Rodney Campbell's Blog

At the start of the year I joined the Clique Photographers Association – an association run by Fairfax press for amateur photographers, whose work can be published in The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age newspapers and online.

Each month Clique runs a nationwide themed monthly challenge where members if Clique can submit one image on the theme.

I’m proud and honoured to tell you that this month my image “Down the Rabbit Hole” taken in the QVB was the national winner for the monthly challenge (the theme for this month was “Buildings and Monuments”)

Down the Rabbit Hole

NIKON D600 + 15.0 mm f/2.8 @ 15 mm, 1/15 sec at f/4, ISO 560

Along with having my image published in todays edition of both The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age;

SMH – Clique Challenge Winners: Buildings and Monuments

The Age – Clique Challenge Winners: Buildings and Monuments

I also received a number of welcome prizes including a personal portfolio review by a Fairfax photographer.

Whilst at “The Cheese Block” – along the coast in the Royal National Park at the southern edge of Sydney.

A stitched panorama of the coastline – this is a bit over 180˚ field of view and is composed of 9 vertical frames taken at 24mm

Note: These photographs (especially the wider shots) look much better when larger – so click any of the images below to see larger versions in an inline overlay slideshow gallery viewer.

Viewing the Cheese

NIKON D600 + 24.0-70.0 mm f/2.8 @ 24 mm, 1/50 sec at f/11, ISO 100

As we were heading back along the coast towards Garie beach and the carpark I spied this rock in the sand out at the waters edge with the waves swishing back and forth past it and two smaller rocks behind which just peeked above the water every now and then as the waves receded.

Note: These images (especially the wider shots) look much better when larger – so click any of the images below to see larger versions in an inline overlay slideshow gallery viewer.

I’d for some time wanted to shoot a super simplified seascape scene and this looked reasonably close to what I had envisioned in my mind. So it was out with my gear again and setup for the shot. ISO 50 and 247 seconds later with the lens at a slight telephoto setting to limit the scene and stacked with the Lee 0.6 grad and a Lee BigStopper we have

Garie Simplified

NIKON D600 + 24.0-70.0 mm f/2.8 @ 60 mm, 247.00 sec at f/11, ISO 50

This one is nearly straight out of camera with only some minor adjustments in post – I didn’t want to mess with the very low contrast feel and the very simple subtle look

I also did a sort of fine art monochrome rendition – I’d be interested to see which you might prefer (I have my own thoughts)

NIKON D600 + 24.0-70.0 mm f/2.8 @ 60 mm, 247.00 sec at f/11, ISO 50

I’d shot a long exposure set of frames for a stitched panorama, a little after sunset at the small manmade lake at Cecil Hills, trying to do something wide but simplified with the stark horizon line, the dead trees and the awesome cracked mud flats in the foreground beside the lake

The panorama basically worked – in that it stitched together fine after a little exposure equalising with the source frames – but the resultant image wasn’t really doing it for me. The overall framing was off and perhaps too many things competing for attention in what was a very simplified scene (the sky was relatively flat except for some interest above the skeletal tree on the right) and the water in the middle was of course flattened by the long exposure

It looked like a reasonable candidate for a Panosphere (often called a Little Planet for somewhat obvious reasons) – frankly I was hoping something would save it – perhaps I was grasping at straws, but I liked the end result 🙂

Note: These photographs (especially the wider shots) look much better when larger – so click any of the images below to see larger versions in an inline overlay slideshow gallery viewer.

Opposites

NIKON D600 + 24.0-70.0 mm f/2.8 @ 24 mm, 87.00 sec at f/11, ISO 200

I’d heard of a place along the coast in the Royal National Park at the southern edge of Sydney which was called “The Cheese Block” and sometimes as “The Wedding Cake”. My eldest daughter was very keen to go see this marvel of modern landscape but unfortunately I didn’t know exactly where it was and online searches only returned images of the location but no actual details for how best to get there

Thankfully my good frond Gerry texted me the exact GPS go-ordinates and with this in hand we made a plan to walk out there when we got a break in the weather. We drove to the corner of Bundeena which was the closest to where we wanted to go and started walking through the bush to the coast. Google Maps indicated it would only take 30 minutes for the walk – definitely not the case (perhaps only if you decided to do it at a run :)). We arrived mid afternoon and whilst the conditions weren’t great we could easily see why this area of white limestone gets it’s name

Note: These photographs (especially the wider shots) look much better when larger – so click any of the images below to see larger versions in an inline overlay slideshow gallery viewer.

A selfie to start things off

A Slice of Me

NIKON D600 + 24.0-70.0 mm f/2.8 @ 24 mm, 1/80 sec at f/11, ISO 100

The Cheese and I

NIKON D600 + 24.0-70.0 mm f/2.8 @ 35 mm, 1/125 sec at f/8, ISO 100

and now my daughters turn

Mouse Trap

NIKON D600 + 24.0-70.0 mm f/2.8 @ 24 mm, 1/125 sec at f/11, ISO 100

It actually feels pretty precarious standing out on the block since there is a very large crack going right around the block – it feels (pardon the pun) rock solid but I’m not exactly sure how much longer that entire chunk of rack is going to remain here

and finally it was BigStopper time to see what a long exposure would do for the scene – Lee BigStopper stacked with a Lee 0.6 GND and the Heliopan CPL (and still we only get it out to 51 seconds at ISO 50 and f/16 – yes it was very bright :))

The Cheese Block

NIKON D600 + 24.0-70.0 mm f/2.8 @ 24 mm, 51.00 sec at f/16, ISO 50