Pilbara Gems: Hamersley Gorge

Hamersley Gorge is part of Karijini National Park (one of my favourite places on earth). Ironically, it is the closest part of the park to where we live, but we haven't been there for over three and a half years. This is a mistake. Hamersley is amazing.

It's different to the other gorges. Not only is the rock banded, but folded, creating some amazing patterns from afar, and difficult terrain to traverse in the close and personal. You can't just follow the flat rock, because all of a sudden, it gets steeper and steeper until it's vertical!

Hopefully this panorama gives you a sense of this amazing place.

Panorama - 3 shots. Canon EOS 50D, f/5, 1/1000 shutter, ISO 250, 10mm (Wide angle Canon lens)

The Slippery Spa

It is a rare occasion that I wake up early, let alone get up to see the sunrise. On this particular morning, I did both (largely because we were camped in a swag and once it was a teensy bit light I wanted to be up and out).

Photographs of the sunrise will come. This post is about the difficulty of traversing Hamersley Gorge and its folded rocks to reach the spa pool and shoot it before the sun crept over the gorge wall and polluted the scene with its light. (Bit of a strong description there, the sun's not all that bad!).

The spa pool is one of the most photographed pools in Karijini - it's stunning. Ken Duncan's shot it, this guy has, Ben Knapinski who is responsible for many of the Pilbara and Kimberly post cards also has a shot, as well as any other photographer - Pilbara or otherwise - who has visited Karijini. Basically, I didn't want to miss out. Some say photography brings out my competitive side. Well, maybe, but I also like to think it brings out the inspirational side as in "This place is beautiful. Look at what these people achieved! Can I do that? Let's give it a go!"

I had the 4WD boots on for this adventure. No bare feet, this was serious business!

We reached the pool. My husband took himself off adventuring further up and I placed my backpack precariously on the rocks. Let me tell you something about where I am standing - the rocks have been folded so that while they are flat they are not horizontal. Anything but! Completely uneven ground, almost impossible to make sense of.

Luckily I had my trusty $30 tripod with me. I set up, making sure that there was no chance of the camera crashing to its death on the rocks, or drowning in the deep pool. This meant I would press the button, while guarding the tripod as if my life depended on it by encircling it with my arms without bumping it. All the while having my feet in bulky boots, balancing on these incredibly uneven rocks. I changed vantage points many times as one side of the pool was already becoming more and more exposed to the sun. I also wanted to avoid the overexposure of the background. I could have experimented more with HDR I suppose, but I haven't had much success with them in the past.

Eventually it got to the point where I had to jettison the boots as they were more slippery than they were help, go barefoot into the slippery, mossy channel and crouch down for balance so I was basically sitting in the water with my camera and a deep pool in front of me. Precarious. I have never been so nervous about dropping my camera! The sun was creeping further and further into my frame so eventually I conceded that if I didn't have the photo already, it wasn't going to happen that day.

Fortunately I did manage to snap a couple I am happy with. Check it out.

Canon EOS 50D, f/14, O.8 seconds, ISO 100, 18mm, (10-22mm Canon Wide Angle)

Canon EOS 50D, f/20, 2.5 seconds, ISO 100, 10mm (10-22mm Canon Wide Angle)

Canon EOS 50D f/22, 2.5 seconds, ISO 100, 16mm (10-22mm Canon Wide Angle)

Pretty happy with these. A shout out to my husband who drove me here and put up with me photographing these spot for at least an hour before he could go for a swim. He's a legend. It was a 275km drive to Hamersley, I was up before the sun, and spent an hour shooting on completely uneven ground in one of the hardest positions I have found myself in. Worth it? Definately. The things you do in the Pilbara.

The Milky Way

"The universe is big. It's vase and complicated, and ridiculous and sometimes, very rarely, impossible things just happen and we call them miracles."

Yes. That was a Doctor Who quote. Don't look at me like that, you all knew it was coming!

My first attempt at photographing the Milky Way Galaxy. I must admit I am surprised. I researched somewhat on how to take these photographs, and stumbled across, among others, this article. It had some good advice, including the "500 Rule", equipment and post processing.

What became clear to me even before I started was that my gear was most likely going to be inadequate for any super duper shots. All the articles I saw said you needed a fast lens to avoid too much noise due to the high ISO value. My fastest lens is my nifty-fifty - so not much help in capturing the whole milky way! My wide angle is only f/3.5-4.5. My nifty fifty is f/1.8. It really made a difference.

This was still a fantastic exercise though. I went in with low expectations, thinking I wasn't going to be able to capture the milky way at all, that it would be cloudy, or I would forget something. We were driving through the Pilbara at night, me anxiously looking to see where the milky way would be and lo and behold, we pull over to camp and here it is, smack bang in front of me! We were able to set up the chairs, my husband patiently sat there watching me after setting up the swag, and I started snapping as soon as the lights were out! I managed to capture the milky way on the first shot. The foreground, not so much but the milky way yes!

The foreground proved to be my most tricky thing. The milky way was easy, because I knew my shots were going to be grainy and there was little I could do about it, given the gear I had. The foreground wasn't playing the game though. Vegetation was blowing in the wind, my flash wasn't making it over the lens and I had left my external flash at home. I ended up light painting with my headlamp, which all in all was an acceptable solution.

Canon 50D, f/3.5, ISO 1600, 30 seconds, 10mm. 10-22mm Wide angle lens (Canon), light painting in the foreground

 The above is probably the best shot of the milky way I got. You can see how it was windy in the vegetation below, but I like the angle of the milky way. You can see I stopped down the ISO to 1600 because 3200 was just far to grainy. This one is still too grainy to do anything useful with, but still, a lot of fun.

Like I said, I tried all my lenses, especially my nifty fifty because it was the fastest. I could boost the ISO to 3200 for this one, still grainy but not too bad. Composition was a challenge though, because I couldn't actually see through the viewfinder, or even in the live view if I was focusing on the galaxy or not. So there was a lot of maneuvering and guess work involved.

Canon EOS 50D f/1.8, 6 seconds, ISO 3200, 50mm (nifty fifty),

It is incredible that even with a slow lens, my camera can pick up so many stars. What's even more incredible is that their creator knows them all by name.

Isaiah 40:26 - 28. Lift up your eyes on high and see: who created these? He who brings out their host by number, calling them all by name, by the greatness of his might, and because he is strong in power not one is missing. Why do you say, O Jacob and speak, O Israel, "My way is hidden from the LORD and my right is disregarded by my God"? The LORD is the everlasting God, the creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary, his understanding is unsearchable.