Australian Content Blog

A website itself is an essential below the-line marketing tool and it can be put together at a cheap price and have an immediate impact on your establishment. Your franchisor or corporation probably boasts a company-wide website, which makes a lot of sense, so that the deatails and costs can be spread across the entire organisation. The website should be a two-way medium that places you in touch with your target customers and explains in detail your offerings and how to contact your organisation. It should gather and distribute leads and should collect prospect details so that you can build a database of potential clients.

Websites have the capability to reach world-wide audiences, which takes you out of your local area! Regardless, websites can also be constructed in such a way that if someone does a search for your products in your area, you can be found.

This is crucial because more and more people are going to the Internet first before reaching for the Yellow Pages. A professionally produced and presented website can establish the credibility of your company regardless if you are working out of a one-bedroom apartment or an expensive office block.

Your website can answer the same questions over and over and over again while you sleep and can increase the life of your printed material, radio and television advertisements by incorporating them on the site. You can introduce forms and gather information as you want and provide your clients with valuable reports whilst collecting their details for your prospect database. The site can also be another inexpensive retail outlet for you without the cost of hard real estate.

Believe it or not, reclusive people not willing to contact you by phone or in person are able to obtain information and if they wish to pursue things, they will often email you via the contacts section of the website.

There is much written about websites and how they should be produced and what they should say. Suffice to say that the content you present on your website is imperative because it has the potential to become the foundation for enticing clients to your site and establishing your company as an expert in its field. By regularly updating the content on your site, you can also attract search engines and, if the content is worthy, other businesses may build inbound links to your site.

There is some debate as to how many pages should constitute your website ranging from one simple tellall/sell-all page to adding as much content as you like. Regardless, it’s crucial to know that the heading or first line of the web page is the most important and the next in line is the first paragraph. Why is this so? Well, a web page is like a newspaper and people will scan for headlines before either selecting something they like or moving on to the next page. Keep the reader interested with clear, concise. and confronting headlines and strong first paragraphs.

Web pages are one of the most easily tracked marketing techniques available. In fact, you can obtain an astounding amount of statistics from hits through to hot spots within a page. Websites are also great for companies that can’t find enough room on their business cards to explain their products and services!

It’s one thing to have a fantastic website; it’s an absolutely different thing to have one that can be found.

For internet marketing Brisbane, Brisbane web design and SEO services Brisbane, contact Search Tempo today.

Artists’ oil colours are created by stirring dry powder pigments with particular refined linseed oil until the substance reaches a stiff paste consistency and then grinding it under harsh friction in steel roller mills. The smoothness of the hue is important. The common standard is a smooth, buttery paste, rather than stringy or long or tacky. When a more flowing or mobile style is required by the artist, a liquid painting medium like pure gum turpentine must be mixed with the substance. In order to expediate drying, a siccative, or liquid drier, might be usually used.

Top-class brushes are available in two kinds: red sable (using numerous members of the weasel family) and bleached hog bristles. They come in numbered sizes for any of four regular shapes: round (pointed), flat, bright (flat but is shorter and not as supple), and oval (flat but bluntly pointed). Red sable brushes are commonly preferred for a smoother, delicate style of brushstroke. The painting knife, a finely tempered, thin version of the palette knife, is a convenient tool for applying oil colours in a robust manner.

The generic support for oil paintings is a canvas from pure European linen of strong close weave. A canvas is cut to the desired size and stretched over a frame, mostly a wood frame, and secured with tacks or, during the 20th century, by staples. If the artist needs to reduce the absorbency of the fabric itself and achieve a consistent surface, a primer or ground may be applied and left to dry before painting begins. The most commonly employed primers for this are gesso, rabbit-skin glue, and lead white. If rigidity and a smooth texture are preferred over elasticity and texture, a wooden or processed paperboard panel, sized or primed, might be utilised. A number of other supports, such as paper and varying textiles and metals, have been experimented with.

