I just finished a 3.5 week tour through Australia. We drove over 7,500 km from Darwin to Adelaide then back to Sydney. My wife had always wanted to visit Uluru and I was able to capture a milky way shot over this giant monolith. We then headed down to the coast and I got a few shots in a sea cave, at the 12 apostles and under a pier. I still haven't had a chance to go through all my shots, but these are some of my early favorites from the trip.
I've been debating about brightening up the uluru shot, but I like night shots to be a bit darker since they feel more real to me. Any thoughts? Also, the 12 apostles blue hour shot is a bit on the purple side of things, can't decide if I should push it more toward magenta or leave it as is. Thanks!
Oz Adventure
Nice work here! I think the foreground in your first pic is a bit busy, maybe the pool with the rock in it a couple pillars up would have been better? That being said the shot is still amazing, keep up the good work!
That's what I get for running around looking for comps. No time to think through all the options. I had been up on a hill a few kilometers away and made the last minute decision to head down to the beach. Will keep it in mind for next time.
I love these pictures! As for the urulu - my initial thoughts were "the foreground could be brighter". But then I gave it a second though, fired it up fullscreen (with black borders instead of white) and I think it's fine. Details are there. Colors are there. It's cohesive with the brightness of the sky. I would leave it like that. :)
I have been running into that problem a lot. Everything looks great on my computer and seems in balance since I always edit against a dark background. When I look at it online it seems too dark. I open it back up in photoshop and it looks fine. I repeat a couple times then give up and move on to the next picture. If I get a print order I revisit the situation so that the print looks correct. Thanks for the feedback.
As you mentioned - printing is another thing. Prints usually have some bright background so they need different processing. I found that some photographers add to the caption / description, that it should be viewed on black background (or just fullscreen). Maybe that could help a little.
nice shots your very lucky to be able to take that much time away.. i can only dream of that much time away.
all shots are very nice the only one i can really make a suggestion on is the astro...next time give the foreground a little bit of illumination it just adds a ice dynamic to it
I'm fortunate that we have no debt and live on the road full time. We can take extended trips wherever we want and it's all a write off. I did a focus stack for the foreground since it was inches from my lens. I have a stack with the front pieces illuminated, but they just looked wrong when I did the blend. Granted, I was working fast on my laptop and probably didn't give them a fair shake. Will probably revisit that when I have some free time (whenever that happens).
I've lived in Oz all my life and I STILL havent been to Uluru 😳 You've got me jealous now mate and I've gotta get out there real soon. Loved the photos Peter, hope you and your wife loved your stay here in Oz 😁👍
It was awesome. That was my 7th trip to Australia and visit a new place everytime. Definitely worth the trip to make it out there. I'm sure you've heard that they're closing uluru for climbing next October if you have the dream of doing that. Drive (or hire) a 4WD so you can make it out to the many other locations around here. There is so much to see and photograph, I really wish I had a full week in just this area alone. Oz is just too big!
Yeah I heard something about they were going to close the climb of Uluru, though Im not sure I'd make it up the top these days, these old legs wouldnt make it LOL I want to just travel all around the top end of Australia one day and you are right on both accounts, there is SO much to photograph and people dont truly realise how big Australia is😳
I live in yulara and I haven't had the chance to get the milky way on uluru, even less that close... any tip for that?? sadly I have no wide angle lens
You're about out of time to shoot the milky way this year. Thankfully you have some time to do so next year. A wide angle lens is by far the easiest to capture it. A longer lens necessitates a faster shutter speed or an equatorial mount if you want the milky way to really show up in your image. I shot this at 14mm f/2.8 and 13s iso 3200. I like crisp stars so can't really run a much longer shutter. As far as shooting it inside the park, they do close the area before full dark so a willingness to chat up the ranger while your camera shoots on it's own is a good skill :-). Definitely practice getting just a shot of the milky way from wherever you are so you're positive you know how to shoot it and it meets your standards. Good luck! I really enjoyed the area and was so happy to get such a great shot.