Day 334 – Low At Sunset

December 4, 2012, 12:45 pm

Low tide and a very calm ocean let me explore some perspectives that I have not seen before. I spotted this little rock pool with the waves occasionally washing over into it, but only wish I did not make the mistake of having a leg of my tripod in the foreground, and having to crop it out. I guess it can be a problem when shooting really wide, but I am usually pretty careful with that one… I will be from now on that’s for sure!

Tagged: 10-22mm, Hungry Head, Low, Low Tide, Photography, Sunset, tide

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Day 335 – Tuckers Rocked

December 5, 2012, 1:02 pm

≫ Next: Day 336 – Flattened

≪ Previous: Day 334 – Low At Sunset

Capturing yesterdays sunset was quite enjoyable for me for some reason. Maybe it was just good to kick off my shoes and get out there in the water… It might have also had something to do with the spectacular colours from the smoke haze on the horizon.

Tagged: 10-22mm, Beach, Bushfires, Repton, Rocks, Smoke, Sunset, Tuckers Rock, Waves

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Day 336 – Flattened

December 10, 2012, 12:04 pm

≫ Next: Day 337 – King of Tides

≪ Previous: Day 335 – Tuckers Rocked

Ok, so I have a bit of a catch up to do from the last few days off.

The ocean has been incredibly flat around here lately, and I was after a way to emphasis this… enter my Lee Big Stopper. I took this long exposure (6 minutes) at sunset on a rather dull grey day, and even with such a long exposure, with the fading light it ended up being under exposed.

After increasing the exposure by almost 1 stop in post processing, there ended up being quite a bit of noise in the image… so hence the almost total lack of colour.

Tagged: 10-22mm, Korora, Lee Big Stopper, Long Exposure, Long-exposure photography, Photography

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Day 337 – King of Tides

December 12, 2012, 6:21 pm

≫ Next: Day 338 – Meabella Hair & Day Spa

≪ Previous: Day 336 – Flattened

King tide today along with a decent size swell (compared to lately that is) provided some nice opportunities this morning over this particular rock. Originally I had the image something like below in my mind, but I couldn’t decide between the two, so you get both!

Tagged: 10-22mm, Boambee Beach, Coffs Harbour, King Tide, Photography, Rocks, Sunrise, Waves

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Day 338 – Meabella Hair & Day Spa

December 15, 2012, 6:46 pm

≫ Next: Day 339 – Distracted

≪ Previous: Day 337 – King of Tides

A long time friend of mine has recently opened Meabella Hair and Day Spa at Nautilus Resort, here in Coffs Harbour. I headed out there to check the place out and grab some photos for the web site. The place looks magnificent, and offers a one stop shop for all your beauty, hair, nail, massage & reiki wants and needs.

For appointments, give Alissa a call on 0499 113 206.

On a photographic note… unfortunately I didn’t have my 360 virtual tours at a point I was happy with, so I decided to give them a miss this time.

Tagged: Australia, Beach, Beachfront, Coffs Harbour, Day Spa, Hairdresser, Nautilus, New South Wales, Resort, Sapphire, Villas

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Day 339 – Distracted

December 17, 2012, 1:08 pm

≫ Next: Day 340 – Something Fishy

≪ Previous: Day 338 – Meabella Hair & Day Spa

I must admit, I have been a little distracted lately. With good reason I think though… I have been planning my next trip away. Less than 4 weeks to go & the countdown begins!

It’s all finished now, so back to my photography! I’ll try to stay focused.

Tagged: 10-22mm, Photography, Sunrise, Waves

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Day 340 – Something Fishy

December 19, 2012, 12:16 pm

≫ Next: Day 341 – Short But Sweet

≪ Previous: Day 339 – Distracted

I didn’t want to get my feet wet – you know that isn’t going to last for long!

My travel kit for landscapes is now complete… that is of course until I upgrade to a full frame camera shortly. With the addition of a Samyang 8mm fish-eye lens and a Sirui T1005X 5 section tripod, my gear lust hopefully will be non-existent for a little while.

The Samyang fish-eye is a full manual lens, requiring both aperture and focus to be set manually on the lens. There are 2 ‘downsides’ that I can see some people would say to the lens; 1 – you can not use filters for the lens due to it being so wide (about 167° on Canon crop bodies and a full 180° view on Nikon and other crop sensor bodies), and 2 – you have to get in really close for a subject to fill the frame. Samyang is very well-known for exceptional quality manual lenses at great prices, so if you have not checked their range out yet, make sure you do.