A coat of paint varnish is commonly set on to a completed oil painting to protect it from atmospheric attacks, minor abrasions, or an harmful accumulation of dirt. This paint varnish can be taken off safely by experts with use of isopropyl alcohol and other such household solvents. Varnishing also brings the surface to a full lustre and takes the tone and colour intensity really to the appearance initially created by the artist in the paint. Some modern painters, especially those who don’t favour deep, intense colouring, and stay with a mat, or lustreless, finish in the paintings.

The majority of oil paintings dating before the 19th century were built in layers. The first would be a blank, uniform field of thin paint known as a ground. The ground graduated the glaring white of the primer and allowed a gentle colour on which to apply the paint. The shapes and objects in the painting would be roughly blocked in from shades of white, and gray or neutral green, red, or brown. The resulting field of monochromatic colours were termed the underpainting. Forms were given definition using either ordinary paint or scumbles, which are non-uniform, thinly applied layers of opaque pigment that displaying a variety of visual effects. For the last stage, transparent layers of pure colour known as glazes were applied to cast luminosity, depth, and brilliance to the figures, and highlights would then be imparted with thick, textured patches of paint known as impastos.

Oil as a painting medium is recorded back to the 11th century. The practice of easel painting with oil colours, however, resulted directly from 15th-century tempera-painting methods. Basic improvements in the method of refining linseed oil and the availability of volatile solvents from 1400 coincided with a need for than pure egg-yolk tempera, to meet the contemporary requirements of the Renaissance (see tempera painting). At first, oil paints and varnishes were employed to glaze tempera panels that had been painted with their traditional linear draftsmanship. The technically brilliant, gem-like paintings of the 15th-century Flemish artist Jan van Eyck, for example, were completed in this new style.

Throughout the 16th century, oil colour became firmly established as the fundamental painting material in Venice. By the end of the century, Venetian artists had become proficient in exploiting the basic aspects of oil painting, especially in applying successive layers of glazing. Canvas of linen, after a long period of growth, topped wooden panels as the common support.

One of the 17th-century masters of the oil technique was Velázquez, a Spanish painter in the Venetian tradition, whose supremely economical but certain brushstrokes have frequently been adopted, especially in portraiture. The Flemish painter Peter Paul Rubens challenged tradition in the manner in which he loaded his light colours opaquely, to juxtapose the thin, transparent darks and shadows. Another remarkable 17th-century master of oil painting was the Dutch painter Rembrandt. In his works, a single brushstroke can effectively depict form; cumulative strokes created great textural depth, with a combination of the rough and the smooth, the thick and the thin. A field of loaded whites and transparent darks was further enhanced by glazing, blendings, and highly controlled impastos.

Other particular influences on the later easel painting techniques are the smooth, thinly painted, deliberately planned, tight styles. A great many admired works (e.g., those from Johannes Vermeer) were formed with smooth gradations and blends of tones to achieve subtle forms and delicate colour variations.

The technical requirements of some schools of modern painting cannot be achieved by use of traditional genres and/or techniques, however, and some abstract painters - as well as to some extent modern traditionally-geared painters - have shown a desire for a totally different plastic flow or viscosity that cannot be formed from oil paint and its conventional additives. Some desire a larger variation of thick and/or thin applications and a more expedient rate of drying. Some artists mix coarsely grained substances with their colours to create new textures, some apply oil paints in much greater thickness than ever before, and a large part have begun to favour acrylic paints, which are more versatile and dry very fast.

Interested in oil painting? For art supplies Brisbane, including canvas art supplies and artists supplies, visit or call the Discount Art Warehouse.

Hydrocarbons are any in a class of organic chemical compounds composed only of the elements carbon and hydrogen. The carbon atoms link together to create the framework of the compound; the hydrogen atoms join to them in a number of different configurations. Hydrocarbons are the primary constituents of petroleum and natural gas. They may be fuels and lubricants as well as raw materials for the construction of plastics, fibres, rubbers, solvents, explosives, and industrial chemicals.

