Melbourne Candid Series #1263 Swanston St

 

Hair first, schedule later
Swanston Street’s unofficial narrator
struts past glass that doubles the cast,
one version future, one version past.

Phone in hand like urgent news
(“Tram delayed… or what to choose?”),
shopping bag swings with retail pride
proof that lunchtime goals were satisfied.

Reflections gossip in polished panes,
traffic hums its weekday refrains,
and somewhere between the lights and feet
fashion negotiates with Swanston Street.

Sony A7RV

FE 35mm f1.4 GM

Check out Candid 1109

Melbourne Candid Series #1262 Swanston St

 

On Swanston Street they stride in sync,
bags swinging, thoughts mid-blink
a Marvel tee, a quiet smile,
footsteps drumming city-mile.

Trams hum gossip down the lane,
shopfronts blink in glass and grain,
sunlight spills through urban trees
like caffeine on a weekday breeze.

Strangers passing, stories crossed,
no one counting what is lost
just pavement, chatter, moving feet,
the everyday parade of Swanston Street.

Sony A7RV

FE 35mm f1.4 GM

Check out Candid 1108

Melbourne Candid Series #1261 Swanston St

 

Swanston Street symphony, midday in swing

One bloke doomscrolls like it’s an Olympic thing.

A shopper power-walks with caffeine and sass,

While a beard with a tote does philosophical laps.

“VAPES” signs hovering like modern-day shrines,

Discount posters preaching retail lifelines.

Someone sips iced coffee like it holds the truth,

While trams clang wisdom no one hears in youth.

Melbourne marches on in grayscale delight

Half late for work, half late for life.

Sony A7RV

FE 35mm f1.4 GM

Check out Candid 1107

Melbourne Candid Series #1260 Swanston St

 

Swanston Street catwalk, 11 a.m. sharp
Shopping bags swinging like modern-day harps.
“OPEN” signs blinking, phones yelling for sales,
While trams grumble past with existential tales.

Two legends stride like they own the CBD,
Dodging lost tourists and a rogue e-scoot spree.
Coffee in one hand, receipts in the other
Retail therapy sponsored by Afterpay’s mother.

Melbourne hums on in its grayscale parade
Where style is effortless… and rent is unpaid.

Sony A7RV

FE 50mm f1.2 GM

Check out Candid 1106

Melbourne Candid Series #1259 Swanston St

 

On Swanston Street he pauses mid-stride,
Banh mi signs glowing, tram bells collide.
Hand on his nose like he’s solving a crime
“Was it the pigeons… or lunch last time?”

Backpack sagging with heroic regret,
Street performers playing songs no one gets.
Tourists drift past like confused schools of fish,
While he rethinks that extra chilli wish.

Melbourne hums in monochrome grace
And he stands there, philosopher of face.

Sony A7RV

FE 50mm f1.2 GM

Check out Candid 1105

Melbourne Candid Series #1255 Swanston St

 

Footsteps stitch the afternoon together.
Bags swing with the weight of small decisions.
Eyes drift past one another,
each carrying a private errand of thought.

Glass remembers their reflections for a second,
then lets them go.
The street keeps no names
only the rhythm of people moving on.

Sony A7RV

FE 35mm f1.4 GM

Check out Candid 1102 and FACE OFF

Melbourne Candid Series #1254 Swanston St

 

Midday leans hard against the pavement,
light spilling through plane trees and glass.
A man stands still inside the crowd,
thumbs scrolling a small, glowing elsewhere.

Ink climbs his arms like remembered roads,
maps of places he has already been.
Behind him, the city queues for a crossing
four lives paused at the same red breath.

Trams hum their low mechanical prayers,
shops flash promises in clean fonts.
A recycling bin waits patiently,
asking nothing, offering order.

Everyone is here,
yet elsewhere
heads bowed to screens, schedules, hunger,
a message arriving late or too soon.

Swanston Street keeps moving without comment.
It has learned this trick:
how to hold thousands of private moments
inside one ordinary afternoon.

Sony A7RV

FE 14mm f1.8 GM

Check out Candid 1101

Melbourne Candid Series #1218 Swanston St

 

On Swanston Street, she walks
through a river of passing hours,
headphones sealing a private weather
against the city’s noise.

