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Danny Tan's picture

Amphitheatre

I dont see many takes from this spot of the Gog & Magog that is located in Victoria, Australia which strikes as odd as I wanted to have my own take and after my first visit I could understand why.

Several key elements needs to be in place in order to make this location any justice.

Decided to take the chance several weeks ago and drove in wee hours to catch the sunrise as the forecast was promising and the receding tide was very low.
I felt very fortunate to have this in our backyard and had this spot to ourselves that morning.

Hope you like it

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10 Comments

I love a sunburnt country... but before the sun comes up. Nice shot!

Thanks so much Darin!

It's very rare for me where the conditions go in my way so I'm glad it worked out.

I'm not a fan of summer either :)

I echo both your sentiments, Danny! Hva had to be patient, sit out the lockdowns and summer, and now can't wait to head down the west coast & Grampians in June, and Tassie again later. Yay!

sounds like an exciting year ahead for you Chris!

Nice job as ever, Danny! Worth your considerable effort.

One tiny compositional nit-pick - I think I'd have angled the camera up a tiny bit, or perhaps stepped back a little if possible to thicken that sliver of rock near the top frame edge a little.

Also, your sea horizon is not quite level.

So just pop back down and do it all again, OK? ;-)

Thanks so much Chris! I had other shots with the extra bit of ceiling near the top frame and picked this instead as the former felt a little closed in and pulled my attention from Gog & Magog.

The cave is not exactly spacious either and was trying to not slip on the mossy rocks (which I did twice) and at the same time wiping the water that was dripping from the top onto the camera.

Always appreciate your kind feedback mate :)

The viewer doesn't see what wasn't in front of the camera!

I'm glad you took those extra shots so you could make a considered choice - maybe I'd have ended up doing the same as you. I get the impression that many here don't do a lot of compositional variants at the scene as we both apparently do, or worse yet blast away ending up with massive stitched panoramas from which they hope to carve out a composition.

Your comps are good, and my guess is that it's partly because you visualise the final image as much as possible in the viewfinder. Would I be right? Do you do much stitching? What about focus stacking? Just curious, as you're one of the better photographers around here, and much stitched and stacked work on FS leaves me totally unmoved.

So true mate with the viewers dont get to see behind the scene.

You're always been kind with my work and truly appreciate it.

Yes I do visualise the final image but mostly even before arriving or switching on the camera which could be my undoing as I usually come home without any usable shots.

I did consider pano stitching but my lack of experience especially with the moving waters would make it worse.

I typically use UWA lens so focus stacking is usually not necessary although this image is a perspective blend between the cave ceiling and the rest.

This is to try balance Gog and Magog while trying to fit in the cave. Don't usually do that but thought this would be fitting.

If you "usually come home without any usable shots", Danny, you must be out there an awful lot cos you've posted a lot of fine images!.

Not as much as I would like to 🙏😊 Melbourne weather certainly doesn't help 🤣