where the land rolls endlessly and the sunsets dream on.
WIndmills, these are staple item across the plains of outback Australia, in this case NSW and boy, do they make great photographic subjects 🙂
Exif love:
D750 coupled with Nikkor 24-70 f2.8 @ 48mm Aperture: f/7.1 and Shutter Speed: 30s
ISO 100
out front – couple of tanks and a windmill.
the silence of silence
the silence of silence
Communication when there is is silence can be more effective than spoken words. Its what is not said that is often what is the most important.
Sunsets in the country are quite a different beast, especially when the landscape is quite flat, one moment the world is bathed in golden light then the next its a pastel wonderland, followed by a inky blackness devoid of cultural lighting (thats not a bad thing either 🙂 ). In the summer months by the sea sunrise is quite prolonged, or at least it feels that way, giving one the opportunity to take in different compositions and savour the moment, in alot of way I prefer the fast setting sun, it forces one to really focus on the task at hand, a skill that should be used across the board in life 😉 (says he who just sat and procrastinated in from of the TV with a pizza;) )
Cheers to +David Brodrick for being my chauffeur the night before allowing me to scope out some of these locations.
I had pulled up here on the dirt road after spotting this lonely tree standing amongst the bean plants and it was just about the perfect tree, it could have grown on the top of the hill, however lets not complain too much 😉 As i got out of the car there was no movement save for several kangaroos off in the distance getting a free feed on the beans, the silence was pretty well deafening, except for the calls of a small birds it was like being in a empty music / radio studio.
So after a trek up into the field across some snake infested thigh high grass, i set up and watched the sun go down over horizon off to the right, out here, crouched in the bean plants…..
…. the world seemed to be a better place.
Vivid Sydney from blues point
To be able to see the bridge pin-striping as part of Vivid Sydney you have to get on the western side of the bridge to be able to get full appreciation of it. Blues point is pretty perfect and on this particular night it was low tide and the few rocks were showing, the lights on the bridge are actually pretty darn bright, hence the intense reflection on the water. The pin striping does all kind of funky animations but i really just like the solid blocks of colour.
This image was taken down on the sand and I used a little LED torch to illuminate the otherwise dark and shadowed rock. Its a couple of images manually blended together, there is quite a huge dynamic range with the bright lights from Luna Park and also the bridge.
Techie love:
D750 coupled with Samyang 14mm f2.8 @ 14mm Aperture: f/4 and Shutter Speed: 1/30s (overexpose) 13s (normal exposure) & 5s (under expose)
ISO 100
out front – a very vivid rock
and of course the obligatory gif animation of the Sydney Opera House Vivid festival projections.
Exif love:
D750 coupled with Nikkor 24-70 f2.8 @ 14mm Aperture: f/3.2 and Shutter Speed: 1/4s
ISO 1000
out front – colourful opera house.
I know what I am getting for christmas…. a smoke machine! The artwork of the dome is very cool, however this sculpture attracted kids like cake at a birthday party, they just could not get enough of it! from peering into the dome thru the smoke to running around like crazy chooks in the wafting smoke as it dissipated into the night.
I had promised Chaos I would take her to see some vivid lights this year, but there was no way I was repeating the experience from a few years back taking her into the city, that was mildly epic (and that was just getting in there). Sydney uni however was the perfect venue for little kids, plenty of space, lots of other kids and most importantly, manageable crowds, plenty of accessible food and drink too (albeit at inflated prices ).
Anyway, chaos loved the Mirador dome and made plenty of friends whilst there, tickles on the other had was much more reserved and found running off into the dark much more fun :-/
a rare moment with no one else in the view 🙂
Exif love:
D750 coupled with Nikkor 24-70 f2.8 @ 42mm Aperture: f/3.2 and Shutter Speed: 1/500s
ISO 1000 (methinks I could have dialed this down a bit lol )
out front – chaos vs the dome!
Are tired of vivid shots yet ? well you have another week of it until it all gets wrapped up but I am sure the images will still flow long after that 🙂
The Sydney Opera House is probably the most premium location and canvas for the Vivid festival, its seen by millions (thats just my guess without any real data 🙂 – but considering how many see it just in their daily commute i reckon its gotta be in that realm) so you wanna get it right.
I was not overly enthused by the display this year, very animated and not many wow moments. I did however do a bit of research on these mad projectors (Barco) which project the images / animations onto the sails, pretty cool things, the lens must be something pretty special and the bulbs that sit behind them… wowsers, however I did note that the bulbs have a life of 500 hours which i pretty good i reckon, you could do quite a few vivid sessions on a set of bulbs 😉 although you do have quite a few projectors for just one location :-O
The following images are a selection of some of the better projections imo 🙂 I did love the big bold colours as opposed to the funny animations 😉 Be sure to zoom in, its large res just for that 🙂
Exif love:
D750 coupled with Nikkor 24-70 f2.8 @ 62mm Aperture: f/3.2 and Shutter Speed: 1/4s
ISO 1000
out front – colourful opera house.
watch out for the giant the hand
those paying attention would have noticed that this feature, dubbed Mirador, is a repeat from the Sculptures by the sea a few years back ( )
Check it out here : https://plus.google.com/+GerardBlacklock/posts/g6PDoARQetK
Designed by University architecture graduates Ivana Kuzmonovska and Rachel Couper. Each part was modelled in Rhino 3D – just for all you CAD junkies out there 😉
Exif love:
D750 coupled with Samyang 14mm f2.8 @ 14mm Aperture: f/16 and Shutter Speed: 2.5s
ISO 100
out front – crazy alien dome
gif-a-holics unite
Be patient with this one, its a pretty large file and over 200 frames, but I reckon its worth the wait 🙂 – I think this is probably the best set of projections for the festival, the combination of the building and also the length/diversity of the projection really made it standout.
Alot of it is themed around Aboriginal Reconciliation with some great imagery themed around Aboriginal culture – and there is some really cool classic building crumbling style projections here too.
Its pretty amazing how a just a bunch of different coloured lights can change the way something looks.
Many years ago I walked through that arch after graduating, never would have guessed it would have ever looked like this 🙂
Zoom in to check out the details and standby for some gif-age
gif overlord overload
MCA Colour
more gifage
Somebody put some tigers in the Argyle Arch…. then all these people came down to have a look 🙂
Luckily the projection sequence is relatively short because I tell ya what you get pretty cold sitting on road looking up at this!
h/t to +Samyang UK – UK Digital and the Samyang 14mm f/2.8 lens, this is one stellar little lens – even shooting at f2.8 and taking a educated punt on the manual focus results in pretty sweet results. This thing craps all over my Nikkor 16-35 f4 lens, even looking at low res files between the two lens the results are quite apparent.
My only regret is not getting it sooner …
Techie love:
D750 coupled with Samyang 14mm f2.8 @ 14mm Aperture: f/2.8 and Shutter Speed: 1/15s
ISO 1600
out front – some happy couple 😉
tickles looking after the little stuff for us 🙂 hopefully big things will grow 🙂
Damn street light shadows make me look like I got man boobs.. ahhh wait.. dammit…
I had to do something to amuse myself while waiting around, this light sculpture seemed fitting and also the moon phase actually changed quite regularly…
Exif love:
D750 coupled with Samyang 14mm f2.8 @ 14mm Aperture: f/5 and Shutter Speed: 1/6s
ISO 200
out front – some clown in a hoodie 🙂