Bill Hatcher Photography

Broken Hill

Click the link below or (here) to view images I made for a story feature Broken Hill: After the Rains published this month in Australia Geographic magazine. The Australian outback around Western New South Wales and the Darling River Basin look very different now following months of local heavy rains and flood waters flowing from Queensland. The best part about this assignment was the chance to witness a once in a lifetime phenomenon and a desert transformed. When shooting the aerial photos for this story I discovered every dry lake bed filled with water, the rivers over their banks and the red desert turned green. And it appears the continued flooding in Queensland will bring even more water to the desert. 

 

Photo(s) of the Week: shooting with a 35 mm focal length lens

I am thinking about getting the new Fuji X100 compact camera that is being released this month. One possible issue with the camera is it has a fixed lens. I wondered if this fixed 22 mm (35 mm equivilent) lens would work for me or if it would be a big limitation.

I found the answer to this qustion by looking at images I am editing for my stock agency. I checked the metadata from those images to see what focal length I used. It turns out I use the classic street photography focal length of 35 mm quite often.  Here is a selection of the photos that I took using my Nikon D300s at the 35 mm focal length. The 35mm focal length does seem to have a timeless street style look. I guess this means I'll have to place my order.

     

All these these images are taken in either mainland Australia or Tasmania.

 

 

Packrafting the Franklin River Tasmania

I am just returning from packrafting the Franklin River in the Franklin-Gordon Wild Rivers National Park in South West Tasmania with Roman Dial and his son Rome. The Franklin River is Australia's equivalent of the Grand Canyon for its sense of remote wilderness and challenging boating. We took 5 days exploring the 100 kilometer long canyon from the confluence with the Collingwood to Sir John Falls on the Gordon River. Click here for Roman's video from the adventure.

The rivers fast moving waters offer kayakers, rafters and especially packrafters with day after day of challenging white water. Our first camp, perfect for three people, was the Huon Pine camp ten kilometers down stream from the Collingwood-Franklin confluence. The Huon Pine that is this camps name stake is over a meter wide and is estimated to be almost 1,500 yeas old. This Huon, seen in the picture above, has a perfect view of the Franklin and grows just above the high flood zone 18 meters above the river level .

Scouting river left on the lower rapids of Thunder Rush in the Franklin Rivers Great Ravine. Our portage around this rapid involve a high portage requiring some fixed line and a short rappel back to the river.

Biking the White Rim Trail, Utah

And there's hiking too. Of course just a couple of weeks before our mountain bike trip around the White Rim Trail a massive rain storm destroyed parts of the trail see it here. Some of the trail reopened so we decided to go anyway as an out and back. That meant there was more miles, but who cares when much of the riding is smooth and fast.

The section up the horsethief Trail, rangers tell us, will not be repaired until spring/summer 2011. But if you are willing to spend more miles on the bike the out and back is an excellent way to go.

 

Exploring Sydney with the Nikon D-300s

These are some photos from a recent day I spent in and around Sydney. Occasionally I have to remind myself that I am living in one of the most beautiful cities in the world. What better place to catch up on the Nikon D-300s camera than photographing iconic scenes around Sydney.

You might remember a couple of months ago I was vacillating between several compact cameras. What I was looking for was something that could work as a small discreet street camera. I reviewed many point and shoot type cameras and I decided the Leica X1 was tops for resolution and will fit in your pocket as well. But the Leicas limitations including slow focus and a fixed lens had me looking again at SLR cameras. I finally decided on the Nikon D-300s. The Nikon-D-300s will not fit in even a large pocket, but you get so much more for the same money spent on the Leica X-1 (I paid about $2,000 USD for the Nikon with a 35mm 1.8 lens). 

Why an SLR? I have been using SLR cameras with a gazillion functions, plus auto focus and interchangeable lenses for years so I decided why should I accept the limitations of a fixed lens range finder or point & shoot camera. Simply put a great shot only comes along once in awhile and I knew the SLR camera gives me the best chance of capturing that image.  

