australia

Vivid Sydney at Taronga Zoo

/ Mike / Leave a comment

My son’s birthday coincides nicely with the Sydney Vivid festival, where “art, technology and commerce intersect” – three weeks of light shows and sculpture that brighten up the city during the cold (and sometimes wet) winter here.

Taronga Zoo has put on an event for the last few years, with wonderful light sculptures that look like giant stained-glass animals. Needless to say, an afternoon at the zoo, followed by a trip through this surreal landscape after dark has become a favourite.

(Click on images in gallery to see full size).

  • Australia – where the spiders kill the poisonous snakes
  • Lanterns
  • The pangolin
  • The bamboo shoots make a rather nice abstract with the tiger in the background
  • Tasmanian devil
  • Croc
  • Bilby
  • Redback spiders
  • Duck-billed platypus
  • Lion cubs
  • Bejewled lizard
  • The big blue elephant

Parramatta, city of the future

/ Mike / 1 Comment

Sydney is one of the most expensive cities in the world to live and work in, with sky-high property prices. The population is expanding, mostly to the West, and hence, so to is the attention of property developers. Parramatta is a suburb in the western sprawl, and the city council have announced a $1.6 billion investment in new buildings – offices, apartments and retail. And so, Parramatta starts its transformation.Paramatta - city of the future-1Paramatta - city of the future-2Paramatta - city of the future-3Paramatta - city of the future-4Paramatta - city of the future-5Paramatta - city of the future-6Paramatta - city of the future-7

Taken with my new Fujifilm X-Pro2 and 35mm f2 lens.

Liffey Falls, Tasmania

/ Mike / 5 Comments

Liffey Falls

We’ve had a welcome break for a week, and visited friends in Tasmania. We did some touring of the national parks around Cradle Mountain, and made our way to Liffey Falls, where we went for a hike through the rain forest. It’s a beautiful place, with lots of shade beneath the trees, and the ground is easy going.

The Liffey Falls themselves are a series of falls, and the track takes you down them, with great lookouts along the way. At the bottom the trees overhang the edges, creating patterns of light that dance on the water.

I took this with my Fuji Film X-E1 and 14mm lens, along with a B+W 10 stop filter, on a tripod, to get the long exposure. The light weight of the Fuji Film gear, along with a carbon fibre tripod makes a big difference in the “carryability” of my setup – especially welcome on the upward climb!