Tuesday 10 July 2012

Stairway to the Moon (Broome)

             Fuji S2 Pro, M exp, 1/90s @ f5.6, 400ISO, 70-400mm Nikkor on 400mm. 5.32pm 22Jun2005

Sometimes photography is just plain hard work; boring; frustrating and mind boggling. Well, at least that's what i've heard a few 'pros' say. Personally, i don't ever feel like I've really worked a day in my life. I have fun and I'm lucky enough people pay me to have fun.
Wildheart had run a  photography workshop in Broome, Western Australia. Broome is a magical, romantic old pearling centre with a colourful multi-racial population ofa couple of thousand. But in the southern winter all the grey nomad retirees head north in their caravans and motorhomes to sip chardonnay, watch the Eagles and check the internet to see how much their super has dropped overnight.
So there I was on the clifftop outside the Mangrove Hotel with my 400mm lens and camera mounted on my 40 year old tripod with a  shutter release in one hand and a glass of champers in the other watching this bloody humungous, awesome moon rise over the tidal flats. I was thinking life was pretty good.
Just a few metres away were two couples, with compact cameras and stubbies of XXXX (obviously Collingwood supporters). I heard the slightly raised female voice say,
'What do you mean you have a  flat battery?'
Her hubbies reply was a defensive mumble and inaudible. But her response was very audible,
'Dont give me that!!! last year at Uluru you had a flat battery then as well!!!!'
'Rhonda' was not happy.

I wandered over to see if i could lend a hand. The two couples were from Melbourne. Between the four of them they had two compact cameras. Both had flat batteries! They had flown all the way from melbourne to Broome to spend two nights specifically to photograph the 'Stairway to the Moon'. Not only was hubby not going to get the Stairway to the Moon, on my reckoning he was not going to get much else that night.