The traffic lights blink and wait,
faces blur into motion,
but she moves with a measured resolve,
eyes forward, unborrowed.

An illustrated gaze stares from her jumper,
another world layered over this one—
ink and fabric carrying a story
the street will never fully hear.

Wind lifts her hair like a half-spoken thought,
boots meet pavement in quiet defiance,
and for a moment the city bends around her,
letting her pass,
untranslated.

Sony A7RV

FE 135mm f1.8 GM

Check out Candid 1065

Melbourne Candid Series #1285 Swanston St

 

On Swanston Street, the light waits at amber,
a held breath between steps.
Trams murmur somewhere out of frame,
steel singing to steel,
while the city keeps time in crossings and bells.

He moves through the monochrome morning
as if the day has chosen him for its measure
hood drawn close, shoulders squared
against the ordinary weather of thought.
The word Nomadic rests on his chest,
not a claim, but a question.

Glass and stone blur behind him,
history smoothed to a soft hush.
Signals hang like small moons,
deciding nothing yet.
His stride answers for him:
forward, unhurried, exact.

This is Melbourne in a minor key
coffee steam lifting unseen,
lanes waking to their own names.
Each footfall writes a line
no map can keep.

And in the brief truce of the crossing,
before the city resumes its argument,
he carries a private horizon with him,
moving through Swanston Street
as if the street were moving too.

Sony A7RV

FE 50mm f1.2 GM

Check out Candid 1042

Melbourne Candid Series #1246 Swanston St

 

A row of men in caps sit still
along the stone bench, shoulder to shoulder
a quiet congregation of screens.
Each head bowed,
not in prayer but in signal,
their thumbs murmuring in perfect rhythm.

The city swirls around them
trams clang, pigeons scatter,
light flickers across their faces
like water over stone.
They do not look up.
The world passes in reflections
on glass and metal and moving lips.

Time, too, seems to pause here
a row of lives humming softly
in their separate orbits,
united by invisible threads of light.
And in that stillness,
the stone bench holds them gently,
as if the street itself were listening.

Sony A7RV

FE 50mm f1.2 GM

Check out Candid 1002

Melbourne Candid Series #1215 Swanston St

 

Bare-chested beneath the awning’s shade,
he sits with his guitar, half in dream—
the strings sigh softly, a golden seam
stitched through the city’s passing parade.

Rain-slick pavement mirrors light,
trams glide by in a silver blur;
his voice, low ember, seems to stir
the air between the day and night.

People pass—umbrellas bloom,
phones glow pale in drifting hands;
yet still he plays, as though he stands
in some cathedral made of gloom.

Unnoticed saint of Swanston Street,
his song spills warm where cold winds meet.

Sony A7RV

FE 35mm f1.4 GM

Check Out Candid 969

Melbourne Candid Series #1181Swanston St

 

The sushi shop is closed,
its doors drawn in silence,
though only yesterday
the place was alive with voices
and the scent of rice and sea.

I did not expect its absence,
for it was well loved,
a small refuge on Swanston
where many found their share of comfort.

Two young girls paused before it,
hopeful, then uncertain,
their search for a simple meal
redirected into the city’s restless night.

So it is with such places
they flourish, they fade,
leaving only the memory
of quiet tables,
and familiar flavours gone.

Sony A7RV

FE 35mm f1.4 GM

Check out Candid 936

Melbourne Candid Series #1163 Swanston St

 

On Swanston Street, where trams hum low,
An Indian man lets the city flow.
Cup in hand, steam curling high,
Like incense drifting to the sky.

The bench holds still, the world moves fast,
Moments like this are never meant to last.
Sip by sip, in the midday light,
He drinks his peace in the urban flight.

Sony A7RV

FE 20-70mm f4 G

Check out 

Melbourne Candid Series #1161 Swanston St

 

Off Swanston Street where trams glide past,
A gent sits down, the crowd flows fast.
His frame is broad, his shirt stretched tight,
A beer gut round, in grayscale light.

But hush the world and let him play
His fingers dance, then drift away.
A melody both rich and clear
Pours from the keys, and draws you near.

No stage, no suit, no grand parade,
Just soul and song in light and shade.
Each note a tale, each pause a breath,
A beauty born from life and depth.