 

The D-300s is not the D3s, but it's fast, compact and reliable and really the perfect SLR for street photography. I saw these Marilyn Monroe look-a-likes on George Street. Taken with the D-300s 35mm 1.8

New lens from Nikon the NIKKOR 24-120mm f/4G ED VR

Nikon has introduce some more new lenses today. The one that I am excited about is the NIKKOR 24-120mm f/4G ED VR you can read more about it at Nikon USA (here). The older version of this lens first introduced in 2003 made Ken Rockwell's list of Nikon's ten worst lenses because it was so unsharp. I had an old 24-120 3.5-5.6 and I didn't think it was as bad as Ken made it to be. I liked the lens because it was compact, worked on my full frame D-700 FX cameras and had a very useful zoom range on the cropped sensor of the DX camera ( it's about a 35-180 zoom).  I used my old 24-120 on many expeditions and got what I thought were some great photos that were acceptably sharp, but with it's variable aperture the lens was not perfect. 

If the new 24-120 f4 is anything near as sharp as the Nikon 16-24 f4 (Ken claims this is sharpest best handling ultrawide-zoom ever made and I agree) and If it is anywhere near as robust as some of Nikons newer pro lenses (Nikon says the new 24-120 f4 is weather sealed and the optics are nano coated) then this lens will be a must have lens for any adventure photographer. I look forward to getting my hands on one soon.

Canyoning and photography in the Blue Mountains

I have discovered that winter is not the best time to visit the wet canyons in the Blue Mountains of New South Wales. But I have been interested in seeing what these places look like and I had a free day this week to drive up to the Blues. I was joined by photographer Rich Crowder also an American living in Sydney. Before heading to the Blues we discussed a list of possible canyons. We settled on Nayook Canyon near Deep Pass in the Blue Mountains. This canyon is very short, not very technical (when we went there were several fixed ropes) and most importantly (since it is winter downunder) you do not require a wet suit for swims. I treated the trip as a way to test some photo setups in the canyons. It would be a nice step before heading into more challenging canyons with photography in mind.

 

Nikon D3s 1/10 sec f 16 ISO800 SB900 with a lastolite softbox.

Rich in the fern gully in Deep Pass Canyon. I found the canyons to be deep, dark, wet and very green. For photography the environment presented challenges with lighting and color balance. There was also the constant issues of dealing with the pervasive moisture and moving through the canyons and up ropes with cameras.

 

Nikon D3s 1/30 sec. f 7.1 ISO 200 SB-900 flash

At the second pool a length of rebar hammered into the rock sets the anchor for the  fixed line, a ratty piece of 11 mil. 

3 pm on a winters day  at the second pool you wouldn't want to swim. 

 D3s on a tripod 24mm lens, 1/13 sec f11 ISO 640

It was a great photo adventure. Now I have my camera and lighting kit figured out for canyoning. The kit would be my camera with a 16-35 f4 vr lens, flash with cord and small softbox. All tucked neatly in my Watershed waterproof bag. I'll just have to wait for summer or have my dry suit shipped over from the U.S. before my next trip in the canyons. Take a look at the photos Rich made while during our trip to Deep Pass on his blog here.

 

 

Why do People Climb Trees?

After Melbourne's devastating fires of Black Saturday, that killed  mainland Australia's tallest known trees, tree hunters like Brett Mifsud and others were on the lookout to discover new giant trees in Australia.  I joined them last week to climb a newly discovered giant tree in a forest miraculously left untouched by the 2009 fires. The tree discovered this year by Brett and named Black Beard is a remnant tree, one of just a few scattered survivors, of the 1939 fires that swept through Victoria and the trees of Toolangi State Forest.

 

Brett led a group of four tree climbers and myself into the forest north of Melbourne. The trip was intended to make an accurate height and volume measurement of this giant. When we reached the tree it would take the team half a day of rigging rope, climbing and measuring to confirm if the tree would set a new record for an Australian giant. The measurements are made using an actual tape measure from the top of the tree to the ground and making many trunk and limb diameter measurements as well.

 

 

Black Beard is massive and distinct from the surrounding smaller trees that germinated after the 1939 fire. The  trunk of Black Beard has a diameter just off the ground of about 12 meters. The photo above is of a climber 10 meters off the ground. The image below is about 60 meters up in Black Beard. This eucalyptus mountain ash is estimated by Brett to be about 400-450 years old.

 
 
Tree climbers in this group have many reasons for climbing trees, but they all agree they share a passion for exploring the forest and climbing the biggest and tallest trees.

 

 

In this photo Brett ascends the tree past curtains of hanging bark a feature that inspired him to name this tree.

 By the end of the day Black Beard  measured to be 72 meters tall and having a volume of about 230 cubic meters. This does not make Black Beard  Australia's biggest tree, but it's discovery is significant and adds to the record of living giant trees in Australia and the ancient remnant giants in Toolangi State Forest. According to Brett there are still more giants out there waiting for discovery. 

