcast is an audio or video file, much like a track off a cd, or a short film, that is available for download from the internet or one of the many podcast directories, like iTunes. Podcasts can take many shapes and forms and cover infinite topics. There are cooking video podcasts sponsored by oven companies, underground hacking videos distributed by secretive internet users, and episodes of the hit series Summer Heights High, distributed by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. As well as viewing them on your computer, podcasts can also be transferred and viewed on portable devices like iPods, Mobile Phones and PDAs. Podcast downloads are on the increase with some videos quoting download numbers in the millions.

A podtour is an inventive twist on the podcast. You still download it from the internet, and can still transfer it to your portable device, but it usually comes with a set of written instructions and/or a map. Some more advanced podtours use the video element to give you instructions/directions. Once a user has transfered the video or audio file to their device they are then navigated via the instructions to a start location and instructed to press play on the file. The file then takes you to a number of positions and discloses information relating to those positions. Essentially you have a pre-recorded tour guide in your ears, in most cases, for free.

This brings me to the point of this article; my discovery of a set of podtours developed by the Melbourne ABC in association with The University of Melbourne’s Cultural Heritage Unit. You have the choice of three different tours, “Eat, Drink Melbourne“, “Showbiz, Sexy Spectacles and Sideshows” and “Death, Dirt and Disease“. I downloaded “Showbiz, Sexy Spectacles and Sideshows”, copied the map to my iPhoto and subsequently to my iPod, (because i would just loose the print out if i didnt have it in digital form), and jumped on the tram into the city.

I arrived at the starting point, Federation Square and had a quick look at the map. Melbourne is my hometown, so i was familiar with the path the tour would take me on. I popped my headphones on and started the track. The track was very well produced with lead in music, sound effects, and spoken by some of the more popular 774 ABC Melbourne Team alongside some guests. I won’t ruin any of the tour for those of you who are going to attempt it, but I will cover the route and some interesting things i experienced.

From Fed Square, it took me up to the Arts Centre, under St Kilda Road (through an underpass i never knew existed), over the Yarra, up to Collins Street to the Regent Theatre. Then I headed up Little Lonsdale Street and ended up the Princess Theatre. The tour track runs for a little over 51 minutes, but that does allow for some walking time, and even fills some of that with stories from the city and surrounding areas. I found that i only had to pause the track 2-3 times, to walk from location to location. Overall the tour took me just over an hour. The track gives you great directions, and I can safely say that if I was a tourist in Melbourne, I wouldn’t have got lost.

I love this idea and I know that I am going to spend a lot of time searching the internet trying to find podtours of overseas cities to add to my collection, for my overseas trip next year. The collaboration between informed sources, the internet and new media is a really great thing. It is also good to know that the information relayed to you is from a university department, so the validity is quite ensured.

So thanks to the ABC and Uni Melb for expanding my knowledge for free. I think I will pop off now to do one of the other two… It’s near dinner time so maybe the Eat, Drink Melbourne.

Links: (look for the scroll bar, in the text box on the pages below to find the download links)

Eat, Drink Melbourne Podtour
Death, Dirt and Disease Podtour
Showbiz, Sexy Spectacles and Sideshows Podtour

Except…

I was sitting here today and my mouse stopped working. I have a bluetooth wireless mouse and it is very pretty, but it simply stopped. When i took control of the mouse pad i navigated up to the bluetooth menu and was greeted with a cross through the bluetooth symbol. When i clicked on it, it stated “Bluetooth unavailable”.

I searched a few forums and eventually gave up. I spent an hour or so using the normal mouse and then decided to try something. I restarted the computer.

And BANG! it was fixed…..

Greatest computer fixing advice ever… Restart you machine!

Late this afternoon I stumbled upon an article by Adam Lusher in Melbourne’s The Age Newspaper (direct link) entitled “Google’s Free Beer and Big Ass Barbies”. Essentially Google founders Sergey Brim and Larry Page, employed chef Charlie Ayers to provide free food to all its employees. The idea was to encourage the workforce to come in early and stay back late, by filling their stomaches with freshly prepared, and more importantly, free food. This was in 1998 and Ayers distinctly remembers them saying ‘we are not going to charge for food here ever’. Ayers was faced with a challenging mission, he had a captive audience and something to build on. The greatest part of the story is that Ayers didn’t just provide canteen style food free of charge, he developed a menu that encouraged workers to get a kick start in the morning, kept them energized after lunch and gradually moved them from a diet of fast food to salads and weekly lobster. He has released a book entitled “Eat Yourself Smart”, and has since sold a portion of his estimated 28.8 million of Google Shares, to buy a home. He has also left the company, and when he did, they renamed the canteen, Charlie’s.

Google aren’t the only ones realising that an empowered and happy staff base work better. Earlier in the year i had seen a short segment on the new National Australia Bank Headquarters in the Docklands, Melbourne. (There is also an Age Article here) The bank has redirected its corporate governance, by building a four energy star rated low rise building that features open play spaces, a large central sun lit atrium, large walkways above the atrium, a saw tooth roof which allows sunlight to replace electrical lighting sources and small bay windowed offices that poke out into the public space. NAB haven’t gone quite as far as say Microsoft, with free massages or on site pool or recreation facilities, but this is mainly to do with stockholders concerns. The move to a more environmentally friendly, more welcoming open plan workplace shows the emphasis on not only employees but on people in general.

In my opinion and from my direct observations, it isn’t essential to have a company sign onto some of the innovative and very modern schemes i have just discussed. It is more about the focus of the company, and the way it handles its workers. Workers need to be motivated to want to do work, or even want to show up. I believe working for a company should be a give and take. I believe each worker should discuss with their employer where they want to be in 1, 2 or 5 years. In my industry, the theatre industry, it is simple things such as staff training that will encourage employees to wholeheartedly commit to a company. For an employer to organize staff professional development is an effective and efficient way of not only building the skills of your staff, but investing in their future with the company. In the theatre industry there are a huge number of extra qualifications that you can obtain; scissor lift license, riggers ticket, truck license, fork lift license, occupational health and safety assessor and more. The costs associated with this are minimal. You cover the wages of the workers for that day, and pay a trainer to come onsite, which usually generates a significant discount.

In the end you need to motivate your employees and make them feel empowered within a company, it doesn’t matter what kind of initiative brings this about, the importance is the focus on your employees as you biggest asset.

I am now meeting with them, to co-ordinate the evening, the launch, the visual and audible aspects. I am so amazingly excited about the idea of working with such a virgin space, and with people at their peak, and to create a first impression on the people who enter the space. I have the opportunity to draw them into the space, to keep them coming back, to get them interested in the space, conversing with the space.

This is why I do this crazy unsustainable work, because it gets my blood pumping, my mind working and I get a rush. Who needs drugs, when you have art.