Finding something new to photograph
After the revelations of the other day, it may not come as any surprise that I am a bit bored with what I have been taking photos of. I really need to start finding something new to photograph.
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Today I thought it might be interesting to look at some images. It is something I have missed doing. I hope you have missed them as well. Today we are going to look at two new images. I’ve been exploring some of my Melbourne images and seeing what experiments I can do with them.
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People on my Facebook pages have expressed wishes to get a weekly photo challenge and it occurred to me that you might like them as well. So the first 1 is going to be Bridges.
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For quite some time I’ve been wanting to do some new work. There is always some apprehension when you start something new and a lot of procrastination can occur before hand. That has certainly been the case for me.
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This image was taken a few weeks when I had a loan of the Canon 5D Mark IV with the 16-35mm 2.8 lens. I was trying it out for long exposure photography and while I had it I took as many as I could. I did process this image a little a couple of weeks ago to use for something else, then I realised I could still do a lot more to it. Here is the final image.
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This weeks weekend wanderings was hard to name. After being to a few places I didn’t know what to call it. There and back again came to mind, then again from one place to another, but in the end settled on from here to there, which pretty much described the day. I went out with a friend and first we went to a waterfall, then to a viaduct railway bridge and finally to an old railway bridge that is no longer used. None of the places were new to use, but they were all so different to previous visits.
Turpins Falls
I’ve been to this waterfall many times. I’ve been when I thought the flow was good, then again a few months back when it was terrible. We have had a lot of rain recently so when Chris Wilson suggested going there it seemed like a good idea. We weren’t disappointed with the flow, that’s for sure.
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It was disappointing with the sun beating down on it directly. Though the weather turned almost straight away after we left, maybe we should have hung around for another half an hour.
Malmsbury
The last time Chris and I had been there it was a beautiful winters day. The sun was shining and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky, unfortunately. We had both wanted to find the viaduct railway bridge and do some long exposures, but with no clouds, there was no point. It was a bit disappointing, still we did get some nice photos of the bridge reflected in the water.
This time as we got closer to Malmsbury the clouds rolled in and kept rolling in. There were so many clouds and it was so overcast that long exposures were out of the question again. If the sky is full of clouds and not much blue long exposures can look just white, almost pointless. I did try a couple, but they really didn’t work. Still the clouds were great and I enjoyed the moodiness they created in the images.
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After the bridge we went into the park there. There were some geese running around there. I do love geese. I think they are great fun. I tried to get photos and wanted to see how close they would let me get.
After the park we went to the bakery and had a quick lunch before heading to our next stop.
Cairn Curran Reservoir
The last place we went to was the Cairn Curran Reservoir near Newstead. We went there last year and visited this old disused railway bridge, that most of last century was under water. When we went that time the area around it was all mud and we couldn’t get close the river or we sank in the mud.
This time we had thought it would be much the same, but were shocked to find that it was completely overgrown with vegetation and we could get very close to the river. The ground was hard enough to walk on.
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The photos were so different to last time.
Revisiting
It is amazing how much a place can change from year to year. It is always worth going back to see what has changed and what photographs you can get. In all three places we got something completely different to previous visits. I hope you go back to previous places to see how much they have changed.
Just recently I’ve been asked to do a few One on One Photography Sessions around Melbourne. It has been great to get people who want to learn how to photograph Melbourne like I do. It is also challenging. I met a lovely man from Sydney the other day and we spent a couple of days exploring Melbourne. On the second day I tried to show him some places that perhaps the average tourist wouldn’t really know about.
We met at Federation Square and went to Birrarung Mar, a local park near the city. You can get some great views of the city from there.
The sun was going down and we really were at the wrong end of the city to be making the most of the sunset. It always seems to be the way with me, unfortunately.
I love the images you can get from this bridge, I’ve been there a view times, but these are the first ones that I can say that I really liked.
We also took photos of the trains going in and out of the city, I took lots so I could stack them. Two in the gallery are stacked, this is one and the other is just one image.
To finish off the night we ended up Hosier Lane. A place that is usually photographed during the day. I’d seen some great shots of it at night and thought I would like to try, so I got this.
