Bryce’s interests and work subjects gradually extended to the whole of Australia and world-wide, based on extensive travel, culminating with a honeymoon/world tour in 1985. He photographed weddings in many places, including one in Fiji.
To this point, his photography focused on earning a living, but he had always been interested in more creative work and experiments with a variety of artistic styles. Opportunities for this multiplied when in 1994 Bryce began lecturing at RMIT, a position he held for the next 24 years. Teaching became the key part of his career, but he still maintained his own practice, and in 2003 he added to his repertoire a publishing imprint, Ides Publishing, established with friend and colleague, Anne Monteith.
In the ensuing years, they published, through Ides, several books, including three large format titles on the Mornington Peninsula, with text by Anne and beautiful colour photos by Bryce. As Bryce got older, his wedding jobs declined for the perhaps unfair reason that people wanted younger, supposedly spunky photographers for their nuptials.
But as the weddings faded the book trade boomed, especially on the peninsula where one title for a while outsold The Da Vinci Code at the height of its fame. As they self-published and self-distributed, there was much travel involved, Bryce once going to China for supervising the production of a title. In 2015, Bryce published a similar large-format book on the Great Ocean Road, with pen portraits of towns and breathtaking photography.
By this time, Bryce had become well-known in photography circles, at RMIT and through a wide variety of contacts. He was renowned for his talents, dedication to his work, loyalty to his associates and his raconteur-like humour. He was always kind to those in need, being particularly so to brother Graham and niece Kiran following the tragic death of his sister-in-law, Jennifer Crawford, in 2000.
In 2017, Bryce was diagnosed with melanoma, Parkinson’s disease and respiratory problems which gave him poor health for the rest of his life. This forced him to retire from RMIT in 2018, though he remained socially active within limits, mostly staying home during the pandemic. Just before Christmas 2021 his health took a turn for the worse and he passed away on December 9. He had no children but is survived by various friends and family.
Dr Graham Dunkley is Bryce Dunkley’s brother.