Well … this is weird, I’m writing my first blog [so exciting] but only about 2 people have subscribed, in fact no one really knows my new website exists! I haven’t yet told the world my site has arrived but I’m getting close, so maybe a few people will knock on the door soon and I will have an audience, meanwhile .. I’ll just write this.
So, this is it, this is my new website, I hope a few people like it and get some enjoyment from what’s going on here. This is a long term project/journey and one I hope some of my friends will join me on. This is partly a portfolio and partly a journey through a photographic diary, many photos I will revisit here have never been seen before, so I hope you enjoy them. But I think I might kick off the first blog like this …
The Story of The Cover Photo.
The photo I have used for the cover of my new site is a popular one, and one that I had planned and, for change, worked out according to plan.
I live in an area that grows a lot of sugarcane, I have noticed that some years the flower on the top of the cane gets a strong purple colour, sometimes it stays white, I’m not sure why. But I always wanted to get a photo showing the purple flowering cane and this was my attempt. To get the best effect I wanted a setting or rising sun behind the cane to get the ‘glow’ happening so I did some planning. I started looking, a cane field, purple cane, setting sun, with a scene that was interesting to look at, this was getting complicated!
There’s a coffee shop, there’s always a coffee shop involved in my planning, but this one is on The Gillies Highway where the highway reaches the top of the range, 900 metres above Cairns, at the start of The Atherton Tablelands and just down the road from home. I was sitting there enjoying a coffee one day and looked across the road, it was a huge cane field and the cane flowers were turning purple. Behind the cane was a hill, with some trees and a house and another mountain in the distance .. mmmm, interesting .. and did I mention it was facing west. This was it, this was going to be my shot.
Later that afternoon I went back to line up a shot and check where the sun was setting and it looked good, so now I’ll just wait for some more purple in those flowers. A few weeks later it was time, time to make a first attempt at getting a sunset over this field of purple cane.
It was the 12th June 2024, a cool breeze blowing with a clear sky in the west as I got my tripod out of the car and set my camera up to get some test shots. I decided that I would bracket a few the shots to create the photo, this was because the light in the sky was so intense, usual practice for a sunset/sunrise photo. I got a few practice shots then the sun was getting close to the horizon, I continued taking photos till the sun was below the horizon. It was now time to go home, get the photos into my computer and choose the ones I like best for processing. I wont bore you with the details of this process but suffice to say I was happy with the result. Many people commented that they liked the photo which was pleasing, a few people purchased prints and canvases.
But this image does have a claim to fame in my small world, many people know I like to print big, I do love to see my photos in print and the bigger the better. But this photo holds the record for being the largest any of my photos have been printed.
Last year I was contacted by a local business, the Atherton International Club, who were looking for some new artwork for a room they were refurbishing. Well, I wasn’t sure what to say when they said they wanted my photo to be printed as wallpaper and to cover the whole wall in this room. What an enormous compliment it was and the end result was jaw dropping. So when it came to choosing the first cover image for this site it was hard to go past the largest photo I have ever had printed.
Well that’s the story of ‘Sunset On The Gillies’ and how it became wallpaper. I intend to tell some stories about many of my photos past and present, so if you’d like to follow these and my photography in general please consider ‘subscribing’ to be kept up to date.
Thank you for dropping in, I hope to catch up again soon.
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