And though the photo’s black and white,
You hear the sound, you feel the light.
A gentle giant, slouched with grace,
Making music in a passing place.

Sony A7RV

FE 50mm f1.2 GM

Check out Candid 916

Melbourne Candid Series #1160 Swanston St

 

On Swanston Street where shadows lie,
A lady dines beneath the sky,
The clatter fades, the traffic hums,
As camera clicks and stillness comes.

She turns her gaze, both calm and keen,
A moment caught in black and sheen—
One hand rests near a porcelain cup,
The other lifts her silence up.

No words are said, yet eyes confer
A quiet question meant for her:
"Why capture me, in time confined?"
She answers only with her mind.

A city swirls, but she holds still,
Framed by chance, by light, by will.
A stranger’s lens, a fleeting grace
Melbourne breathes in her quiet face.

Sony A7RV

FE 50mm f1.2 GM

Check out Candid 915

Melbourne Candid Series 1150 Swanston St

 

A man walks with measured pace,
In weathered jeans, with timeworn grace,
Down Swanston Street, beneath the sun,
Where Melbourne’s rhythm softly runs.

Beside him strides a younger frame,
A girl of brightness none could tame—
Dark hair, a shimmer, sunglasses bold,
A phone in hand, the future told.

Two lives aligned for just a street,
A fleeting dance, the past and fleet,
He walks in thought, she taps and swipes,
Their worlds diverge, yet both alike.

A moment held in city light,
Of age and youth in shared delight,
No word exchanged, no need for sound—
Just footsteps echoing downtown.

Sony A7RV

FE 50mm f1.2 GM

Check out 

Melbourne Candid Series #1149 Swanston St

 

On Swanston Street in midday glare,
Two young men wandered without a care.
In singlets light and weathered stride,
They moved like currents, side by side.

One bore a cap, his mullet proud,
Sunglasses hooked, his stance unbowed.
He faced ahead, eyes on the flow,
A figure caught in city’s glow.

The other turned, his glance askew,
A bag in hand, tattoos in view.
A smile broke free—half sun, half jest,
As though the world had passed some test.

Diverging steps in Melbourne's heat,
Two stories danced along the street.
Each bearing tone, a silent song,
Of youth adrift, where all belongs.

Sony A7RV

FE 50mm f1.2 GM

Check out Candid 903

Melbourne Candid Series #1135 Swanston St (before winter this year)

 

Upon Swanston Street, where footsteps meet,
A lone man walks in midday heat.
With earphones snug and singlet white,
He strides ahead, lost from all sight.

The city's hum fades to a tone,
For in his world, he walks alone.
Eyes widely shut, no glance is thrown—
This is his hour, he is the zone.

Sony A7RV

FE 50mm f1.2 GM

Check out Candid 889 and FACE OFF

Melbourne Candid Series #1134 Swanston St

 

In the sun, she moves with quiet grace,
A pram before her, steady pace.
Down Swanston Street where footsteps flow,
Through the city’s midday glow.

The crowd surges, a restless stream,
Shadows flit and windows gleam.
But she — a calm within the tide,
With a plaid of hair swung to one side.

The tram bell rings, the pigeons stir,
Yet all the world slows down for her.
A mother’s rhythm, firm yet light,
Carving day from neon light.

Melbourne pulses, grand and wide,
But still she walks, with time beside.

Sony A7RV

FE 50mm f1.2 GM

Check out Candid 888

Melbourne Candid Series #1125 Swanston St

 

Upon a bench on Swanston bare,
Mid winter’s breath and biting air,
An elder woman took her place,
The chill wind tracing 'cross her face.

A cap drawn low o’er silver strands,
A phone held firm in gloved-up hands.
Her coat was thick, her posture sure,
She braved the cold with something pure.

Beside her sat, with polished grace,
A bag that spoke of wealth and place—
Its leather gleamed, its buckles shone,
A thing of means, yet she alone.

She spoke in murmurs, calm, composed,
As trams passed by and daylight dozed.
The city swirled in greys and blacks,
While frost clung tight to tramway tracks.

She seemed a relic, firm and still,
A monument of tempered will.
While winter wrapped the world in white,
She warmed the street with quiet might.

Sony A7RV

FE 50mm f1.2 GM 

Check out Candid 880