Helen Stephenson's Australian Pictures - February/March, 2000 - Sunsets

Most of these photographs were taken in South Australia during February and March in 2000.

The first picture was taken outside of Strathalbyn on the Bletchley road. I was initially disappointed with it, because I was aiming for "in your face" colours, and that isn't the way this picture turned out. However the more subtle colours and the way the tree silhouette shows up not only against the sky but also against the hills in the background give this shot a charm all of its own.

These two pictures are actually the same shot. The one on the left is the way my print appeared when it came back from the lab, while the one on the right is the way it looked after I went a bit wild on the computer with it. I know that photographing an Australian windmill is a terrible cliché, but this is a particularly fine windmill with a 24 blade fan, which makes it quite a big one. It is in the Red Creek area, some kilometres east of Wistow.

The next three pictures were taken in New South Wales near Chowilla on a very bumpy dirt road.

The fence line visible at the extreme right edge of the one on the left is the New South Wales/South Australian border line. This picture is a good example of why one's (borrowed) tripod should not remain in the car boot while one improvises by supporting the camera on a fence post, as there is a good bit of camera shake evident. (The exposure length was considerably longer than 1/60th second.) I have done what I can in Photoshop with the Unsharp Mask Tool, but this will never be a really good picture even though my sister in law likes it a lot.

I then turned 90 degrees and faced into South Australia to record the fading sunset. The picture came back from the lab as it's portrayed on the right, but a bit of computer wizardry dredged some details up, and I have included it this way in the centre.

This shot was taken coming up the Back Callington Road.

A truck parking bay near the Mount Barker summit on the Adelaide bound side of the South Eastern Freeway was the location for this shot.

A drive out along the Callington-Strathalbyn Road provided this view. I like the sheep along the skyline.