DAMIAN WHITE

Born: Warrnambool on October 11, 1969.

Wife: Kim.

Children: Darcy, Jack and Harrison.

Parents: Bill and Judy.

Siblings: Brett, Jodie and Jason.

Education: Warrnambool West Primary School before attending Warrnambool Technical School.

Sporting Highlight: Representing Warrnambool in country week hockey in Melbourne.

Damian, what are the memories of your sporting highlight?

I think I was in year 7 at school when I started playing hockey.

A couple of teachers set up a side called Techniques, and I went from there.

I was only a little tracker when I started and I played on the wing.

We won a few hockey grand finals and I was lucky enough to be selected to represent Warrnambool.

In those days we used to train and play on grass in Warrnambool but games in Melbourne were played at the State Hockey Centre which was an artificial surface.

I can still remember going to the Fig Tree caravan park in Lava Street to train because it had an artificial surface on the tennis court.

I played a bit of footy for Bushfield juniors and then Northern Districts but my sporting career was short lived.

Can you explain why your sporting career was short lived?

I got a job as a cadet photographer at The Standard in June 1989. The cadetship was for three years, and getting the job meant I had to work on a lot of weekends across the next 25 years.

I was fortunate in my job to have the front-row seat at lots of different events. They were all amazing.

For example, I worked at 25 consecutive Warrnambool May Racing Carnivals for the paper. I can remember my first carnival in 1990, I was working at the first road double jumps.

Over the years, when my responsibilities increased, I used to be in front of the stand and then at the last jump on the inside of the track using the crowd as the backdrop for photos of that last fence.

Events like the May Carnival, you were always busy. There was always something going on.

I would work with reporters like Peter Fletcher, Greg Best, Bradley Green, Andrew Thomson and Kate Fowles over those 25 years.

I was very lucky in my first carnivals to be taught by talented snappers Rob Sharrock and Simon O'Dwyer and then I worked with Leanne Pickett, Ange Marshall, Vicki Hughson, Rob Gunstone and various others.

Photographers only have a split second to capture the image that tells the story. The photo has got to capture the emotion of that moment, whether that's to do with sport or anything else.

Des Gleeson and Frank Beattie, who were stewards, were a big help and then people like clerk-of-course Leo Dwyer and the late Gordon Ballis, who sold race books at the track for years, offered great support.

The racing carnival is an iconic event in Warrnambool and I was lucky to have worked at it.

I'll never forget one of my early carnivals was when champion jockey Damien Oliver had his first rides there.

Peter Fletcher had been talking to Ollie during the day and happened to say he loved surfing.

Fletch told Ollie I also loved surfing, so we ended up having a talk later in the day. I met with Ollie the next morning at 6am and we went surfing at Logan's Beach. We had a great morning catching a wave before seeing him back at the track later in the day.

We worked long hours over the carnival but we all loved it.

One of the best times of the week was hanging out with the staff from The Standard on the Thursday night after the carnival was finished.

We would usually head out to one of the pubs and let our hair down after what was a big week.

There was always a lot of preparation in the lead-up to the event but the person on the street doesn't realise all the work that is needed behind the scenes to get the paper out each day.

Those people behind the scenes including sub-editors, pre-press, advertising staff and printers were all passionate about putting out a great product each day. It used to be a massive team effort.

Damian, apart from the Warrnambool May Racing Carnival, what are some of the other events or things that have stayed in your mind from your career at The Standard?

The strange thing about the job was that you never knew what was going to happen next.

I can still remember one day I went to Colac to photograph Prime Minister John Howard, after that I was down at Naringal taking a photo of a farmer and to finish the day I went up in a helicopter to take photos of whales at Childers Cove.

There was another day that I happened to be at the airport at Mailors Flat doing a job and I spotted this security bloke in an unmarked car. I waited around to see what was happening.

The next minute this jet touched down - and who got off, it was Prime Minister Kevin Rudd.

The Lismore train crash in May 2006 was another thing I'll never forget. I got a call at 7am and rushed down to Lismore. There was a heavy fog. It was really eerie. I went back to work and we ended up getting a helicopter to go up over the scene.

There's been drownings, car crashes and everything in between.

It was extremely difficult if you turned up to a job like a car crash or a drowning and you might have known a person involved.

The emergency services were all great to work with over the years.

I look back at my 25-year career at The Standard and I consider myself very lucky to have worked with great people at a top regional paper helping document Warrnambool's history. It was an honour.

What does Damian White do with his time now?

I'm a theatre technician at St John Of God Hospital. I've been in the job for more than three years.

I found it difficult at the start because you could be in an operating theatre for 10 hours, compared to being outside photographing things. It's an interesting job.

In my spare time, I love getting out to ride my mountain bike.

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