Wildside of the Kimberley- APS Monitor article
11 Mar 2020 -- Posted by :I'm really proud to have my article published in the March edition of the Australian Photographic Society's Monitor Magazine.
The Wildside of the Kimberley.
I’m a professional photographer based in Broome in north Western Australia. 
Having the Kimberley as my backyard is an amazing thing and the reason why I moved here some 30 years ago. It’s also a great place to bring up a family, go fishing and camping and of course has the most stunning photography locations.
At the moment we are in the full swing of our “wet season”. I prefer to call it the storm season, as we don’t always get a lot of rain. Sometimes we can go a few weeks without any storms but when they make an appearance our tropical skies can produce a range of light and colour to delight any photographer. Combine this with a lightning show over Roebuck Bay or Cable Beach and you’re ticking all the boxes.
In 2017 I won the 2017 WA Science, Wildlife and Wild Places, Professional Photographer of the Year with a selection of my images taken across the Kimberley. What a long name for a category! It was such an honour to be recognised by my industry and within the year of going full time in my photography business.
The Kimberley is such a huge area, over 423,500 sq. kms, twice the size of Victoria, so there is plenty of scope for a variety of photographic style and locations to keep you coming back time and time again. This could explain why my passion for photography covers several genres.
If someone asked me what my favourite style of photography is, I’d have to say abstract aerials. The Kimberley is becoming quite well know for producing some excellent aerial photo locations and I have been lucky enough to fly over many of them, some several times. This has allowed me to build up a strong portfolio of Kimberley aerial images resulting in a couple of Gold in the International Pano Awards. Most of these have been taken from a helicopter, my favourite form of transport! But I have also used light aircraft and a drone.
I have lots of seascape and landscape options in Broome and I often get out my ND filters and take long exposures. I can drive 5 mins and be at Cable Beach or a few more minutes and I’m out on the flat landscape of Roebuck Plains. This time of year, the light is beautiful, and the storms are frequent. I wouldn’t call myself a storm chaser, but I do have quite a few weather apps and watch with interest what is happening on them and what is happening in the sky.
Does that make me a storm chaser?
If something is looking good, I try to anticipate where it will be and at what time.
Does that make me a storm chaser?
Probably not, but it’s hard to ignore the weather up here in the “wet” season.
Besides my passion for long exposures and ND filters I am passionate about Astro Photography. The night skies up here in the “dry” season are so clear and light pollution is close to non-existent it’s just made for Astrophotography.
I enjoy building my skills in this area and I always include some night sky photography in my tours. I’m stepping it up a notch this year and in June I will be running a six day Astro Photography tour. Getting out at night shooting takes top priority. There will be tips on astro technique and time for post processing. We head out of Broome for a couple of days to capture one of my personal favourites, boab trees, under the night sky. I’ve also added in coastal locations to capture the colours and textures of the nine metre tides occurring during that period.
Another photographic journey I’m embarking on is creative photography. This year I have teamed up with the wonderful Sandra Dann who has won various awards for her creative style photography including a 2019 Gold Award Creative Category - Better Photography. I am really looking forward to our creative retreat in July where for six days, people can indulge their photography and dig into their creative side. Sandra will help them visualise their creative art and guide them in their post processing. I will take them to locations to inspire them, and assist them to capture images for their portfolio. I’m really excited about this retreat as it is a new direction for me. Best of all when the retreat is done, people should have at least one finished art piece, and lots more in the production phase.
Having grown up in Western Australia I have always loved our wildflowers and now I take groups exploring the best wildflower locations north of Perth every August. It’s more than just wildflowers though as we shoot bird, landscape and aerial photography as well. It’s a fun adventure with like-minded people.
I have lots more to share with you so please check out my website and feel free to email me.
I hope you enjoy my images.
Our Workshops