It was a fun evening and I think my client enjoyed what I showed him and what he got to photograph. We finished off the night with a drink and a bowl of chips with aioli at Young & Jackson, another Melbourne institution. I think he enjoyed his time and got some great shots too. I love showing my city to other people.
I have a gallery of a few more images, plus those above, I hope you enjoy them. Weekend here, and the weather is looking nice. Enjoy.
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It is Monochrome Madness over on my other blog and I thought I would do another image where I process it in monochrome and then switch it back to colour. Here is the black and white version, or monochrome really.
I was in the city the other day and we were trying to get the sunrise from Princes Bridge in Melbourne. It was a strange one, so after a while we decided to head over to the other side of the bridge and watch the city waking up along the river. As we were there taking photos a couple of balloons came along, then there were three, and then we realized another two were coming, so five all up. It certainly added to the scene.
It was dawn, but facing the other way. Even thought there wasn’t much of a sunrise that morning, there was some colour in the sky, a pinkish sort of colour. I thought the whole image might be nice with a pink tone, give it the look of early morning. It couldn’t be too strong, but I don’t mind how it came out.
Then I wondered what would happen if I put the colour back into the image, my reverse processing. I haven’t done it for a while.
I haven’t taken out any of the colour in this, but I did have to tone down the pink tone a bit more. I like the look of it. It is different from the monochrome one, which is nice. There is something very graphic about it, I can’t explain it, and I don’t know if it is the buildings or what, but there is.
I don’t know which one I prefer. I like them both for different reasons.
If you want to see more great monochrome images head over to my other blog and the post, MM 2-45: Monochrome Madness. There are some wonderful images there.
In Melbourne there are many bridges that allow you to cross the river. Some are for cars, and many for pedestrians and bicycles. One bridge that is one of my favourites to photograph is the Seafarers Bridge where it goes over the Yarra.
One View
The things that go over are like ribs of a ship or a sail. It is like our mini opera house. There are so many angles to experiment with. This image is also a long exposure. I’ve really only done long exposures here once, but it is definitely a place I want to do more.
Another View
This is from the other side. I’ve began to realize that I need to explore the angles a lot more.
One of the downsides with this bridge is how popular it is and there are always people on it, or so it seems at times. This is where the advantage of doing a long exposure comes in. If you can get a long enough time then you can get photos so that the people don’t show up. It is something that really interests me with long exposures.
I’ve been using the Formatt Hitech Filters, and the one I especially love is the Firecrest 16. I’ve now got several of their filters, and the full ND filters are the ones I like the most. I have the 6 , the 10 and the 16 stop, I just need to get the 13 and I will have the full set. I really like their filters.
The next thing to get is the filter holder and maybe the 10 stop to start with for my Nikon 14-24mm. I would love to be able to do some long exposure photography with that lens. That is next on the list.
I just keep wanting to go into the city and take photos these days. I find it so satisfying. The more I do it the more I can understand what sort of scenes I want to shoot. I have a purpose in mind and I can see that it is becoming a reality, if that is the right way of putting it.
Yesterday on social media I put up a photo which I think is quite an iconic image of San Francisco. I have seen many many similar images. It is one of the Bay Bridge at night.
There is no doubt that many people have taken this image. Even when I was getting this there were lots of other photographers as well. Who wouldn’t want to get a shot like this?
It is going to be like this in any city where you have places that will give the photographer a beautiful image. These are the iconic images of photography, and whether we want to admit it or not, most of us want them in our collections.
I couldn’t help myself when I was away I had to get many photos of these iconic places. There is no point, I think, not wanting to, but I also knew that I would have accept that my images may not be original.
Even in my home town there are images that everyone, or most, have that I knew I wanted as well.
The light trails around Flinders Street Station is very iconic image. Most Melbourne based photographers are going to have an image like this.
I don’t think there is anything wrong with getting these images. I wouldn’t put them into competitions or anything like that, but I like that I have them. It can still be a challenge trying to get something different, but in the end, you end up with what others have. I think that is fine.
I hope you try and take photos of iconic places, as well as ones that aren’t so well known. One of the problems with travelling is that you often only know, or are aware of, the places that everyone else takes images of. Whereas, one of the benefits of getting to know where you live is that you can take photos of places that people visiting won’t be aware of. I like that part.
