Burning Botany – (C) 2019 Gerard Blacklock, all rights reserved
The older I get the less I know and the more questions I have. There is a airport over there on the other side of the bay. Pretty bizarre to watch aircraft appearing and disappearing in the smoke haze..
The older I get the less I know and the more questions I have.
There is a airport over there on the other side of the bay. Pretty bizarre to watch aircraft appearing and disappearing in the smoke haze..
the underside
The many breakwalls placed in Botany bay to try and prevent sand shift and loss create a strange view but also do create neat photo ops and also handy fishing outcrops for those so interested in catching fish 🙂
At low tide you can see all the cool little sea creatures that have also turned up to make the basalt boulder wall their home, unfortunately its also slippery as a freshly greased bearing so one must take care not to slip over.
This image is a kind of panorama, i took one image for the foreground at an exposure to get the detail in the rocks and another exposure captured for the sky in particular to maintain the highlights on the clouds. I was too lazy to bother bracketing each one 🙂 and the post processing was as simple as stitching the two together and some manual blending to get the exposure correct between the images.
D750 coupled with Nikkor16-35 f4 @ 20mm Aperture: f16 and Shutter Speed: 1/3s and 6s (or thereabouts) for the foreground
ISO: 100
Out front: Lee Graduated Filter 0.9x and Hoya CPL.
Ya gotta love kids.. well most of the time anyways.. as tickles refused to go to sleep and insisted on watching me look at photos said, ‘you like taking photos’? i said ‘yup’ to which she replied ‘they are really nice dad’. 🙂 might have had something to do with the fact that I previously said I would let her sleep with her jelly-straw (Japanese semi frozen sweet), she did not want to eat it.. just go to sleep with it 🙂 whateva works for ya I reckon, just go to sleep 🙂
Somebody went and whacked a bunch of nets on my lovely isolated, minimal poles 🙁 oh well, on the bright side, you can now swim here without the fear of being chomped by a narky sharky.
Exif love:
D750 coupled with Nikkor 16-35 mm f4 @ 20mm Aperture: f13 and Shutter Speed: 272.4 seconds
ISO 100
Out front – LEE GND (0.6x) and Lee Bigstopper and Hoya CPL.
Botany Bay
I think I broke every rule here 🙂 central composition… disobeyed rule of thirds … man i am a rebel 😉
Its actually a 2 shot vertical panorama, I wanted that tall slim orientation (a bit like me 😉 ) with alittle beach, some nice turquoise water and the fog/rain clouds overhead…
Exif love:
D750 coupled with Nikkor 24-70 mm f2.8 @ 24mm Aperture: f14 and Shutter Speed: 111.1s
ISO 100
Out front – no filters, the storm clouds were my graduated ND and the grey overcast pre sunrise dullness was my ND
Let the storm rage on
For those in the know, or should i just say, if you have a child around the age of 6, then these words would be pretty familiar. Its a excerpt from the song "Let it Go" in the Disney's animated movie Frozen.
I hear this song about.. 15 times a day now, so i pretty well know the lyrics off by heart 😉 But, I gotta say, I can't get it out of my head now, those chaps and ladies at Disney who write these things have a lot to answer for , damn catchy tunes which just stick in your head. Next I will be doing the movements!
Anyway, i found the words seemed to fit with this image, originally starting life as a 6 shot panorama it was then cropped down to get to the view you now see and mixed with a little bit of gerry's special sauce processing and voilà there you have it. The little nav aid standing out there, just where it will stay, while teh storm (or fog) rages on 😉
Exif love:
D750 coupled with Nikkor 24-70mm f4 @ 24mm Aperture: f18 and Shutter Speed: s
ISO 100
Out front – Lee Graduated Filter 0.6x
Probably not the best to compare a bunch of poles in the bay with ones family, however when I took it, i had them in mind 😉
On the left we have my wonderful partner in crime, in da middle is chaos and on the right tickles aka mayhem.
