City Bound Wilderness

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Its kinda hard to believe these spots still exist minutes from Sydney Harbour amongst the suburbs, as you walk into this place there are only a few tell tale signs that you are merely minutes away from a busy roads, upper class willoughby (ohh i'm gonna cop some flack for that 😉 they would reckon they are just middle class 😉 ) and sydney harbour. Alrightly the power lines across the top falls was a bit of a giveaway 🙂 the stormwater runoff and all the usual piles of plastic bottles another clue and the all too familiar sound of aircraft departing mascot continually remind me of where I really was.

There are a series of cut steps that lead right into the waterfall pool, at the upper falls and also the lower ones, so I can only imagine many years ago it may have been a popular swimming spot. Whilst waiting for old man Rodney to turn up I also found a old crusty one penny coin dislodged by all the rain, yup a 1936 copper coin .. very cool. However, Sarah's nan (86) did not think it was cool, after I told her she told me she has a whole jar of them apparently 🙁 talk about stealing me thunder 😉

I do love my panoramic views and this fern and the other green plant just screamed to be bookends for my picture of the jumbled mess of rocks and the trickle of water fighting for an escape route to the harbour.

I have cobbled together, with the help of Cameron K. Fong and Kudos Cameras a light weight pano kit which is serving me quite well, it can double as a single row kit or a multi row kit, its not super stiff, however thats a tradeoff for the 900 grams of weight. Its made from a few Leofoto components (PAN-02, BPL-200 (2 off), DDM-60) and a Desmond DVC-220 clamp. Its can handle a FX camera with a 24-70mm lens on it, its got a bit of wobble when going between click stops, however more than acceptable for the weight and price.

This shot was taken using just the single row parts, which are a single rail , panning clamp and DDM-60 discal clamp, this combo is rock solid and really compact, fits in my pocket and can also be left on the tripod for the majority of shots. Is it worth the effort, when you shoot these very close scenes at fairly wide angles (24mm) the parallax error is a real killer and whilst PS does a great job, the joy of seeing 5 images (in this case) just stitch seamlessly and with no need to warp it back into perspective saves time in front the computer 🙂

Our place feels like a chicken coop some days :) :)

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I gotta say Chaos has a rather uncanny knack of being able to catch animals and chickens are no exception, she can pretty well pick up every chicken and give it a cuddle in the space of 5 minutes, most importantly as well, without traumatising them 🙂 Tickles even gets in and has a go, she caught her first one the other day and I think she was more surprised than the chicken 🙂

The girls even got to have the eggs for breakfast the next morning, they got a much higher rating than the ones from the shop 🙂

The garden plot is going well too, you can see Chaos posing nicely in front of it with the selection of corn, capsicum, beans, sunflower and a whole bunch of other unknowns which they threw 🙂

In Album 16/03/2017

Sunrise

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Some images just fall out the computer, others need some real help, this is one such shot, well series of shots, its a 5 shot panorama with each frame bracketed to increase the dynamic range. Just about everything I did to it left it looking washer out, unnatural and generally just looking crap, thus I cut my losses and ended up with this version, not one I am still entirely happy with, however at least something to show for all the darn effort 🙂

I keen for your thoughts? bin it ? too warm, too cool ?

Dragon's Perch

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This small trail of rocks etched out of the sand at Collaroy reminded me of a kids fairy tale of a place where a dragon should be sitting, right out there on that rocky outcropping, ready to lunge and eat up any child who did not bring home their lunch containers… i'm looking at you here Chaos 🙂 . Scene is complete with greenish yellow dragon poo, aka seaweed 🙂

The overcast conditions and the 267s exposure time left the scene with a soft glow and completely removed that lady (who I would call crazy) swimming out in the murky seaweed infested water 🙂

D750 coupled with Nikkor 16-35 f4 @ 16mm Aperture: f11 and Shutter Speed: 267s
ISO: 100
Out front: Lee bigstopper, Lee 0.9x graduated filter and Hoya Circular Polariser

Wet Feet

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There comes a time when you stop dancing over the puddles and minimizing how wet your feet are and simply accept the fact that you are gonna have wet feet, wet shoes and wet socks.

Deep in the jungle of frenchs creek..

Buried

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I am getting quite the collection of Stormwater outflow pipes in Sydney, luckily for me there are barely 2 alike , although I would have thought a standardised design would have been much more cost effective..

Tvindefossen

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(Frenchies version)
get a load of this one full screen and find those leeches

Well, its the aussie version aways, Tvindefossen, which i am pretty sure means twin falls is midly epic waterfall in Voss, Norway – yep where the sparkling mineral water comes from – not 🙂 its actually comes from much further south in Norway, but clearly "Voss" said with the appropriate deep Norwegian accent sound a crapload better than the boring spot where the extraction and bottling plant is 🙂

Anyways, this set of falls in Sydney, with its distinct set of two falls reminded me…a tiny bit.. of Voss, also the home of extreme sports, thats another story for another day.

This is the second cascade in the water falls in Belrose on Frenchs creek, where the water quality is.. well a small step above first stage sewerage treatment level, it smelt bad, it mostly looked bad and somehow still, the leeches survive 🙁 I am gonna name these leeches the crotch searching leeches from hell. I am not overly perturbed by leeches, however these ones seemed to get on your legs and with their gaily little wobble make beeline for higher ground 🙁 much rather they just hang about the ankle and suck some blood …

This image is a bunch of vertical shots stitched into a panorama, the conditions where good, overcast, plenty of water and the company (Rodney Campbell) was bearable 😉 plus its better if someone can be there to at least listen to the continued stream of profanities about finding yet another leech.