Innholdsfortegnelse for June-July 2023 i Australian Photography

Ansel Adams called landscapes the the supreme test of the photographer – and often the supreme disappointment - but it’s also a genre of photography we’ve always championed at Australian Photography. Some of you may remember way back in the early 2010s we launched a competition called Landscape Photographer of the Year, which later evolved into Photographer of the Year. The idea of a dedicated landscape competition sat in hiatus for nearly a decade, but in 2023, we’re delighted to say it lives again and the results of which you can find in this very issue you hold in your hands. Looking back on the images that won the competition in 2014 is a reminder that Ansel’s quote (and he said many!) is still an important one. A decade ago,…

GERMAN stock photo website EyeEm, a platform that once overtook Instagram in the App Store charts, has reportedly filed for bankruptcy. EyeEm was originally a tech darling, drawing investment from star investor Peter Thiel in 2012. At one point the site even briefly overtook Instagram in the App Store charts following Instagram’s controversial move to claim the right to sell users’ photos without payment or notification, in a move the now Facebook-owned company later walked back from. And now, according to German media outlet Business Insider, EyeEm has filed for bankruptcy following a turbulent two years, which began with its founders Florian Meissner and Ranzi Rizk leaving the platform in 2020 following a restructure. Six months later, the company was sold to listed Swiss investment company New Value, which has…

PRESENTED BY CATEGORY SPONSORS CHARITY PARTNER PRESENTED BY Run for the first time this year, the Awards received more than 2,000 entries from photographers vying for a a prize pool worth more than $24,000. In addition, the competition raised $10,000 for its charity partner the Australian Conservation Foundation. Judged by an esteemed panel of professional photographers, the competition sought entries in one of three categories, Landscape, Seascape and Urban, and was open to photographers in Australia and New Zealand. In the Landscape category, Sydney photographer Kathy Wallace won the top prize with a timeless image that harks back to the origins of landscape photography in one of Australia’s most iconic locations. In the Seascape category, Canberra aerial specialist Tim Burgess wowed the judges with a wave shot he says reminded…

Canberra-based firefighter and keen photographer Tim Burgess is on a roll. His gorgeous aerial images not only took out the Aerial Category of the 2022 Photographer of the Year competition, but now the Seascape category of the Landscape Awards for 2023. All the more remarkable when you consider he’s still a relative newby to photography, who only started learning aerial photography at the start of the pandemic. His work is inspired by his love of Australia’s coastlines, but also demonstrates his clear appreciation for dramatic light, something his winning image The Dark Night celebrates. It’s also something our judges’ couldn’t get enough of. timmboslice_ THE DARK NIGHT Tim Burgess’ moody aerial was captured at Peregian Beach on the Sunshine Coast, QLD. “What made it stand out for me was its complete…

Solicitor Heather McNeice emigrated to Australia seventeen years ago and, until recently, continued to practice English law remotely from her home on the Sunshine Coast. Despite the busy job, she’s managed to grow a love for photography which she says continues to be a humbling, frustrating, but hugely enjoyable journey. She says she especially enjoys travel and landscape photography, with her runner-up winning image in the urban category celebrating one of the classic views of the Italian city of Venice. heathermcneice.com VENICE REFLECTIONS “Not long after the Australian borders reopened early last year, I travelled to Italy, spending time in the Dolomites, Tuscany and Venice,” says Heather McNeice. “I had always thought of Venice as a tourist-trap, to be avoided, but being there so soon after the lock-downs in Italy was…

The original Peak Design Sling 5L has been part of my travel photography kit for quite some time, and it has always been a great addition when I want to take a smaller kit or when visiting locations where big backpacks are a hassle. Recently, I had the opportunity to put the new Everyday Sling (in a fetching Midnight blue) through its paces during a three-week trip through Italy. THE BAG The Peak Design Everyday Sling is now available in three sizes - 3L, 6L and 10L. They come in a variety of colours, Black, Ash and Midnight which is an exclusive colour to the 6L bag, which will set you back around $200. If Mary Poppins had a camera bag it would be the 6L version as despite its…

