Cairns, Townsville and Brisbane

[fi5hbone]

So did not manage to bring the camera around much as there were simply too many activities to do and wasn't sure if it were safe to bring the ol' D70 around. But tried when I can.

Anyway, it was a great trip and I really loved the itinerary that we took. Here is a rough breakdown. Had excellent accommodation as well and spent in total about SGD3,200 in total including airfare and accommodation.

Cairns: White water rafting, Paronella Park (an old Spanish castle), dining corn beef and fish and chips beside a waterfall, snorkeling along the Great Barrier Reef

Townsville: Castle Hill, Magnetic Island with wild wallabies and kangaroos, horse-riding in the sea, Strand Night Markets and should have done snorkeling and diving too. (Great Barrier Reef stretches to Townsville). Marinetime Museum, cheap seafood, many many many boats

Brisbane: Warner Brothers Studio (new rides since I went there eons ago. Vertical shootup aka Batman something something, Superman rollercoaster ride with 4.5Gs and -1G, Lethal Weapon aka upside down dangly legs, Scooby Doo indoor roller coaster and well, Marilyn Monroe. The famous Steve Irwin zoo, great brush with nature and hanging with more kangaroos. Not to mention cheap suburb food, driving around hunting for strawberry farms in Caboolture, Sunshine Coast and freaky Ghost Tour.

#1 A Window To


#2 Gateway to Paronella


#3 Glimpse into the Past


#4 The Way to Mary


#5 Rush

[fi5hbone]

#6 Marilyn Monroe


#7 Mr Tiger (soft soft picture. can't seem to make it work after a rainy day and behind a glass)


#8 Rock Wallaby


#9 Irwin-ian Respect


#10 Along the Esplanade

[fi5hbone]

#11 Along the Esplanade Again


#12 Search for Strawberries


#13 Castle Hill


#14 En Route to Paronella


#15 Markings on the Sand

[velasco]

i love 1 , 3 ,6 ,13 and the lomo effect on the last pic works.

besides that, i realized that there seems to be alot of ghosting (2,4 and 12), did you have multiple layers for the pictures?

i really love 3!!!

if you could crop off the rails on the left side of 13 that would be marvellous.

glad that you enjoyed the trip

[fi5hbone]

Really good eye you have there. Yeah the ghosting for 12 seems to be the worst. I tried to merge some of them as the vast terrain and harsh lighting made it difficult to capture what I wanted with my limited knowledge of exposur-ing.

I love 13 as well, liked the little house on the top of the hill but didn't manage to figure out what it was. Think it might be just a security house or something.

Glad you enjoyed the photos!

[velasco]

Originally Posted by fi5hbone Really good eye you have there. Yeah the ghosting for 12 seems to be the worst. I tried to merge some of them as the vast terrain and harsh lighting made it difficult to capture what I wanted with my limited knowledge of exposur-ing. I love 13 as well, liked the little house on the top of the hill but didn't manage to figure out what it was. Think it might be just a security house or something. Glad you enjoyed the photos!

haha

well your camera dont have the autobracketing for exposures?


haha yesh 13 rules but looking back again, theres a bottle on the left foreground. PP away? hahahaha

[fi5hbone]

Got some queries about the budget of SGD3200 so I'll just put the skeleton here:

Took Brunei Airways, transit about 1.5hours in Brunei all the way to Brisbane. Proceeded to travel to Cairns via Virgin Blue. When we were done in Cairns, we took a greyhound down to Townsville. From Townsville was another Virgin Blue flight back to Brisbane and from there back home to Singapore. Total was about $1028 for both international and domestic flights.