Most hydrocarbons occur in nature. While also forming fossil fuels, such compounds may be located in trees or some plants, as, for example, for the sort of pigments called carotenes that can be seen in carrots and green leaves. A little more than 98 percent of natural crude rubber is a part of hydrocarbon polymer, a chainlike molecule formed of numerous units connected.

Hydrocarbons will not dissolve in water and are less dense than water, so will float on its surface. They will often be soluble with one another, though, as well as in some organic solvents. All hydrocarbons will be fully combustible. If they are burned fully with sufficient oxygen, they can produce carbon dioxide and water, releasing heat. If there is inadequate oxygen, the combustion will yield carbon monoxide.

The structures and chemistry of unique hydrocarbons is dependant for the most part on the sorts of chemical bonds that link the atoms of the constituent molecules. A carbon atom can feature four single bonds, or it can have double or triple bonds. A hydrogen atom can possess only a single bond.

Hydrocarbons are allocated into differing classes based on their structure. The two essential categories are aliphatic and aromatic. Aliphatic hydrocarbons may be created out of molecules in which the carbon atoms are attached in chains (termed acyclic) or in rings (known as alicyclic, or carbocyclic). Aliphatic hydrocarbons also are allocated depending on the kinds of bonds between the carbon atoms. For aliphatic hydrocarbons, when the bonds are all single (termed sigma bonds), the compound is known as saturated. Those compounds are classified as alkanes or cycloalkanes. If at least two bonds connect any two carbon atoms, the hydrocarbon is called unsaturated. The bonds may be double, like the alkenes or alkadienes, or triple, such as the alkynes. A few compounds have both sorts of multiple bonds for the singular molecule.

The simple alkanes are methane, ethane , and propane. Those compounds exist in only an individual structure in each. Higher types of the series, beginning with butane, might be compounded in two varying procedures, from whether the carbon chain is straight or branched. Such compounds are known as isomers; those are compounds that have a matching molecular formula but feature different arrangements of the atoms. Because of this, they can possess varied chemical properties.

Cycloalkanes are ring structures that have two fewer hydrogen atoms within the molecule of the corresponding alkane. Many of these feature multiple rings, not just one. Six-membered rings are of significance because they are seen in numerous natural products, especially the steroids. Cyclic structures also might be isomers for which two molecules vary only in the spatial arrangement of substituent groups.

The primary commercial sources of alkanes are petroleum and natural gas. Singular higher alkanes and cycloalkanes commonly are synthesized from reactions designed for a particular product. These saturated hydrocarbons might also be synthesized by the relative unsaturated molecules, by hydrogenation (inclusion of hydrogen). Saturated hydrocarbons are generally inert; i.e., at room temperature they aren’t affected by common acids, alkalies, and oxidizing or reducing agents.

For hydrocarbon storage tanks and self-bundled hydrocarbon tanks, contact Logitank.com.au

Gone are the days of synthetic grass looking fake and plastic. These days new generation synthetic lawn is lush, soft, extremely realistic and difficult to tell apart from the real thing.

Everyone adores the natural look of a lawn, but who has the time these days? With artificial grass you get all the benefits of real grass with no chance of dead patches, muddy patches or the weekend maintenance ritual.

Never mow again
Imagine having your weekends available to do what you like most without ever having to find the mower again. Not only will you never be caught out by unexpected visitors and an unkempt lawn, you’ll have the peace of mind of never having to listen to that mower motor pacing up and down your yard ever again!

Save your water
Only grass that grows needs water, save it for something more necessary, like drinking a nice cold glass of it while you are admiring your lawn.

No nasties
Don’t worry about having to use smelly fertilisers, stepping in thorns, or dealing with seasonal grass allergies. With synthetic grass this is all in the past, you can sit on it, lie on it, roll in it and get up without being covered in mud or grass clippings.

Can be installed anywhere grass won’t grow or you don’t want to mow
Synthetic grass doesn’t need sunlight , it is fine in shady areas and will keep them looking lush whilst providing you with many years of usable space. Being synthetic it is unaffected by constant direct sunlight or harsh conditions, this grass is made to last. Synthetic grass is also at home around the pool, good quality grasses are UV, salt and chlorine resistant.

