Photographic trip to Popanyinning in the Winter of 2015
I took off for a run to that popular weekend destination of Popanyinning yesterday—well it's popular with those of us who know someone there anyway. On the way there, and on the way back, I did something I have never done before. I forced myself to take those pictures I always just zoom past and tell myself "next time".
This first one is of granite outcrop on the left of the road about five kilometers past Rock Inne, and one day I am going to rock into the the Rock Inne—just for the fun of it.
This was taken about 8:30 a.m. in early winter so the sun is still relatively low in the sky and the sunlight is kind of skating off the damp moss and giving it the almost neon green glow. I actually went past this site and then decided I was going to go back and take some shots. So I did a U-turn about three minutes later and drove back to the site.
This next picture was taken about half way through the disease risk forest on the Brookton Highway. There a few pictures that I took in this location about two or three kilometres from each other. There has been a fire through this bit of the bush, probably from a controlled burn, and that has left many of the trees and blackboys (a.k.a. grass trees) with burnt black trunks.
With the sun still low in the sky you get these long shadows from the grass trees (a.k.a. blackboys) look really good (well, I think to anyway) and the sun coming through the tops of the grass trees makes the green foliage sort of glow a bit.
The next shot shows how the controlled burn fire (assuming that is what it was) burnt one tree but completely missed a tree standing next to it.
I like effect of the sun shining directly on the burnt part of the tree and silky shine that it gives it. Pity about the bitumen road in the background—such is the life of a photographer.
I will admit that I was sort of lucky with this next picture, and almost did turn around and go back to take the picture. I saw the 'effect' as I zoomed past at about 100 kph but I made myself go back and take the picture, and I am glad I did.
It shows a burnt out hulk of a tree, but growing inside the burnt out hulk is a new seeding. And I just happened to be in the right place to get a shot as the low sun was shining through and lighting up the leaves on the seedling.
There are a few things here I like. The solid blacks of the burnt out tree, the silver-whites of the faded tree that we can see on the left hand side of the tree, and the new seedling growing in the bowl of the burnt tree.
I was tempted to crop this shot down to just just the burnt tree and the seedling, but in the end I decided to leave it as I took it (as I often do) with the other trees in the shot.
The following tree is really awesome. This is on a property about five kilometres out of Brookton on the way to Popanyinning. I had to drive onto the property a bit to get the pictures that I took. This tree almost looks like someone has painted on it. It almost doesn't look real.
You can't tell from the picture but this tree is quite large. When I saw it I sort of wished I was a painter and I could paint this picture—but I can't draw or paint at all. Completely hopeless at drawing and painting.
On this property there are actually a row of these big trees with colourful trunks. Following is another of the trees which is about 30 metres from the tree above. The trunk is not quite as colourful but is still impressive.
I wasn't quite as lucky with the light on this picture. It was starting to become overcast, but I just like that grand old tree.
These pictures were taken on the trip going to Popanyinning. In my next posting I will put up some pictures taken on the way back to Kalamunda.