Thoughtfactory: large format

a minor blog about the trials, tribulations and explorations of large format, analogue photography in Australia

photography in high summer

The  two photographs below are an experiment. 

At the time I was trying to obtain a washed-out or bleached, high summer look. The photographs are of nothing much, the technique I used was overexposure, and the camera  was a 1960's heavy metal Super Cambo 8x10 monorail,  a Schneider-Kreuznach 240mm  lens and  a Pronto shutter.  

The photo below is of the mouth of the Hindmarsh River  at Victor Harbor on the Fleurieu Peninsula of South Australia: 

South Australia has long periods of  little to no rain -- 5-6 months after the winter rains and during the high summer everything looks dried and withered. It looks as if things are just hanging on until the rains arrive in late autumn. The  plants usually  look as if they are  in bare survival mode. Dead almost. 

The emphasis of the experiment was on the 'harshness'   of the landscape not  its beauty. The effects of climate heating  on Australia was in the back of my mind at the time.  The projected CSIOR climate change scenario for South Australia is one of  rising temperatures, less rainfall and drier conditions.  

This  second picture  is  of a section of a couple of pink gums --- roadside vegetation on a back country road in Waitpinga in the early morning summer light:

There are no bird sounds here within this agricultural landscape. It was not difficult to imagine  this  particular world  when the leaves on the trees were few and far between.  

Hence the experiment  to figure how  to photograph an excess of light and heat -- what photographers, including myself,  normally shy away from. The result of this experiment were discouraging.  I needed to rethink my approach --  maybe to  shift towards harsher imagery.