Tag Archives: grass

10/11/2012
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Articles, Image Sets

Off to The Emerald City

Somewhere Over The Rainbow, Bluebirds fly. Birds fly Over The Rainbow. Why then, oh why can’t I? If happy little Bluebirds fly beyond the rainbow, why oh why cant I? – Dorothy

883km North West of Brisbane lies the town of Emerald. With a population of around 15000 it services a large area consisting of two main industries, farming and mining. As of January, this 133 year old town will be my new base of operations for at least the next three years. One of the many things I’m excited about are the new photographic opportunities that this new area will present! A lot more nature, macro, star trails and wildlife will be coming the blogs way next year.

In September this year we took a few days to fly up and have a good look around… our yellow brick road began at Brisbane Airport not long after sunrise.

Quick shot from airport parking before heading off.

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31/10/2012
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Guns of Brisbane

Fort Lytton was built in 1880 and operational until the 1950′s. It was commissioned in response to aggressive Russian expansion in the 1870′s. It’s position at the narrowest part of the mouth of the Brisbane River put it in good stead to defend against a Naval attack. Although the guns were never fired in anger, during the Boer and the World Wars, thousands of troops were trained there.

Disappearing carriage artillery, anti-air defenses, a fortress and associated buildings are still there, a great weekend visit (open Sundays) with firings of ‘Marc’ and ‘Antony’. There are also two museums with great historical displays. The land was set aside by the surrounding oil companies and funded to create a National Park in the late 1980′s. It’s an odd feeling having this wonderful historic park surrounded by heavy industrial oil equipment, but at least it wasn’t allowed to be consumed by development.

Enjoy

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15/10/2012
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Castles in the sand

Marcoola is an area around 120km north of Brisbane on the east coast of Australia. There is around 12km of beach front with a very minimal visual human footprint. Unlike the internationally well know Gold Coast (A.K.A Surfers Paradise), Marcoola takes the more laid back approach at beach life. I thought I’d share a couple of family snaps from a trip up there earlier this year.

Enjoy

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04/09/2012
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Image Sets

Short, but Sweet – Joe

With warmer weather during the day I have noticed a couple of flowers blooming in the back yard. I haven’t really had the opportunity to go out of late but on seeing these I couldn’t resist going out to take a few shots.

Joe

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29/07/2012
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Botanical Flowers – Part one

Following on from my last post Botanical Butterfly, here are some flora macro and HDR shots. Being winter there wasn’t a great deal of flowering plants, but we still managed to find some! (click for larger versions)

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17/07/2012
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Close up Clivia

The Clivia, Kaffir Lily, Bush Lily or Winter Lily is one of our favourite plants that we’ve been growing. They generally only flower in spring or winter, however ours has flowered almost constantly since we got it. I decided one day when there was a lovely group of flowers to grab the macro lens out and take some pics. Click for larger version and enjoy!

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31/05/2012
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Articles, Image Sets, Reviews

What time?

For disappearing acts, it’s hard to beat what happens to the eight hours supposedly left after eight of sleep and eight of work.  ~Doug Larson

Like many, it seems I’ve fallen victim to a robber of what is most precious to men (Napoleon I, Maxims, 1815) . Over the last four weeks I’ve had little time to enjoy my photography, and the only time I’ve used my camera was at other peoples behest (albeit still enjoyable). To maintain the spark of photographic interest I’ve been making full use of a tool that has divided professionals – my mobile phone. The ability to grab a shot, edit and distribute in seconds is brilliant, and you can see why it has some professionals in a flap. I’ve been in two minds about the whole ‘instagram’ ‘fad’, I see how it may be considered to diminish the efforts of professionals to get certain effects by a simple touch of a button… that said, it has allowed me to continue shooting while I have no time to do the ‘real’ stuff.

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25/04/2012
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New Zealand in 8 days – Part five

Whitianga: 6:30am and a quiet and timid voice says, “Alex, I think you need to look out the window… don’t be mad at me for waking you up”. I dragged myself out of bed and pulled back the blinds to be greeted with an amazing sunrise over a perfect seascape… grabbing my camera I headed out the door, then back again and grabbed some clothes…

I spent over an hour walking around barefoot in the sand dunes and ocean. It was the most peaceful and relaxed I had felt the whole trip. The beach was empty, air was clear and everything seemed right! Wherever I pointed the camera there was a great scene to be shot, this morning proved to be my favourite photography moment of the entire trip.

I hope you enjoy these photos, they recreate not even 1/10th of how it felt to be there! As always click for larger images.

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23/04/2012
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New Zealand in 8 days – Part four

In this, part four of our 8 day tour of the North Island of New Zealand, we covered some more of Rotorua and headed towards the Coromandel Peninsula to a small town called Whitianga.

Rotorua Museum, opened in 1908 as a bath house where various ‘cures’ were administered for a fee.

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18/04/2012
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Image Sets

Wintergarden Flowers – New Zealand

The Auckland Domain is a wonderful place to visit for someone interested in the horticultural arts, with lots of ponds, gardens, the Winter-garden Glasshouses and Fernz Fernery. The glasshouses were brilliant, one temperate and one tropical (heated) that included a Lilly pond. With my trusty Tamron 90mm 1:1, I crawled over every inch of the two houses inspecting the wonderful flowers… my companions showed great patience!

I’ve included quite a few photos in this post, but I feel they are all too amazing not to view! (the flowers, not the photos).

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