 

 

Artist Roxy Paine's Neuron installed at the 17th Biennale of Sydney

Once every two years Sydney becomes the stage for the art extravaganza known as  the Sydney Biennale. This years art event will be showing 440 works by 146 artists from around the world. The Biennale will be held at several locations around the city from 12 May until 1 August 2010. The Biennale has been credited with exposing the city as well as Australia to contemporary art from around the world. Wikipedia had a really cool thing to say about the Sydney Biennale on this page.

This year the theme of the Biennale is THE BEAUTY OF DISTANCE: Songs of Survival in a Precarious Age. The artistic director of the Biennale is David Elliott who has lots of experienced around the world in the installation and exhibiting of contemporary art. David Elliot also happens to be a writer, curator, broadcaster as well as a museum director and lecturer. The Biennale will host works by hundreds of artist from around the world. Last year the event drew crowds of nearly half a million. 

Typically the art for the Biennale is not revealed until the opening day. This year however the center piece for this event, located on the front lawn of The Museum of Contemporary Art near Circular Quay in Sydney, was installed this week. It is a very large sculpture of welded tubular stainless steel titled "Nueron" and created by artist Roxy Paine from New York City. I spent a couple of days shooting photos and watching this sculpture take shape. It is a large sculpture (1100x1070 cm in diameter) and required several days to install. The installation crew included two welders and the studio manager from the Roxy Paine Studio flown in from NYC, an installation expert from the James Cohan Gallery in NYC, and the installation staff from the MCA. This team with the help of a couple of  cranes, man lifters, welders and grinders  moved "Nueron" into position from two 40 foot shipping containers. The team completed the assembly during one jet lagged all nighter plus two more days. Unfortunately the artist was not able to make it over for the installation. Watching the sculpture go up was a very cool experience. I have followed Roxy's work, especially admiring his Dendroids work, for several years so it was a great experience to see one of his newest works installed in Sydney.

 
Here are some words about this work that I took from an artist statement posted at the site. The "Nueron" is part of a series of works by Roxy Paine called Dendroids (an example is his exhibit "Maelstrom" on the rooftop of the Metropolitan Museum of Art  NYC last year). This new work continues his focus on the idea of dendrites and synapses, the means by which information, knowledge and experience are electrically transmitted through the body. 

Since this is a photo site I am obliged to give some technical data on this photo. The photo was made before sunrise on the final morning of the installation.

nikon D3s handheld with a 16-35 f4 vr lens the light is from a Elinchrom Quadra with two A heads at full power.

New Zealand: Masters of Sport

 

 

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New Zealand: Masters of Sport

The New Zealander Sir Edmund Hillary captures the spirit of the individual Kiwi when he said,  "In some ways I believe I epitomize the average New Zealander: I have modest abilities, I combine these with a good deal of determination, and I rather like to succeed." 

 

New Zealand. Spectacular landscape, sturdy people. Humble. While many people have a perception about what's supposed to happen as you grow older I ran into a lot of Kiwis who quietly rejected the popular notions of life beyond 60.

 

Jan Nicols started kayaking when she was in her 50's. She's known as fearless in the kayak as well as on the mountain bike. She does adventure races and has  been an athlete all her life. She works as a nurses aid and is a grandmother of several.

 

Dick Smith, 82, has been open water swimming for over 50 years. Most of the people coming out of the water at the same time as him were at least half his age, some one third his age. He used to be a school teacher.

 

Mike Ward has done every Coast to Coast, all 28 of them, all 243 km of running, kayaking and cycling. He was a member of parliament and has never had a driver's license. His first C2C was when he was in his 40's.

 

Dave Brash is still pulling down hard. He's 61, and climbs hard 5.10 and 5.11. He's climbed all over the world and his favorite area is the Darren's in New Zealand.

 

The Dunedin over-60's tramping club. They regretted that I wasn't able to make their hike 2 days earlier, which had over 50 people. As it was, I joined them for their 7 hour hike, and since it had been raining, several went down hard in the mud. No broken hips, just smiles and a bit of chuckle and appreciation for the beauty that they walked amongst. The oldest in the group was 83.

 

My time in New Zealand was highlighted by meeting these people. Not professional athletes, just, as they would say, "average blokes". But they undersell themselves, because their youthful attitude, vision, focus and quiet commitment, was absolutely inspiring.