This photo is of the Owens River and the Sierra Nevada near the town of Bishop in California. I can trace the inspiration for it to the earliest days of my journey in photography. In the 90s, my love of rock-climbing found me exploring the jagged peaks of this mountain range, known as the “range of light” as it was called by pioneering environmentalist John Muir. At the time, I lugged a camera along to document the landscapes on my adventures with 35mm colour slide film. My choice, Fuji Velvia, meant that my ‘post processing’ was fixed ahead of time as a highly saturated, high contrast look. It didn’t handle a wide dynamic range well but wow, the transparencies leapt off the light table! When I got the exposure right,…

DPREVIEW, one of the busiest and most respected online photography publications, has announced it will shut down, after 25 years in operation. The website has been caught up in the recent layoffs at parent company Amazon, which announced in April it was to lay off 9,000 jobs, following another 18,000 Amazon workers whose jobs were cut in January in response to a widespread downturn in the tech industry. Digital Photography Review, or DPReview, was founded in London in 1998 before being acquired by Amazon in 2007 when its base moved to Seattle. The website was highly regarded for its detailed and exhaustive reviews of cameras, lenses, and other photo gear - to the point where it was, for many photographers, the go-to website for photography gear and information. On a…

Sydney photographer Kathy Wallace hasn’t looked back since picking up her first DSLR in 2017, recently winning the Architecture category in the 2020 edition of Australasia’s Top Emerging Photographers competition, run by our sister title Capture. “I know I love photography and it consumes me. It takes me to places near and far,” she says. “At the moment my strength seems to have steered towards the architecture genre, but during Covid, I focused on landscapes as well.” kathywallacephotography.com.au FOREST SILENCE Kathy Wallace’s classic landscape shot Forest Silence was captured at Echo Point in the Blue Mountains. Wallace says that on the day her goal was to see and photograph the Three Sisters, but it was impossible to find them as layers of mist descended across the scene. Instead, she chose to focus…

Based in Melbourne, Russell Turner is a keen amateur photographer who likes to explore different genres but has a particular passion for landscapes. He says he caught the photography bug on a trip to Myanmar at the end of 2019, where he was inspired by the landscape, culture, and people. He likes to keep it simple with a focus on composition and light. His Seascape category runner-up image impressed our judges with its wildly colourful palette and painterly style. russellturnerphotography.com COLOURS Colours was shot off the waters of Shark Bay WA from a Cessna with the doors off, explains Russell Turner. “After earlier in the year doing aerial photography over Kati Thanda, I caught the bug and ventured to Shark Bay. I was motivated to enter this photo by interplay of…

Chances are you have never heard of a “flat lay” but you have seen them - they are the birds-eye views we see every day of food, fashion and countless consumer items. Commercial and advertising photographers have been shooting flat lay for decades but soon after the internet became a shop, almost every web-store and home blogger began making use of the idea too. Despite the commercial applications, a flat lay can also be a wonderful technique for describing personal stories, be it fun photos of trinkets gathered while on a holiday, or a more meaningful image of mementos gathered during a life less ordinary. As with any photo though, the secret to a strong flat lay lies in the mix of interesting content, strong design and some clever lighting.…

The 2019 A7R IV ushered in impressive resolution. Responsive autofocus. And a sturdier body. So what direction did Sony take with a camera line already at the top of its class? Well, the A7R V has been upgraded in several core areas to help it overcome challenging situations. The newly developed AI processing unit better tracks fleeting subjects like vehicles and insects. The reimagined back screen tilts, twists and flips for greater angle flexibility. And the redesigned sensor stabilisation unit counters 8 stops of camera shake. But how do all the new specs and features stack up in the field? For this month-long review, I put the A7R V through its paces across Victoria. To withstand the gusty sand dunes of Wilsons Promontory. To capture curious wallabies on Phillip Island.…

