Remembering

Listening to Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu in my new studio space, while the summer rain drizzles outside my window, and remembering travelling through Central Australia hearing this extraordinary voice - beautiful voice and beautiful memories!

No excuse for some work now!!

Central Australia

A few images from Alice Springs to Ayers Rock and Kings Canyon – I have been challenged by one of my daughters to show her only my BEST 10 PHOTOS when I get home – this is out of around 3000 that I have taken during the last 3 months of my rambles! So I will eventually be posting the ones I’ve chosen but it will take me several weeks to sort through them!

Meantime here are a few images from the last couple of weeks in the heart of Australia (you can click on the image to enlarge them) – It is truly magnificent country and I hope to return one day to ramble further north in Broome, Darwin and Cairns – so much to see here and the distances are huge!

First stop from Alice Springs was the Camel Farm!

I was getting excited but NO it’s not Ayers Rock/Uluru but Mount Conner. It’s a long and lonely road – just under 500 kilometres!

Sunset at Uluru – I took a series of about 30 photos while the sun was setting!

It’s a very spiritual place and difficult to do it justice with photographs

Around the base walk of the rock I came across this marvellous piece of burn wood! I thought it was a sculpture at first but it was completely natural.

The Olgas or Kata Tjuta (the aborginal name) are every bit as awe inspiring as Uluru

Finally a 6 kilometre walk around the rim of Kings Canyon – this is where they filmed the final desert scene in the movie ‘Priscilla Queen of the Desert’ – and yes I climbed all those steps and stood on the top shouting into the canyon below – a fantastic echo!

Now I’m back in Sydney for my last few days here in Australia – I fly back to the UK on Monday – I’m really looking forward to being back home again now!

From Alice Springs to the Western MacDonald range and gorges

I continue to be fascinated with the trees and rocks in Australia and they just seem to get more magnificent  each place I visit – on the advice of my Melbourne friend Kate I took this trip out to the Western MacDonald ranges and here are some of the images I took – i have had no time to edit the photographs in anyway so they are straight from the camera. This is where I was heading

the first stop was at Simpson’s gap – a waterhole several kilometres out of Alice Springs then on to Stanley Chasm

Yes the sky is really this blue!

Tree bark- the river gum tree

The ochre pits below are a sacred Aboriginal site where they obtain the red, yellow and white pigments for skin decoration – the pigments are mixed with fat to intensify the colour.

I love the way the pure white bark of this tree protrudes from the red rock face

Heavy rains a few weeks ago have caused the waterholes to be unusually full and rivers to flow – a rare event in this part of the world! This is Glen Helen Gorge below.

And finally some tree images of course!

Can you believe the bark on this tree – I thought it looked clothed!

From TREES to ROCKS!

I’m just back from Wilson’s Prom

and a Night photography and Light painting workshop with Lloyd Godman of Baldessin Press – we camped for 4 days and I must say I was very glad to get back to a comfy bed last night! No wombats searching for a morsel or other delightful species of Australian wildlife wanting to share my tent!

I have had fun with my camera and here are a few of the images that I picked for the show and tell at the end of the workshop! (You can click on the image to see a larger version)

All the photography took place at sunrise (yes we had to get up at 5.30am!) or at dusk - it was the full moon and we went off down to Squeaky Beach see above 2nd image (yes the sand squeaks underfoot hence the original name!) to do the light painting – it was very experimental and I only came out with a couple of worthwhile images but I loved the process and will definitely be out there (wherever I am) at night with my torch and camera! (keeping the mossies company and providing them with food!!!!). It does help if it's full moon as you can see what you're doing!!

If you want to try this it is pretty simple but you need a tripod and a camera that lets you set the exposure to at least 15secs and preferably much longer – my camera lets me go to 30 secs and I managed to get some interesting results – you then set the self timer pick up your torch and run around in front of the camera making a drawing with your torch –

As I said it’s all very experimental and you never know what kind of result you’ll get – here someone was running along the side of the river with a torch

you can also use a torch and coloured gels to paint areas of the scene in front of you as in this one – as you can see I’ve got a lot of practising to do!

the last ingredient is a beautiful place because if all fails it is just wonderful to be out in the wild!

if anything about this process doesn’t make sense then please ask me anything you want to know and if you are in Australia then I highly recommend Lloyd’s workshop - go HERE for info

Tomorrow I’m looking forward to meeting up with Jo from Mystory – we are going to visit the TarraWarra Museum of Art together

Australian trees

I have been rather obsessed by the trees over here and these are just a few of the MANY photographs I have taken

 

  

the last photo of a Scribbley Gum tree is a taster of what is to come ………soon!