Uploads from Big Jobs, with geodata

Observing

nobody@flickr.com (Big Jobs) — Mon, 13 May 2013 13:35:36 -0700

Big Jobs posted a photo:

This shot is from 2012 sometime and is one of many such images that I've taken as part of the night photography/light painting trip that I seem to have been on over the last few years.

I have many more unpublished images of Bald Rock and Girraween National Parks, in this style, that I really should get around to organizing and uploading... if only I wasn't such a lazy bugger :)

Kwiambal National Park Dawn

nobody@flickr.com (Big Jobs) — Tue, 09 Apr 2013 12:41:40 -0700

Big Jobs posted a photo:

Sunrise from an old farm field on the edge of Kwiambal National Park - this was literally almost at my door, so it was a very laid-back affair.

Kwiambal National Park sits near the NSW/QLD border and is about 5 hours drive from Brisbane.
Quite an isolated spot really, even though it was Easter, there were very few campers about and I never once saw anybody else when out walking the tracks in the park itself.

The major features of the park are the Severn and Macintyre Rivers and the junction where the two meet.
It is quite possible to rock-hop for a few kilometers in either direction through each of the rugged gorges down at river level, if you're confident to do so and don't mind getting your feet wet crossing occasionally.

Angourie - Back Beach Sunset

nobody@flickr.com (Big Jobs) — Wed, 06 Mar 2013 11:55:42 -0800

Big Jobs posted a photo:

Sunset at Angourie, taken just South of where I shot the previous image at Dawn and on the same day.

Angourie Point Sunrise

nobody@flickr.com (Big Jobs) — Wed, 06 Mar 2013 11:55:35 -0800

Big Jobs posted a photo:

Christening my new D800E with a Sunrise from the rock shelf near Angourie Point in Northern New South Wales.

Not much doing in the sky on this particular morning but otherwise the conditions were perfect, a lovely place to be and up until this time it had been about 16 years since I was last in this spot... starting to sound old :)

Curtis Falls

nobody@flickr.com (Big Jobs) — Sat, 09 Feb 2013 18:32:25 -0800

Big Jobs posted a photo:

Curtis Falls | Tamborine National Park | Queensland

To get this POV I had to jump the fence into the RESTRICTED area, much to the shock of another visitor's child, just out of frame to the left - "GASP! Look Mummy, that man is in the water!"

In my defense, the viewing platform was quite crowded and obtaining a satisfying composition from there was next to impossible.

However, my environmental impact was minimal, much less I suspect than that of the Hippies who were earlier frolicking under the falls or the person whom I witnessed throw a Pepsi bottle into the creek behind me :(

This image is a five-shot stitch and the camera was mounted on my Nodal Ninja Pano Head.

D800E
Nikkor 17-35mm f/2.8 @ 24mm
Circular Polariser

Alright

nobody@flickr.com (Big Jobs) — Mon, 07 Jan 2013 12:54:33 -0800

Big Jobs posted a photo:

Dawn on New Years Day 2013 from the rocks @ Point Cartwright on the Sunshine Coast.

2012 is outta here :)

nobody@flickr.com (Big Jobs) — Tue, 01 Jan 2013 02:14:34 -0800

Big Jobs posted a photo:

2012 New Years Eve Fireworks at Caloundra.

My first attempt at shooting fireworks ever!

This image is a stack of about 10 or so frames, using the lighten blend mode in photoshop - I realise it's a probably a little bit busy, but who cares right?

Basically I just ran a series of long exposures, covered the lens with a cloth and revealed it at the appropriate moment.

Little Wonder

nobody@flickr.com (Big Jobs) — Thu, 20 Dec 2012 03:45:46 -0800

Big Jobs posted a photo:

The 2012 Geminid Meteor Shower over Girraween National Park.

This image is a composite of all the meteors that I managed to capture over a period of about 3 hours.

Although my enthusiasm for shooting the night sky far outweighs my knowledge about what I'm actually looking at, I'm pretty confident that most of the meteors here are in fact Geminids, but some may well just be random sporadics.

Regardless, the night was perfect for it and I couldn't have asked for better conditions - new moon and no clouds of any consequence.