It might look delicate but its durability will surprise you
As well as homes these grasses are used in schools and council public areas, even dog runs and kennels. Just by viewing these new generation artificial lawns you can be forgiven for thinking they are fragile, but in fact they are extremely sturdy. They can stand up to heavy daily traffic, children, pets, are non-flammable and, you can expect high quality synthetic grass to last as long as high quality pavers.

It is available for DIY
For those that are handy you can install your own synthetic grass. Find a good DIY installation guide do it yourself and save some money.

Turn unusable space into your favourite place
Synthetic lawn is so inviting, you will find that areas that were never used in the past become favourite resting and/or play areas.

You don’t need to leave home to have a practice hit on the green.
If golf is your thing then what could be more luxurious than planting a putting green in your backyard. There are a variety of options when it comes to artificial putting greens. Everything from DIY putting kits through to PGA level greens just like those in the homes of the top golfers, these PGA level greens allow you to chip and pitch from a distance, with a realistic roll from every angle of the green.

Synthetic lawn is used on the fringe of the green and can flow out to truly blend the putting green into the garden landscape.

Of course synthetic putting greens have all the same low maintenance benefits of synthetic grass. So these greens will be ready for play when you are.

Perfect for Children’s play areas
Synthetic grass has always been popular in day care centres, but synthetic lawn takes it to a whole new level of softness. Synthetic grass doesn’t conceal hidden sharps the way that sand or chipped bark can, and synthetic grass can be installed to comply with soft fall standards for use where play equipment is used.

Perfect for pets
Pets love synthetic grass and it is often used in luxury dog kennels.
Urine will simply soak through and make its way into the earth below, unfortunately there is no way of magically making number 2’s disappear so they will need to be picked up just as you would with real grass, however neither one of these will damage your grass. Removal of waste is purely for you and your dog to avoid any inconvenience.

For dogs that like to dig there are special installation techniques that will ensure your grass remains as long as it should so make sure you mention this when you are being quoted on installation.

Enduroturf is Australian made, available Australia-wide and recognised as being one of Australia’s largest suppliers and installers of synthetic grass. Brisbane is home to Enduroturf’s head office but you can find our synthetic grass in Melbourne, Geelong , Canberra, Sydney, Cairns, Toowoomba, , Tasmania , Alice Springs, Adelaide and we of course also provide our synthetic grass in Perth. Call us today for a free, no obligation quote or visit us at enduroturf.com.au

Sculpture is an art form in which hard or plastic materials are molded into three-dimensional objects. The designs may be embodied in freestanding objects, in reliefs on surfaces, or in environments ranging from tableaux to contexts surrounding the spectator. An endless variety of media are used, including clay, wax, stone, metal, fabric, glass, wood, plaster, rubber, and random “found” objects. Materials are carved, modeled, molded, cast, wrought, welded, sewn, assembled, or purely shaped and combined.

Sculpture is not a fixed brand that applies to a permanently restricted category of objects or sets of activities. It is, rather, the name given to art that is growing and changes and is continually extending the range of forms and evolving new styles of objects. The breadth of the term became much wider in the second half of the 20th century than it had been only two or three decades previously, and in the fluid state of art at the turn of the 21st century, one simply cannot predict what its future dimensions are likely to be.

There are some features which in previous centuries were considered essential to the art of sculpture but are not present in a large part of modern sculpture and thus no longer form part of its definition. One of the most elementary points of these is representation. Prior to the 20th century, sculpture was considered a representational art; an imitation of forms in life, most often of human figures but also inanimate objects, such as game, utensils, and books. Since the beginning of the 20th century, however, sculpture has also included nonrepresentational forms. It became accepted that figures of such functional 3-D objects as furniture, pots, and buildings might be expressive and beautiful without having to be representational. It was only in the 20th century that nonfunctional, nonrepresentational, three-D artworks began to be an art form in and of themselves.