Sirui’s T1005X tripod is amazingly small. Shown in some of the pictures below is my full size Manffrotto 055XPROB tripod along side, which is huge in comparison. The Sirui folds down to about 34cm in length, extends to over 1.4m tall (with ball head), and only weighs 1kg. I did a lot of research on travel tripods, and my main reason for going with this one was that even though it is small… it can still support 10kg making it very sturdy for longer exposures, or for use with my Nodal Ninja panoramic head.

Now everything fits into a compact Lowepro Passport Sling bag. Tripod, camera with lens attached, an additional lens, Lowepro S&F filter pouch 100 (with an assortment of Lee and Hitech filters), along with spare batteries and cards. Not shown is my camera, and my Nodal Ninja NN5, which I also plan on cramming in there somewhere. I think this will be the perfect travel kit for me.

Tagged: 10-22mm, 17-55mm, 8mm, Bag, Filters, Fish-eye, Fisheye, Gear, Hitech, Kit, Lee, Lens, Lowepro, Manfrotto, Nodal Ninja, Photography, Samyang, Sirui, Travel, Tripod

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Day 341 – Short But Sweet

December 21, 2012, 6:13 am

≫ Next: Day 342 – Merry Christmas Everyone

≪ Previous: Day 340 – Something Fishy

Results from a short but sweet light painting session with Dan Murphy. We headed out to check out some earthmoving equipment in a new section of a local housing estate. Clearly someone nearby was questioning why there were two idiots waving coloured lights around, and called the police on us. I think even the police were wondering why there were two idiots out taking photos in the dark.

No earthmoving equipment was harmed in the making of these images.

Tagged: 10-22mm, Earthmoving, Equipment, Heavy equipment (construction), light painting, Long Exposure, Photography, Police

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Day 342 – Merry Christmas Everyone

December 24, 2012, 6:20 am

≫ Next: Day 343 – Goodbye 2012… Hello 2013

≪ Previous: Day 341 – Short But Sweet

Talk about right place…right time!

Merry Christmas! I hope everyone has a very safe & happy holiday season, and Santa Claus brings you everything you wished for.

Tagged: Christmas, Claus, Holiday, Merry, Merry Christmas, Moon, Reindeer, Santa, Santa Claus, Silhouette, Sled, Sleigh, Xmas

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Day 343 – Goodbye 2012… Hello 2013

January 1, 2013, 10:25 pm

≫ Next: Day 344 – My First Sunrise of 2013

≪ Previous: Day 342 – Merry Christmas Everyone

Happy New Year!!!

I managed to tick another item off my bucket list by welcoming in a new year, in what I think is one of the most beautiful an iconic harbours in the world… Sydney Harbour.

As friends opened the door and welcomed me into their apartment, I was greeted with the magnificent panoramic view of what McMahons Point has to offer.

Of course shortly after that the beer was flowing, and so were the tequila shots as I learnt the rules of the house. A boat cruising past the front door, 2 trains on the bridge or 2 rivercats on the harbour, 3 helicopters, 4 water taxis, 5 ferries, 6 Luna Park rides going at the same time, 7 harbour cruises, 9 sailboats or 10 seagulls on the edge of the pool all required a shot. Then there was the attempted re-creation of the Opera House from lime wedges… the things you do for fun!

The anticipation grew as the sun set, and the harbour filled with boats all wanting a front row seat to the fireworks spectacular that Sydney in renowned for. The early show looked more like a trial run, and was just a tease to the main event that let loose as soon as the clock struck midnight, and we said hello to 2013.

A massive welcome and thank you to all who have recently begun to follow my work. I have received so many wonderful comments in the last week. I have not had a chance to read all of them and check out your page, but I will make time by the end of the week. A huge thanks must go out to WordPress for featuring my site, along with those that have re-blogged posts on their site.

To my longtime followers, thank you for all your kind words and support in 2012. I hope I can keep things interesting in 2013, and continue to grow and push myself to get that awesome shot to share with you.

Best wishes for everyone for 2013.