I really gotta break this minimalist phase.. every where i look at the moment everything seems.. cluttered 🙂 my new challenge is to portray clutter with a sense of minimalism 😉 now thats a task worth tackling 🙂
Originally a 4 shot panorama, the images cropped down to about 3 landscape orientation images to get the right positioning of the poles within the frame, oh btw, the rule of third gods will be pleased with me 😉
Exif love:
D750 coupled with Nikkor 24-70mm f2.8 @ 48mm Aperture: f18 and Shutter Speed: 3s
ISO 100
Out front – nada…
+Landscape Photography +Margaret Tompkins +Tony Phillips +Dave Gaylord +Doug Hagadorn +Eric Drumm +Jeff Beddow +David D
D750 coupled with Nikkor 16-35mm f4 @ 16mm Aperture: f14 and Shutter Speed: 247.7s
ISO 100
Out front – Lee Graduated Filter 0.6x and Lee Bigstopper
Life throws alot of things at you, some good, some bad.. in the absence of any useful advice, persevere is the only course of action…well thats what I reckon anyway 😉
Cruising down the parade at Sans Souci on the edge of Botany bay things seemed pretty dire from the photographic perspective; the clouds were heavy, rain was falling and sandy shore and picnic areas were littered with rubbish providing that extra incentive to drive on..
However in the face of crap-ville (photographically speaking, Sans Souci is not really that bad 😉 ) I pulled up at the carpark that I had found on google maps just near the ruins of a old sea pool / shark net..damn i love google maps, its like a treasure trove of stuff that when viewed from a dinky little satellite could be either nothing or something, in any case, without the maps i would not be there 🙂
I donned the rain coat and whacked my camera rain cover (code for plastic ziplock bag and rubber band) on and headed out into the rain. The location is actually pretty cool, fitting well with my minimalist phase 🙂 there are a number of old poles which previously held some kind of shark net which just make for awesome subjects.
I forgot my freaking polariser which would have helped a bit in this scene, but, one must deal with these kind things…
Single shot, long exposure, the rain cloud had just passed and engulfed the opening of Botany Bay, i took a test shot, of 3 minutes, in which time a small wave sunk my tripod, so this was the second take on the shot
Exif love:
D750 coupled with Nikkor 16-35mm f4 @ 16mm Aperture: f14 and Shutter Speed: 247.7s
ISO 100
Out front – Lee Graduated Filter 0.6x and Lee Bigstopper
Dreamin' of Iceland
Over the years I have always dreamed of visiting Iceland, such a interesting place, did you know they are the only country to import Breastmilk (from Denmark or thereabouts from memory) ? well thats not quite the reason for me wanting to visit but hey, still a fun fact.
I actually now think rather than visiting Iceland I would rather visit somewhere like sweden or Norway, purely based on the fact they seem to be less represented in the photographic tour departments 😉
If I see another image of Gullfloss (or what ever it is) i think I am gonna barf, even if it is brilliant (which most are) 🙂
So on that note, i have dedicated this image to me moving past my desire to visit Iceland (ok there might be the other 10K price tag factor too but….), hence I'll be happy with Sydney for the moment 😉
Now this location is the unique Botany bay, the site of first white invasion in the country (yeah i know that'll rile some people up but relax, its history, deal with it 🙂 ) But what I do like about it, beside being fairly local to me, is there are lots of cool locations, from the airport (for those plane nuts), to mangroves, to Bare Island, to industrial, something for everyone I say 🙂 So.. at the crack of dawn I wandered down and was greeted by a local who said as he jogged away on his morning fitness run;
'ya picked a good one mate, its gonna light up nicely today'
So i found myself a nice little spot with my toes in the water, not really by choice, but I really wanted this composition which meant wet feet 🙂 and.. waited for the promised colour. The dude was not wrong either, it turned out nice and I was outta there as the sun peaked over the horizon and home in time for pancakes with the girls. Nicely played I say 😉
This is a 3 image blend (+Adobe Photoshop ) one for the foreground (+2EV), one for the hot stuff in the middle (-2EV) and one for the rest (0EV)
Exif love:
D750 coupled with 16-35mm f4 @ 16mm Aperture: f/16 and Shutter Speed: 15s (0EV) 4s (-2EV) and 30s (+2EV)
ISO 100
out front – Hoya CPL, Lee Graduated 0.9 Filter
Towra Point v2
Rarely do I revisit a location twice in the space of a couple of weeks, however I really wanted to check out this place at high tide, thus it called me for another quick visit and the tidal times worked out nicely – it did however result in very wet feet since the only way to get there was to wade thru calf deep water – alittle disconcerting when its dark and navigating by torchlight. I even walked right past my little subject tree since i did not recognise it with all the water around!