Before the 20th century, sculpture was regarded as essentially an art of solid form, or mass. Though the negative elements of sculpture — the voids and hollows inside and between its solid areas — have always been to some extent an intricate part of its design, but their role was unacknowledged. In a lot of modern sculpture, however, the attention has widened, and the spatial elements have started to come out as dominant. Spatial sculpture is now a commonly acknowledged field of the art form.

It was also taken for granted in sculpture from the past that its components were of a constant shape and size and, with the exception of items such as Augustus Saint-Gaudens’s Diana (a monumental weather vane), could not move. With contemporary development of kinetic sculpture, neither the immobility nor immutability of its elements can any longer be seen as fundamental to defining sculpture.

Last, sculpture since the 20th century has not been limited to the two traditional forming procedures of carving and modeling, or to the traditional natural materials like stone, metal, wood, ivory, bone, and clay. Now that modern sculptors might use any materials and methods of manufacture that can be used, the art of sculpture can no longer be identified by any particular materials or techniques.

Throughout all these changes, there is probably still one thing that stays constant in sculpture, and it emerges as the central abiding concern of sculptors: the art form is a branch of the visual arts that is especially concerned with the creation of works in three dimensions.

Sculpture can be either in the round or in relief. A sculpture in the round consists of a separate, detached piece in its own right, possessing an independent existence in reality as a human body or a chair. A sculpture that is in relief does not have this independance. It is attached to and projects from or is an innate part of an object that can serve either as a background to it or a matrix from whence it projects.

The actual three-dimensionality of sculpture in the round puts restrictions on its scope in certain respects when compared with the scope of painting. Sculpture cannot have the illusion of space by purely optical means, or invest its forms with atmosphere and light as we see in painting. However, sculpture does proffer a reality, a vivid physical presence that simply cannot be found in the pictorial arts. The forms of sculpture are tangible as well as visible, and may appeal strongly and directly to the tactile and visual sense. Even the visually impaired, even those who are congenitally blind, can produce and appreciate different pieces of sculpture. It was, in fact, debated by the 20th-century art critic Sir Herbert Read that sculpture should be considered as primarily an art of touch and that the originating roots of sculptural art can be traced to the pleasure that we experience in touching things.

All 3-D forms are perceived as possessing an expressive character along with their solely geometric properties. They are viewed the observer as delicate, aggressive, flowing, taut, relaxed, dynamic, soft, and more. By exploiting the evocative qualities of form, the artist is able to create visual imagery in which subject matter and expressiveness of form are mutually reinforcing. This visual imagery will go beyond the mere presentation of fact and communicate a near endless range of subtle and powerful feelings.

The aesthetic raw material used in the art of sculpture is, so to speak, the whole realm of expressive 3D form. A sculpture may draw upon what we see that exists in the endless variety of natural and man-made form, or it might be an art of simple invention. It has been utilised to express a wide range of human emotions and feelings from the subtly tender and delicate to the most violent and ecstatic.

All human beings, intimately involved from birth with the world of 3-D form, learn something of its structural and expressive properties and will possess emotional responses to them. This combination of understanding and sensitive reaction, called a sense of form, is able to be cultivated and refined. It is to the sense of form that this art of sculpture primarily appeals.

For art supplies Brisbane, including canvas art supplies and artists supplies, visit or call the Discount Art Warehouse. Become a member for free and get 10% discount on future purchases.

In the advertising industry the persuasiveness of an advert is measured by:- How many people it targets, how many times they see it, do they relate to it?, do they recall what it was selling?, and most essentially, will it influence them to buy?

We cannot think of any other sort of advertising that is as good as promotional products at delivering you exposure to customers and generating goodwill that leads to sales.

Consider these examples:-

1. A low cost item like a promotional fridge magnet, custom notepad or promotional drink bottle will give your company an abundance of repeat advertising exposure to your customer. Your logo/message (or perhaps something as simple as your telephone number) will always be at hand - they will not have to use the Yellow Pages to find your (and your competitors) details.