This night was the first time I'd ever had the opportunity to shoot a decent meteor shower, in fact for the last couple of years, each time one was due to occur, the clouds would turn up and ruin it for me - not this time though :)

Also the first real night test for my new D800E - happy to say it more than met my expectations for image quality and high-iso noise properties... and also, quite unexpectedly, battery performance.
About 30 minutes of setup (composing, live view focusing and test shots etc.) and around 3 1/4 hours of constant shooting with the intervalometer, all on one battery!

Technical stuff:

540 x 20" @ ISO 2500 | f/2.8 | 14mm
Nikon D800E
Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8

Quite a bit of (tedious) post work involved to produce this image, but here it is in a nutshell:

Import the base layer into CS6; which is just a single image shot at my chosen settings, but it also includes some light painting - basically just a couple of quick bursts with neutral and warm white LED flashlights.

Images where a meteor was captured were then loaded into CS6 as individual layers, where each layer was then rotated back to to line-up with the celestial point of origin for the Geminid shower (at it's position on the base layer). Then everything other than the meteor was masked out of each individual layer.

I'll also be attempting to put all these frames together into a time lapse movie, when I get around to it (which will probably be in about 2 years :)

Fingal Head Winter Dawn

nobody@flickr.com (Big Jobs) — Fri, 07 Sep 2012 04:50:52 -0700

Big Jobs posted a photo:

Dawn from Fingal Head, looking out towards Cook Island on the horizon.

I don't seem to be able to catch a break with the skies in 2012... this particular morning was no exception, with just a hint of colour before it started to rain on me.

I'm off to New Zealand in about 4 weeks time - been gearing up, both literally and figuratively, since January.

Really looking forward to it and hopefully the weather-gods will be on my side for a change.

not_too_shabby@beachmere.com.au

nobody@flickr.com (Big Jobs) — Mon, 27 Aug 2012 05:50:17 -0700

Big Jobs posted a photo:

Met up with a buddy for my first visit to this end of Beachmere.
Got some sort of okay light and colour... which was nice as I was expecting it to be crap.

This is about 1 minute of exposure with the Big Stopper... softness is courtesy of Flickr (as per usual).

DIY Baffle for the Lee SW 150 Filter System

nobody@flickr.com (Big Jobs) — Wed, 22 Aug 2012 04:44:21 -0700

Big Jobs posted a photo:

You may be thinking, "What the hell is that contraption?"

Well, let me introduce my home-made baffle for the Lee SW150 Filter System.

Which may be of interest to other Lee SW150 owners out there, who have problems with stray reflections when using it - everybody else, move along, nothing to see here.

Under certain conditions (angle of the camera relative to the Sun etc.), light seems to hit the back of the filter and cause dodgy-looking reflections in the image, basically ruining it.

What is needed is some kind of baffle to block the light from entering from behind or from the sides.
Lee does include two flimsy clip-on plastic baffles with the SW150 kit, but I found them to be next to useless.

Having discussed the issue with another Flickr member, who kindly showed me some photos of his DIY baffle made from foam - I set about creating my own version, which based largely upon his idea, but refined to my taste.

I hacked this together in about an hour and although originally it was intended to be just a prototype/proof-of-concept, it actually turned out to be functional and did the job nicely... so while it isn't pretty, it is good enough... which suits my lazy style just fine :)

Hopefully the photos are self-explanatory enough for anybody hoping to make something similar, but if not, please don't hesitate to send me a FlickrMail with your question/s.

You may also like check out this discussion in the Nikon 14-24mm group, for more clues.

Enjoy,
Cheers.

Point Cartwright Dawn

nobody@flickr.com (Big Jobs) — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 12:38:16 -0800

Big Jobs posted a photo:

Dawn from the rocks at Point Cartwright.

Still getting the cobwebs out and it's been a while since I've done any seascape stuff, so got up at stupid o'clock last weekend and drove up the coast for what turned out to be a nice morning, albeit one without much colour in the sky.

Last Light of 2011 Over Girraween National Park

nobody@flickr.com (Big Jobs) — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 04:23:54 -0800

Big Jobs posted a photo:

The sun setting on New Years Eve 2011, as seen from the summit of Turtle Rock in Girraween National Park, QLD.

