VICTORIA – The third installment and first anniversary of YYJ Rocktographers, a showcase of live music photography on Vancouver Island, started with a bang on January 16, 2015 with an estimated 500 people walking through the door of Al Smith’s Vic42 Studio space in Victoria (660 Discovery Street) to see 28 local live music photographers’ best photos.

The theme for YYJ Rocktographers 3 was simply photos taken in 2014 at shows on Vancouver Island. A call out for photo submissions was announced December 1, 2015 via a mail list and photographers had until December 15, 2015 to submit photos for consideration.

“We had almost 40 photographers submit for the show and almost 100 photos altogether submitted,” said YYJ Rocktographers organizer Tyson Elder. “Of the 100 photos, I’d say like 85 of the photos were top notch should be produced in a magazine quality photos. They were just amazing.”

Webmeister Bud of The [email protected] who helped Tyson in the selection process for the gallery spoke about how hard it was choosing which photos would be featured saying, “you’ve got a city full of super talent photographers and you ask them all to choose their top 3 best photos of 2014 and then all of those come in. Then you somehow have to one of the top tier? It was tough, it was really really tough. With a number of them it came down to I honestly couldn’t tell. It’s, like, coin flipping time.”

All 28 selected photos were printed at The PRINT Lab in Oak Bay and mounted on birch and satin laminated making each one look stunning. Music artists featured in the photos ranged from Victoria locals such as Current Swell, Aidan Knight, Vince Vaccaro, Jesse Roper and LIINKS to other known Canadian performers Rich Aucoin, July Talk, Dear Rouge and Gob to major international artists Death Cab For Cutie, Girl Talk, Phantogram and more.

Sydney Batters of Honey Rose at YYJ Rocktographers 3
Sydney Batters of Honey Rose at YYJ Rocktographers 3
The launch party also featured live musical performances from local artists. Honey Rose, a new music collaboration project of Hawk and Steel frontman Peter Gardner and singer Sydney Batters began the night’s live entertainment. Their set also happened to be their very first live performance as Honey Rose. Noah Edwards of Noah Edwards Band followed up with a solo set and then Mike Edel put on a surprise performance to end the night.

What’s next for YYJ Rocktographers? Elder says, “we’re going to have another show in May, celebrating festival season inside Victoria and outside of Victoria as well. We’re hoping to have some pop-up shows a lot of local music festivals and around Victoria.”

YYJ Rocktographers 3 continues all weekend through to Monday January 19, 2015. It is open for free viewing noon – 8pm Saturday and noon – 5pm Sunday/Monday. (660 Discovery Street)

Below is a quick look at the launch of YYJ Rocktographers 3.


YYJ Rocktographers: http://www.yyjrocktographers.com