During the 20 years I spent living on the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, an external territory of Australia in the middle of the Indian Ocean, I spent a vast majority of my time photographing the incredible marine life that inhabited this amazing atoll. Photographing fish has its underlying challenges. Firstly, like all creatures there’s no way to direct them, or pose them. You also need to rely on your own skills to hopefully capture the image in focus (fishy subjects are fast movers), and this is all before you can even hope of ending up with an image you are happy with. Being a ‘citizen scientist’ at least enabled me not to be too pedantic with capturing a great image – what was more important was I captured an image that…

WHAT ABOUT TURNING IT INTO ART? “I went for a four day holiday at O'Reilly’s Rainforest Retreat, and we were on the hill to watch the sunset on the first day. I remembered to look behind me and took this shot of the forest, it was slightly raining but the sun was shining. No editing at all was done to this photo. It reminds me of a painting.” Hi Ngaire, I am pleased you mentioned how you “remembered to look behind”; too often we get fixated in one direction and miss great images occurring in the opposite direction. For me this image lacks some of the design elements I’d usually like to see in this genre. That being said, you mentioned this image reminded you of a painting, which is…

SONY has announced its much anticipated compact mirrorless full-frame camera, the ZV-E1. The new flagship of Sony’s ZV line of vlog-centric cameras, the ZV-E1 uses the same backside-illuminated (BSI) 12-megapixel sensor as the A7S III, and matches it with the A7R V’s AI autofocus system in a lightweight, compact body that also features its own dedicated AI processing unit. The new camera weighs just 483 grams - by comparison, the Sony A7 IV weighs 659 grams, and the Sony A7C, 509 grams. Video specs max out at 4K 120P, and 10-bit 4:2:2 recording is available with S-Log-3/S-Gamut3.Cine log modes, delivering up to 15 stops of dynamic range. According to Sony, the sensor has an ISO range up to 409,600 expanded (80-102400 in normal modes), which makes it the best…

MANIPULATION This month, we wanted to see your favourite images that explored a world beyond what the camera sees. From unique travel shots to curious Ps creations, these were our picks. KATHERINE DILLON Travel EDITOR’S COMMENT Katherine Dillon’s mind-bending image Travel is a great example of how with a bit of Photoshop magic you can transform something ordinary into something unique. The initial image was shot handheld on a boat on a cloud free day. The vastness of the ocean enabled a composition featuring only the ocean. She tells us that with Photoshop she copied the image onto a new layer, before rotating this layer 90 degrees clockwise, shifting it downwards over the original image until the “bend” in the water was sharp, and then reduced the size of the…

A space physicist by trade, Murray Parkinson is also a passionate photographer, primarily for what he says is the joy of experiencing nature and creating art. “I love most aspects of nature, especially those that celebrate the many forms of water: fog and mist, ominous clouds, crashing waves, rapids and waterfalls, rainstorms, ice and snow,” he explains. flickr.com/people/mlparkinson/ STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN #1 Murray Parkinson’s Landscape category runner-up image Stairway to heaven #1 was taken North-East of the summit of Rams Head North in Thredbo, NSW. “During winter storms, the Rams Head Range is one of the most dramatic places in Australia,” explains Parkinson. “The effort required to photograph this wet, frigid environment was high, but very rewarding,” he adds. “I thought this was a special image because the distinction between the…

Recently, I took part in a workshop that included a focus on how light and focal distance combine to produce a portrait, and it made me reflect on where technology is taking photography. Firstly, sophisticated software such as Adobe Photoshop alone does not produce good portraits – you need a human element for that. Even with all the recent advances in AI, I’m not convinced that we can replace either the photographer or the subject just yet. What AI can do however is enhance how a photographer persuades light to travel across angles, textures, colour, facial expressions, and all the other countless other elements within a frame to put a unique slant on a photo of a person. For me, the promise of blending human creativity with computer generated intelligence…