Tagged: 10-22mm, Australia, Fireworks, Long Exposure, McMahons Point New South Wales, New Years Eve, Photography, Sydney, Sydney Harbour, Sydney Harbour Bridge, Sydney Opera House, Travel, WordPress

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Day 344 – My First Sunrise of 2013

January 6, 2013, 12:12 pm

≫ Next: Day 345 – Getting Back Into The Rhythm

≪ Previous: Day 343 – Goodbye 2012… Hello 2013

Heading back to work today after a few weeks off gave me motivation to get up early enough to catch the sunrise, in fact the first sunrise I have seen this year!

I do admit I have missed getting up for this part of the day.

1 week until I am holidays again though… I thought I better ease myself into 2013!

Tagged: 10-22mm, 2013, Coffs Harbour, Photography, Sunrise

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Day 345 – Getting Back Into The Rhythm

January 7, 2013, 5:16 pm

≫ Next: Day 346 – Reflecting The Sun

≪ Previous: Day 344 – My First Sunrise of 2013

It feels like I am getting back into the rhythm of things again with the last 2 mornings resulting in images that I like…. I’m happy with that!

I shot this one, and then thought I wanted to recompose to get lower and wider. By the time I did that, the sun was too high in the sky, and was flaring across the filters and lens pretty badly… So this ended up being the keeper of the morning.

Tagged: 10-22mm, Australia, Hungry Head, Photography, Rocks, Sunrise, Waves

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Day 346 – Reflecting The Sun

January 8, 2013, 6:19 pm

≫ Next: Day 347 – Goodbye Coffs Coast

≪ Previous: Day 345 – Getting Back Into The Rhythm

I couldn’t resist this image once I spotted the reflection of the sun on both this rock and the sand this morning.

I was almost going to clone out the sun flare, but I thought of how much trouble they would go to adding the flare into animations these days, so I left it alone… for this time.

Tagged: 10-22mm, Australia, Photography, Sunrise, Tuckers Rock

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Day 347 – Goodbye Coffs Coast

January 12, 2013, 3:59 am

≫ Next: Day 348 – A Taste Of Zeavola

≪ Previous: Day 346 – Reflecting The Sun

It’s goodbye to the Coffs Coast for a few weeks as I am off on another adventure overseas.

This shot is a 5 shot vertical stitch using my Nodal Ninja NN5. Pretty much straight out of the camera too. I would have liked to have done a HDR of this one to tone down the highlights a little.

Tagged: 10-22mm, Coffs Coast, Mid North Coast, Nodal Ninja NN5, Photography

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Day 348 – A Taste Of Zeavola

January 19, 2013, 2:33 am

≫ Next: Day 349 – Back To The Start In Phuket

≪ Previous: Day 347 – Goodbye Coffs Coast

I have just landed at Zeavola Resort on Koh Phi Phi Don Island, Thailand… and Wow! I hope you all forgive me for not writing much right now, for I am off to see what other luxuries Zeavola has to offer. Expect a full report when I arrive home though.

I have a few posts to do since this is my first reliable internet connection that I have had for a little while, so maybe I can catch up from my private hideaway tomorrow.

Tagged: 8mm, Asia, Island, Krabi, Phi Phi, Phi Phi Don, Phi Phi Island, Photography, Phuket, Resort, Thailand, Travel, Zeavola

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Day 349 – Back To The Start In Phuket

January 29, 2013, 5:28 am

≫ Next: Day 350 – Spend A Day On Phi Phi

≪ Previous: Day 348 – A Taste Of Zeavola

Sitting back watching the sunset over Patong beach, with the locals playing soccer on the beach, and a person parasails overhead.

Finding a reliable internet connection proved to be a hassle while traveling, so I am going back to the start of my trip over the next few days and going though some photos. Our first stop was Phuket, where we stayed at Baan Laimai Beach Resort in Patong.

While being in a great location opposite Patong Beach, the little touches make all the difference, and I don’t think I would stay here again with much better hotels close by – for just a little more cash. I would however recommend the food from the restaurant, and the live band was fantastic. There was plenty of shopping, catching up with friends from other trips to Phuket, lazing on the beach, and kicking back by the pool… what a way to start a holiday.