The view was well worth the rather difficult ascent, through a tight chimney of sorts, between two massive Granite slabs.

Getting gear up as well as oneself is what actually makes it difficult, it's a tight squeeze and you need to stand sideways and pass your equipment ahead of you, then move your body.

First Light of 2012 Over Girraween National Park

nobody@flickr.com (Big Jobs) — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 04:24:03 -0800

Big Jobs posted a photo:

The sun rising on New Years Day 2012, as seen from the summit of Castle Rock in Girraween National Park, QLD.

Lake Moogerah Dam

nobody@flickr.com (Big Jobs) — Tue, 21 Dec 2010 12:03:09 -0800

Big Jobs posted a photo:

Moogerah dam is pretty awesome, and I have a relative who was one of engineers that designed this bad boy.

Anyway, I was in the area, so I thought I'd drop by to check it out, and she's a bit full at the moment.

Last time I visited I was climbing all over the spillway, but if one was to attempt that now... well, one would get a bit damp, wouldn't one? :)

Girraween - Sunrise over the Pyramid

nobody@flickr.com (Big Jobs) — Thu, 28 Oct 2010 03:03:14 -0700

Big Jobs posted a photo:

After descending from a somewhat chilly morning spent on top of that big rock, shooting star trails and doing stupid things with fire, the first rays of the Sun were quite welcome, and produced this lovely golden light.

I must admit I found this a challenging shot to take, as I can't attach any of my beloved filters to the fisheye lens... omg! :)

I've come to rely on my filters so much in high contrast situations, it felt really strange not being able to use them.

Girraween - Bald Rock Creek

nobody@flickr.com (Big Jobs) — Thu, 28 Oct 2010 03:03:22 -0700

Big Jobs posted a photo:

I love Girraween NP and for me, this was a very special thing to have witnessed; Bald Rock Creek in full flow.

I just had to grab a few quick shots of this.

There was quite a large volume of water about the whole place really, and I've never seen so much in Bald Rock Creek before. It was running very fast and making quite a loud noise.

Down in the Park

nobody@flickr.com (Big Jobs) — Wed, 27 Oct 2010 13:05:04 -0700

Big Jobs posted a photo:

As per usual, at around the halfway-point into climbing this rock, I asked myself what the hell I was doing. It's a strenuous climb, I'm always lugging a ton of gear and it's usually at night or very early morning. Oh, and it's always cold.

Anyway, this was the first opportunity for me to properly test out my new toy, a 16mm f/2.8 Fisheye; so that was the justification.

The Moon was setting at 2:40am this morning and the plan was for an hour or so of star trails.
Left camp at 1:25am and accompanied by a howling wind, I reached the top at 2:05am.

So after starting this exposure, I light painted the foreground and then attempted to shelter from the wind. After about 30 minutes of being cold, boredom set in and I decided to spoil my shot with steel wool.

Realising that the the cold was affecting my battery and that I still had to complete the in-camera noise reduction, I decided to cut this short at roughly 50 minutes. I need not have worried though, the battery made it through and I still had enough juice to shoot the sunrise on the way back to camp.

Lichtspielhaus

nobody@flickr.com (Big Jobs) — Mon, 27 Sep 2010 04:59:23 -0700

Big Jobs posted a photo:

Light painting @ Fingal Head Lighthouse and there was just enough moonlight about to illuminate Cook Island in the distance.

Plenty of traffic here on a Saturday night it seems, and the inevitable happened - I was spotted running about with my fluro light rig. Thus my suspicions were confirmed, and I got some funny looks.

As I was leaving, a fisherman said "G'day" to me about four times... quite odd, really.

Middle Head Fort - Night

nobody@flickr.com (Big Jobs) — Tue, 21 Sep 2010 02:33:53 -0700

Big Jobs posted a photo:

A little light painting excursion out to Middle Head Fort - this old bunker complex is one of the most interesting places I've visited in quite some time.

In the few hours I spent there, I barely scratched the surface of the photographic possibilities of this location. Definitely a spot that I will return to one day.

Special thanks to Brent Pearson for taking the time to give me his advice and suggestions for shooting this location.