Earlier this year I was in Darwin shooting for the Northern Territory Library. I organised for one extra day in my schedule to allow me to zoom out to Kakadu & shoot some virtual tours. It’s a 3hr+ drive each way from Darwin to Jabiru in the Kakadu NP, so I didn’t expect to have much time for shooting. Plus the wet season wasn’t over yet, so most places were inaccessible. Even so the couple of places I could get to were amazing.
The Nourlangie and Nanguluwur art sites are a short drive from the Kakadu visitors centre and about a 1.5km (1 mile) walk. The art & rock shelters are amazing to see, and very worthwhile.
Quite some time ago I was in Tasmania shooting hundreds of virtual tours. One morning while staying in Hobart (capital city) I got up at 4am to drive out to Port Arthur (1.5hrs away) to shoot virtual tours at sunrise.
Driving 1.5hrs for a sunrise shoot is always a little risky. It’s still dark when you leave, so all you have to go on are the weather reports from the night before & what clouds you can see locally in the dark. Fortunately this morning was beautiful.
30+ Port Arthur Virtual Tours.
The Port Arthur ruins are some of the oldest in Australia and sit on a beautiful waterway. If it wasn’t for the cruel & severe life convicts endured here… I’m sure it would have been quite lovely.
Port Arthur Ruins at Sunrise
Port Arthur is the most popular attraction in Tasmania, the heritage listed park is wonderfully maintained, with a large and informative visitors centre.
The Annual Canberra flower festival – Floriade is on right now… up until the 11th of October 2009. If you get a chance… go, it’s beautiful. Now I’m not a flower lover in particular, but they build all sorts of images in flowers, it’s amazing stuff.
When I shot the festival last year I happened to arrive in Canberra about 1hr before it finished for the year. I not only witnessed the amazing flowers, but the aftermath, as festival volunteers got to dig up whatever plants they wanted.
Floriade Aftermath. (Only for volunteers)
The fact everything was about to be destroyed also meant I could walk all over the flower beds as well, getting to the middle of them for virtual tours, which was great. I would have loved to shoot pole panoramas there as well, but unfortunately time didn’t permit.
With all the noise about the Sydney Dust Storms this morning we here in Queensland were watching with interest… until about lunchtime when the dust storms hit us as well, 1000km (620 miles) north of Sydney.
Surfers Paradise Beach – Under Dust.
I figured if the dust got so thick I couldn’t see buildings about 300m (1000ft) away I’d head into Surfers Paradise and shoot some virtual tours for posterity. As it turns out we got the pea soup thick dust, so I took the shots.
Surfers Paradise Beach – Typical Morning.
Here is the full set of 4 virtual tours I shot today. You can also check them out on maps in the virtual tour player. Click the ‘map’ button, on the lower right control panel.
Dust storm virtual tours.
Finally I did up a quick comparison page showing each of the dusty scenes as they normally look. You can check it out here:
Like everyone else in Australia & many around the world our hearts are heavy at the devastating loss of life & property caused by the Victorian Bush Fires.
Being a dad with a young family I cannot read the tragic stories of loss without imagining my family in those horriffic situations…battling the flames for their homes, then battling or fleeing for their lives. Just considering this is more than I can bear.
Being 2000km from the fires & with all my money invested in Panedia, I’ve been pondering what I could do to help. The answer was obvious, use what I have & what I do to raise money for the Victorian Bushfire Appeal, so that’s precisely what we’ve done.
We’re selling high quality large panoramic prints of regions devastated by the fires. We’re then donating 100% of the profit from sales to the Victorian Bushfire Appeal.
The goal is not to have people buy prints instead of donating directly, but to appeal to people who weren’t planning to donate in the first place, or who have already given what they had planned.