2. Being given a mid priced item like a promotional desk clock, a branded mousemat or a logo printed coffee mug will show your existing customers that you appreciate them, they will thank you for it, which in turn will formulate goodwill towards you and your business. Furthermore it will give years of daily exposure to your logo/message. The cost of pre exposure (to your message) will be miniscule.

3. Top clients and staff are essential to our business and they will be to yours too. Studies have shown that happy staff are productive staff and you will know how much business, say, your top twenty five customers provide. A $30 thank you gift will represent less than 1/1000 of most employees yearly pay!

It might a smaller fraction of a contract you are tendering for or the annual sales volume of clients. Some of the most successful companies we know are not huge payers but place importance on staff contentment and showing them they are appreciated - they often use Corporate Gifts. Simply acknowledging someone and telling them they are wonderful is good but the act of giving is a lot more powerful.

What are Promotional Products?

Promotional Products are gifts that can be decorated with a clients name, logo or message on them. The industry is rapidly growing and has a value of $3.0 billion p.a. in Australia. Marketers need to brand their organisation, product, or service is the reason why they use Promotion Product’s items and services.

Many other media options are available - newspaper, radio, and direct mail to name a few - these however do not offer the accountability offered by Promotional Product Marketing. Promotional Products succeed, as not only do they present your message but your client will thank you for them.

Consider the benefits of Promotional Product Marketing outlined below:

Targeted - Promotional Products only convey your message to the people you are interested in. No non-prospects, no wasted circulation.

Longevity - A well made Promotional Product will be around for years and is used on a daily basis by your client. No other media presents as much exposure.

Versatility - There are so many applications for Promotional Products Marketing that a listing of them would look like the Sydney telephone directory.

Budget Flexible - From a few cents to hundreds of dollars Promotion Products has products to fulfill your personal communication objectives.

Obligation - Good business is based on relationships Promotional Products to customers strengthens these relationships and creates an obligation towards doing business with you and your organisation.

Functional - The Promotional Products we offer are useful ensuring that your client will use the gift and be exposed to your message on a daily basis.

Promotion Products is a Brisbane based company that supplies promotional products such as promotional drink bottles and custom notepads and much, much more, call us on 1300 303 717 at anytime.

Some form of marriage has been known to exist in all human societies, past and present. Its importance can be seen in the ornate and intricate laws and rituals surrounding it. Although these laws and rituals are as different and copious as human social and cultural organizations, some universals do apply.

The central legal function of marriage is to ensure the rights of the partners with respect to each other and to assure the rights and define the relationships of children within a community. Marriage has empirically conferred a legal status on the offspring, which entitled him or her to the various privileges set down by the culture of that community, including the right of inheritance. In most societies marriage also allowed the permissible social relations allowed to the offspring, including the sufficient selection of future spouses.

Until the late 20th century, marriage was rarely a matter of free choice. In Western societies love between partners came to be associated with marriage, but even in Western cultures (as the novels of writers such as Henry James and Edith Wharton attest) romantic love was not the chief motive for matrimony in the majority of eras, and one’s marriage partner was carefully chosen.

Endogamy, the practice of marrying someone from within one’s own tribe or group, is the oldest social regulation of marriage. When the methods of communication with outside groups are limited, endogamous marriage is a natural result. Cultural influences to partner within one’s social, economic, and ethnic group are still very strongly regulated in some societies.

Exogamy, the routineof marrying outside the group, is prevalent in societies in which kinship partnerships are the most complex, thus excluding from marriage large groups who may trace their lineage to a common ancestry.

In societies in which the large, or extended, family structure remains the basic unit, marriages are usually arranged by the family. The assumption is that love between the partners occurs after marriage, and much thought is given to the socioeconomic advantages given to the larger family from the match. By contrast, in societies in which the small, or nuclear, family predominates, young adults usually choose their own partners. It is assumed that love precedes (and determines) marriage, and less thought is normally given to the socioeconomic aspects of the match.

In societies with arranged marriages, the overwhelming custom is that a person acts as an intermediary, or matchmaker. This person’s dominantresponsibility is to arrange a marriage that will be satisfactory to the two families represented. Usually a form of dowry or bridewealth is usually exchanged in societies that favour arranged marriages.