We spent our last day in Phuket down at Karon, and witnessed a couple getting some wedding shots on sunset. It drew quite a crowd of onlookers, and a few saw it as an opportunity to borrow a reflector from the photographers for an impromptu model shoot… and I had to have a little laugh I would imaging the wedding photographers got some great shots with such a beautiful sunset.

Tagged: Asia, Baan Laimai, Beach, Karon, Karon Beach, Patong, Patong Beach, Photography, Phuket, Phuket Province, Sunset, Thailand, Travel, Wedding

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Day 350 – Spend A Day On Phi Phi

January 31, 2013, 4:08 am

≫ Next: Day 351 – Can’t Help But Feel Lucky

≪ Previous: Day 349 – Back To The Start In Phuket

Do yourself a favor and find a nice quiet spot on the beach of Loh Dalam Bay. From here you can truly admire Phi Phi Island, and marvel at those beautiful rich blues and greens that work so well together. Look past all the tourists and block out everything else in life, you don’t have to look far to find beauty here.

Take a stroll along the white sand, and you will no doubt see a long-tail boat or 7. Pause and take at least a second to soak in the view… Suddenly all those idyllic postcards come to life right in front of you.

Barter a deal and jump aboard a long-tail or ‘taxi boat’, for your own private tour of wherever you wish to go. Bamboo Island is a favorite close by destination of mine for its crystal clear water. Swimming and soaking up the sun after finding a slice of paradise on a private little beach is just a bonus.

Looking at the time, I know there is one more stop I want to make. A short trek back to the boat, and I have to wake up the captain… sleeping under a tree, with a foam esky lid as a pillow – ahhh the simple life!

Cruising to the next stop, I am again awestruck with the huge cliffs that jut out of the ocean everywhere you look… then you arrive at Maya Bay – ‘The Beach’

Having visited here a few times on my last trip to Phi Phi, I left my visit this time to later on in the day in the hope of avoiding the plague of people ferried by speedboats from around Thailand. It sort of worked out, and there were definitely fewer people than most times I have seen. Time to kick back and enjoy a beer or two.

Drift away, and imagine how perfect it would be if no one else was around. If only those 50 people were not in my photo, and the dozen speedboats were not here…

I must admit… there is something special about having one of the worlds most famous beaches pretty much to yourself.

Tagged: Asia, Bamboo Island, Beach, Don, Island, Koh Phi Phi, Krabi, Ley, Maya Bay, Phi Phi, Phi Phi Island, Phuket, Provinces, Thailand, The Beach

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Day 351 – Can’t Help But Feel Lucky

February 3, 2013, 5:23 am

≫ Next: Day 352 – A Wave Caught My Eye

≪ Previous: Day 350 – Spend A Day On Phi Phi

I can’t help but feel a little lucky this week when I look at where I live. Maybe I just missed the early mornings while I was on holidays. I did get to witness this spectacular sunrise, so that did help a little.

Tagged: 10-22mm, Beach, Boambee Beach, Coffs Harbour, Ian Spagnolo, Photography, Sunrise

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Day 352 – A Wave Caught My Eye

February 4, 2013, 1:05 pm

≫ Next: Day 353 – Washed Away

≪ Previous: Day 351 – Can’t Help But Feel Lucky

This image caught my eye when flicking through my photos from this morning. I like the line the little wave formed, and it’s always nice to have something that adds a little interest in the foreground.

Tagged: 10-22mm, Beach, Photography, Sunrise, Tuckers Rock, Wave

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Day 353 – Washed Away

February 5, 2013, 9:01 pm

≫ Next: Day 354 – On The Line

≪ Previous: Day 352 – A Wave Caught My Eye

I came very close to getting washed away a few times again this morning. In the end I didn’t even get the image I had imagined in my head, but I did like this one even though the sun has some blown highlights.

Processing of this photo was done a little different to my usual quick conversion. It’s a pseudo HDR image – that is a HDR photo created from a single raw image file, not multiple bracketed shots - I converted the raw file into 4 16 bit tiff files with DPP using multiple exposure values (-2 -1 0 and +1), the four files were then processed in Photomatix, and final editing was done in Photoshop. Seems like a lot of work for one photo to me.

Tagged: 10-22mm, Adobe Photoshop, HDR, High dynamic range imaging, Photography, Photomatix, Photomatix Pro, Photoshop, Pseudo, Raw image format

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