June 28, 1018 — Cape Saunders, Otago Peninsula, South Island, New Zealand Just a half a minute later, three seconds of intentional camera movement. (Nikon D850, Tamron SP 24–70mm f/2.8 Di VC USD G2. RAW processing in DxO PhotoLab 3.2; Editing in Adobe Photoshop.) For more Abstract Horizons, go to www.amagaphoto.com
June 28, 1018 — Cape Saunders, Otago Peninsula, South Island, New Zealand If you go due south from this spot, you’ll come to Antarctica. If you go due east, you’ll hit South America. Either way, it’s chilly. It wasn’t all that warm right where we were on this winter afternoon, either. This is sort of how it looked. Kind of. (Nikon D850, Tamron SP 24–70mm f/2.8 Di VC USD G2. RAW processing in DxO PhotoLab 3.2; […]
June 28, 2018 — Puketeraki Lookout, Otago, South Island, New Zealand When the clouds part over New Zealand, there is a glow. I know the trek is not yet over, but it is being traveled with aplomb. Be well. Do good. Create. (Nikon D500, Nikon 200-500mm f/5.6E ED VR zoom. RAW processing in DxO PhotoLab 3.2. Final editing in Adobe Photoshop.)
June 28, 2018 — Puketeraki Lookout, Otago, South Island, New Zealand Rescued from the archives. Here’s one that I kept coming back to, but in post-processing I could never get it to do what I saw. Tonight I could. And did. Persistence pays off in the end. This is for all the Kiwis who are showing the rest of the world how it’s done. In adversity, the light shines even brighter. Persistence pays off in […]
January 24, 2020 — Londrangar View Point, Snaefellsjökull Peninsula, Iceland I think I’ve only done this once before: posted that same frame twice in a row, with the second being a re-do. There’s a story. When I posted this picture the other night, I decided at the last minute that the image was too dark. It was late and I was in a hurry, so I simply went back to the 16-bit Photoshop file and […]
July 1 and 2, 2018, Near Waipara, New Zealand. We were staying in a remote location near the Greystone Winery. Our trip was nearing the end and I was losing hope of getting a good shot of my favorite New Zealand bird: the New Zealand fantail — the Maori names being Pīwakawaka, Tīwakawaka, or Piwaiwaka. The trouble was, being insectivores, they were in constant darting motion playing “you can’t catch me,” which made them very […]
June 28, 2018, Otago Peninsula, New Zealand. This is a bonus post. A few minutes before yesterday’s shots were made, this bigshot chased us off the beach. Tony told us this guy had been troublesome at times and had chased several people away. He told us to run if he started chasing. Run fast. New Zealand sea lions can sprint 26 kmh. (16 mph.) My wife got the lead shot before he decided to mess […]
June 28, 2018, Otago Peninsula, New Zealand. A one-day tour of Otago is like going to a gourmet restaurant, having the amuse bouche, and leaving — but there we were, and we were going to get everything out of our day that we could. Tony said it was very important that we get to the beach by 3:45. “Why?” “Because that’s when the penguins come home from work.” “Oh. Really? 3:45? Exactly?” “Within a very […]
June 20, 2018, Doubtful Sound and June 28, 2018, Otago Peninsula, New Zealand. New Zealand fur seals were hunted to near-extinction in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and were injured and killed by the thousands by commercial fisheries well into the twentieth century. In New Zealand, they have been protected by law since 1978. The show-off above was guarding the mouth of Doubtful Sound in Fiordland National Park. This mother and child were on the […]
June 28, 2018, Northwest of Dunedin, New Zealand. After the photography workshop, we rented a car and headed southeast from Queenstown to Dunedin and then took a week to drive all the way up the east coast of the South Island. We fell in love with Dunedin, which reminded us a little of San Francisco — although it beats San Francisco by having the steepest street in the world. While there we took a tour […]
June 25, 2018, Peter’s Lookout, Mount Cook Road, New Zealand. Lake Pukaki is fed by the runoff of two glaciers. The fine silt in the runoff, known as glacial flour, makes the water turquoise. Take a look at satellite photos of the Southern Island and it will stick out like a turquois thumb. We stopped for a lunch break on the way to Lake Tasman and fed our stomachs and our cameras. These two photos […]
June 22, 2018, Haast Pass-Makarora Road, New Zealand. A quick stop on the way to Fox Glacier. I posted photos of Fox Glacier back in February. The road we were on leads through a temperate rainforest pass in New Zealand’s Southern Alps out to the Tasman Sea. There are many waterfalls along the way. This is a small somewhat abstracted crop of one of the most impressive. (Nikon D850; Tamron SP 24–70mm f/2.8 Di VC USD […]
June 21, 2018, Wanaka and Lake Wanaka, New Zealand. You can’t go to the South Island of New Zealand without going to Wanaka and getting your own shot the famed lone willow. Here’s mine. Water: Mirror flat. Late-afternoon sky: Entertaining. Tree: Noble. Gary and Don showed us shots they made just a week earlier when the water was all the way up to the base of the trunk. Conditions change fast. Just before dinner we […]
June 21, 2018, Te Anau-Milford Highway, New Zealand. Our planned sunrise shot was a wash: thick fog meant no sunrise to speak of. Actually, no visible sunrise at all, although the sky sort of got lighter. A bit dejected, we got into the van and motored off. But as we headed north toward Mirror Lakes, another opportunity presented itself. A soft frosty hillside lay before shadowed mountains with the sun just behind them about to […]
June 18, 2018, Closeburn Beach Lookout, Lake Wakatipu, New Zealand. A year ago this week, on our first evening of a photo workshop led by Gary Hart and Don Smith. A few kilometers west of Queenstown. Although Mother Nature was very kind to us regarding lighting and sky, we were not yet used to freezing fingers from her June winter. (Nikon D850; Tamron SP 24–70mm f/2.8 Di VC USD G2. RAW processing in DxO Pro; Editing […]
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