In societies in which individuals choose their own mates, dating is the usual way for people to meet and become acquainted with prospective partners. Successful dating may result in courtship, which then usually leads to marriage.

Marriage rituals
The rituals and ceremonies for marriage in most cultures are associated primarily with fertility and confirm the distinction of marriage for the continuation of a clan, people, or society. They also assert a familial or communal sanction of the mutual choice and a comprehension of the difficulties and sacrifices involved in making what is considered, in most cases, to be a lifelong commitment to and responsibility for the welfare of spouse and children.

Marriage ceremonies include symbolic rites, often sanctified by a religious order, which are thought to confer good fortune on the couple. Because economic considerations play a crucial role in the fruition of child rearing, the offering of gifts, both real and symbolic, to the married couple are a important part of the marriage ritual. Where the exchange of prevents is extensive, either from the bride’s family to the bridegroom’s or vice versa, this usually signifies that the ability to choose one’s marital partner has been restricted and announced by the families of the betrothed.

Fertility rites intended to ensure a fruitful marriage exist in some form in all ceremonies. Some of the oldest rituals still to appear in contemporary ceremonies include the conspicuous display of fruits or of cereal grains that may be sprinkled over the couple or on their nuptial bed, the companionship of a small child with the bride, and the smashing of an object or food to cultivate a successful consummation of the marriage and an easy childbirth.

The most universal ritual is one that symbolizes a sacred union. This may be asserted by the joining of hands, an exchange of rings or chains, or the tying of garments. However, all the elements in marriage rituals differ greatly among different societies, and components such as time, place, and the social importance of the event are established by tradition and habit.

These ceremonies are, to a certain extent, formed by the religious beliefs and practices found in societies throughout the world. In the Hindu tradition, for example, weddings are highly elaborate affairs, involving several prescribed rituals. Marriages are generally arranged by the parents of the couple, and the date of the ceremony is determined by careful astrological calculations. Among the majority of Buddhists marriage remains chiefly a secular affair, even though the Buddha offered guidelines for the responsibilities of lay householders.

In Judaism marriage is thought to have been instituted by God and is described as making the individual complete. Marriage involves a double ceremony, which includes the formal betrothal and wedding rites (prior to the 12th century the two were separated by as much as one year). The modern ceremony opens with the groom signing the marriage contract before a group of witnesses. He is then led to the bride’s room, where he places a veil on her. This is followed by the ceremony under the huppa (a canopy that symbolizes the bridal bower), which includes the reading of the marriage contract, the seven marriage benedictions, the groom’s placing a ring on the bride’s finger (in Conservative and Reform traditions the double ring ceremony has been introduced), and, in most communities, the crushing of a glass under foot. After the ceremony the couple is led into a private room for seclusion, which symbolizes the consummation of the marriage.

From its origins, Christianity has emphasized the spiritual nature and indissolubility of marriage. Jesus Christ spoke of marriage as being instituted by God, and the majority Christians consider it a permanent union based upon mutual consent. Some Christian churches count marriage as one of the sacraments, and other Christians confirm the sanctity of marriage but don’t consider it as a sacrament. Since the Middle Ages, Christian weddings have taken place before a priest or minister, and the ceremony involves the exchange of vows, readings from Scripture, a blessing, and, sometimes, the eucharistic rite.

In Islam marriage is not strictly a sacrament but is always understood as a gift from God or a kind of service to God. The basic Islamic tenets concerning marriage are written in the Qur’an, which states that the marital bond rests on “mutual love and mercy,” and that spouses are “each other’s garments.” Muslim men are allowed to have up to four wives at one time (though they seldom do), but the wives must all be treated equitably. Marriages are traditionally contracted by the father or guardian of the bride and her intended husband, who must offer his bride the mahr, a payment offered as a gift to guarantee her financial independence.

If you are looking for a Cairns wedding celebrant, a wedding celebrant in Cairns or a Cairns civil celebrant, contact Del at sharingandcaringcairns.com.au