The previous shot of a similar composition is here : https://plus.google.com/100975265940134223422/posts/GQxovkJ7CzR
Single frame
Exif/setup data:
D7000 coupled with Tokina 11-16mm f2.8 @ 11.5mm Aperture: f/8 and Shutter Speed: 297.1s
out front – LEE Bigstopper, LEE graduated filter 0.9 and screw in circular polariser
As always, I welcome any suggestions, comments and improvements to my photography, they are always warmly welcomed.
Just like where there is a light side, there is a dark and cold side – where there is smoothness, roughness is nearby.
There was difficulty tracking down a interesting foreground to match the sky here, however, one must always make do with what is there – watch for the next one with a dinky little oyster, high and dry 🙂
Exif/setup data:
D7000 coupled with Nikkor 17-55mm f2.8 @ 17mm Aperture: f/8 and Shutter Speed: 248.3s
out front – LEE Bigstopper, LEE graduated filter 0.9 and screw in circular polariser
As always, I welcome any suggestions, comments and improvements to my photography, they are always warmly welcomed.
Towra Nature Reserve – home of the Little Tern bird
This point has been reamed by humans, from attempted grazing, corn crops, to a radar station to oyster farming and finally recognized as a significant wetlands of the Sydney Basin with a little island now home to a thriving population of Little Terns 🙂 and the occasional pelican.
3 shot landscape orientation panorama.
Techie data:
D7000 with Nikkor 135mm f2 @ 135mm Aperture: f/11 Shutter 1/90 seconds
panorama
I welcome any suggestions, comments and improvements to my photography, they are always warmly welcomed and always appreciate the time people take to have a look, plus and/or comment.
Artist license is something every tog uses, whether it simply be the way a image is framed or the way it is processed, images can and do lie 🙂 – this one is no exception, this spot on the East side of Botany bay is probably the only spot I have seen that is not strewn with washed up bottles, rubbish and general crap, just the other morning I was standing in a spot several kilometers to the south of here and all around me on the shoreline was all manner of rubbish – and that was in the Nature Reserve section of the Bay 🙂 So, this is not really a true representation of the true nature of Botany Bay.
However, I have chosen to try and portray this particular composition as something one would see at Jervis bay, a place which I wish I could visit more often 🙂 For those not familiar with Jervis Bay, it does apparently have some of the white-ist sand in Aussie land and whilst a bit full of old naval junk it is pretty clean 😉
So here you have it, Botany Bay, from Kurnell, the city lights and new shipping terminal just in sight on the horizon.
4 shot landscape orientation panorama.
Techie data:
D7000 with Nikkor 17-55 mm f2.8 @ 17mm Aperture: f/8 Shutter 2 seconds
LEE Graduated Filter out front.
panorama
I welcome any suggestions, comments and improvements to my photography, they are always warmly welcomed and always appreciate the time people take to have a look, plus and/or comment.
Not much out there in Botany Bay to really fill the foreground to complete a shot, however on several of the little headlands (essentially man made due to the breakwalls) there some nice grass knolls. There was also some nice colour developing out on the left.
Was a tad unexposed really needed about twice the shutter time, but was running outta time fast!
Exif/setup data:
D7000 coupled with Tokina 11-16mm f2.8 @911mm Aperture: f/9.5 and Shutter Speed: 84s
out front – LEE Bigstopper, LEE graduated filter 0.9 and screw in circular polariser
As always, I welcome any suggestions, comments and improvements to my photography, they are always warmly welcomed.
A large rain cloud sneaked over Botany this morning, spreading like a cancer snuffing all light and warmth that was meant to be..sunrise.
Single image – triggered using a Phottix Aion wireless remote, these things are great for this kind of thing, heaps of range and pretty consist, works thru the pocket too 🙂
techie love:
D7000 coupled with Tokina 11-16mm f2.8 @ Aperture: f/13 and Shutter Speed: 1.5s
out front – LEE Graduated Filter (0.9)