(birds cawing)
(gentle, upbeat piano)
- Well, good morning, everyone.
You find me again in locked up Melbourne,
on my morning exercise.
I'm heading back into the woods,
and hopefully, it's supposed to rain.
So like in last week's video, I'm traveling very light.
I've got a little tripod, my camera and the DGR pocket,
but given it's going to rain, I've got a tiny umbrella,
which is obviously important.
But more important to the camera,
my number one tip would be,
is bring a shower cap, so if we do get some rain,
I usually put the shower cap over the camera
during any heavy falls.
(gentle piano continues)
So, one thing I've been waiting for all,
well, during lockdown over the last, probably,
eight weeks is to be given an opportunity to find a location
and also a composition, that celebrates
the Australian Wattle, which is Australia's national flower,
which you've probably seen.
At different sporting events that are around the world,
obviously we're green and gold at the Olympics, et cetera,
but haven't found any,
but just, literally, I have walked on this trail, I swear,
hundreds of times in the last two years, (laughs)
and looking at a different perspective
with my eyes wide open,
I found a composition that celebrates that wattle,
so let me show you now.
(gentle piano continues)
Beautiful wattle coming in over the trail here,
providing, like, a path, which, again, is obvious,
but because of the heavy eucalyptus in the background there,
they're in quite congested, through into the scene.
And not only does the trail provide, I guess,
somewhere like a leading lung,
heavy canopy of the eucalypts at the back, there,
is also framing that east sky,
and on the right side here, we've also got
some lovely, white, native flowers,
which I'll have to look up, I don't know what they are,
but on the side here,
which I think, potentially, if I come back in another month,
the wattle will probably be gone, but there's banks here,
here, as well, and some great textures.
Again, those grasses we saw in last week's video,
but also the textures of the different shrubs,
and small trees around the edge of the frames.
So, potentially, depending on the,
I didn't actually check PhotoPills
where the sun's gonna rise. I know it rises behind me.
But potentially, I could have had that wattle,
probably with a bit of side light, if I stick around,
so we might stick around, see what happens
in the next 20 minutes.
F13, ISO 400, and one third of a second.
I set the white balance slightly warmer,
'cause I wanted to offset the wattles themselves
with a little bit of, y'know, it's a deeper,
sort of, warmer tones.
(gentle, upbeat acoustic guitar music)
All right, so I've moved a bit further down the trail,
so I'm trying something completely new,
which I'm experimenting with, essentially,
so I've got a theme behind me here,
where I've got a fallen, I think it's a native...
I think it's a native pine, and then I've got
a young eucalypt in the foregrounds, which I'll show you,
but I'm just looking at it again, the textures of the bark,
the leaves, and the native pine, here,
also has a really fine...
Mm, it's not even a Christmas-y tree little effect,
but I'll show you what I've lined up on the camera now,
but a beautiful morning here, absolutely stunning.
So just walking into the scene, so I said before,
if you look, there's actually a native pine here,
with a bit of texture of the bark there,
and the leaves just coming through here,
and there's fallen eucalypt,
which is coming into the scene,
sort of, a little bit like a...
A monster kind of thing, was what I was seeing anyway.
(laughs) But over here, we've also got
the beautiful native bottlebrush.
And again, we've got the textures of the grass
down here, as well, which is making for a beautiful scene.
So, dunno if it's going to work.
We'll have a look when we get back home,
but something a little bit different, and, yeah.
(gentle, upbeat piano and guitar music)
So, it's a very light rain starting to fall,
so, gonna hurry along the trail here,
'cause I've got a place I want to show you,
which looks like someone has set up for a wedding.
(gentle, upbeat piano and guitar music continues)
Ah, the joys of landscape photography
says so much for the rain,
so I've got full sun on me, and on the scene behind me,
but I framed up a shot that took on my iPhone last week,
which I shared on Instagram.
Just here with these, what I think is called Wedding Bush,
I'll check that when I get home,
frame the edge of the trail here.
So again, using the lead under the trail,
nothing unique about that,
but getting the composition and the separation
of the trees correct has been a little more of a challenge,
this is the third attempt I've had at this location,
so I'll turn around and give you a look at it now.
So as you walk into the scene here,
so you see, got the Wedding Bush here,
on each side of the trail, and the trail leading around.
We've got these trees here, these eucalypts again,
they're stringy barks, leading into the scene,
and as we come back with this,
the images make sure that I've separated this paperbark
from stringy bark, and providing a balance across the scene,
of both the Wedding Bush, and trying to really celebrate
those beautiful spring colors.
(gentle, upbeat piano and guitar music continues)
So, I've zoomed in to about 35 mil,
maybe a tad under, to really isolate the sky,
and just really make it all about the textures,
and the colors of spring here,
in the Australian Bush.
Or "woodlands", depending where you are in the world,
or "forest".
(gentle music continues)
One thing I've learned about landscape photography
and woodland photography in Australia,
especially in this part of Australia, is,
you can't beat the weather,
so we had four seasons in one day,
but hopefully, looking at the compositions here,
in the spring, in Australia, was useful for you,
and if it was, feel free to hit that like button, as well.
And, in saying all of that,
the next video you're going to want to watch
is a video that I did a few weeks,
actually, a few months back,
in a cool temperate rainforest in Australia.