Michael Rayner was born in Stockport UK in 1951, 18 months before his parents Alan and Dorothy migrated with him to the industrial Melbourne bayside suburb Altona, as "Ten Pound Poms".
[1] Ron Lovitt,[1] the pictorial editor who employed him and took a famous picture of the last ball of the tied Test cricket match between Australia and the West Indies, was an influence on Rayner's photography.
In 1972 he won the Sydney E Pratt Award for the best photograph taken by a cadet Australia-wide; it showed VFL footballer Sam Newman being struck square in the face by the ball he had just missed.
He meanwhile directed 'Impressions Photography' from a shopfront in North Melbourne with partner the press photographer Tony Feder for four years from 1983 for around two hundred clients including Time magazine and The Telegraph in London,[9] then briefly worked freelance on his own 1987- 1988.
His subjects have included Mel Gibson, Bob Hawke when he resigned from the ACTU and launched his Federal election campaign,[20] Eddie McGuire, Paul Keating,[21] Jean Bedford,[22] Kate Langbroek, Steven Berkoff, Tony Greig[23] Guy Pearce, David Gulpilil, Peter Carey, Hugo Weaving, Rachel Griffiths, Gérard Depardieu, Andrea Stretton[24] and Adam Elliot, though not all such assignments went smoothly; Mushroom Records was reported as having treated Rayner 'aggressively' when he attempted to photograph singer Jimmy Barnes in 'casual clothes'.