Accommodation came up to about AUS470. At Cairns we (3 of us) stayed at this place called Oasis Inn Cairns at about $115 a night per room. Awesome place. The folks in charge Martin and Rose were awesome hosts and were super duper friendly, helping us to book our snorkelling trips and all. At Townsville, we stayed at Roberts Town Comfort Inn, slightly pricier at $156 per room, but it's because of the peak period, major footy game, atheletics competition and a Jehovah's Convention going on so the whole town was booked. But at $156 you get a hotel standard room with room service, mini bar and everything. Awesome place as well. At Brisbane we stayed at Bown Terrace Accommodations, basically a little backpackers place along Barker Street in New Farm, just about 15 - 20 mins walk to the CBD or a 7 min bus ride. Cheap food, convenience stores, etc all within walking distance. Fantastic hosts there as well, John and Laura were very helpful in aiding us with our directions and little things like that.

The rest of the money went to food, where we did budgeted a little, rewarding ourselves with a big meal once in about 2 days. Bulk of the dough went to paying for snorkelling trips, entrance tickets, day tours and such, renting a car, etc.

Free and easy rocks. If anyone would like to ask more about the trip, just shoot.

[fi5hbone]

Originally Posted by velasco haha well your camera dont have the autobracketing for exposures? haha yesh 13 rules but looking back again, theres a bottle on the left foreground. PP away? hahahaha

Yeah it has but I had trouble keeping really steady as I was shivering! Fringes of winter is still brrrrrr!

Thanks for the heads up about the bottle. Come to think of it, it was quite funny really. You see things like that 286 metres above sea level where it would take 45 mins to an hour to climb to the top and people would want to spoil it by dumping rubbish. Funniest thing was that we saw cigarette butts even! Didn't think that they would still have breath left in them to puff after making their way all the way up!

Castle Hill on Wiki: [Link]

[zoossh]

the consistency of the pics range from good to not so good.... think #6 maryln, #13 castle and #1 window to... are the better ones, though the light fall off or vignette on the right on the maryln shot is not enhancing to the picture.

[fi5hbone]

Appreciate the comments there zoosh.

Do share a bit more about the not so good pictures. Got my notebook out already

[zoossh]

Originally Posted by fi5hbone Appreciate the comments there zoosh. Do share a bit more about the not so good pictures. Got my notebook out already

it is not so easy to comment fairly on the rest cos the optical/digital quality is not in its best and further processing just make the texture worse. i'm not sure the equipment or setting you have, but i'm speaking from my experience of my old 3.2MP compact and the photos i've taken with dslr in suboptimal conditions (lighting, misfocusing etc....) processing usually does not salvage, let alone enhance. i presume u use DSLR as i see the same sensor dirt on #13 and #15. but i see drastically different and swinging extreme approaches in processing for example #14 and #15, one with overtly low contrast and another with overtly high contrast. the "digital grittiness" which comes with these contrast levels make them less impactful, while similar contrast in which the texture, detail and dynamic range is maintained will appear more natural.

much of the less successful shots (in my subjective opinion) are those in which there is a lack of an engaging subject in sufficient volume, without which the composition can look mundane even if you have post processed to fill it with vibrant colors. this becomes even more apparent where a "typical HDR-looking" processing is being done, becos the flattening of shadows and highlights all to midtone removes depth and subject of focus often cannot stand out. pictures where there is a lot of space, may require in replacement of the fine details, some pretty good patterns or colors with good texture.

and sometimes the forcing of a picture of single exposure to look HDR creates what i call loopholes, or patchy alterations, which i think perhaps is shown in #1 (i may be wrong, do point out if so). i presume you have adjusted to taste the exposure u like in most parts of the picture, but there are two areas that appears to be excluded, the blown highlight in the car window with a narrow gradient to colors, and the car door in shadow. if we imagine the frame to be under artificial lighting, then it would be seem to be a lighting that shines on all but with a lobang in the middle.

[fi5hbone]

Originally Posted by zoossh it is not so easy to comment fairly on the rest cos the optical/digital quality is not in its best and further processing just make the texture worse. i'm not sure the equipment or setting you have, but i'm speaking from my experience of my old 3.2MP compact and the photos i've taken with dslr in suboptimal conditions (lighting, misfocusing etc....) processing usually does not salvage, let alone enhance. i presume u use DSLR as i see the same sensor dirt on #13 and #15. but i see drastically different and swinging extreme approaches in processing for example #14 and #15, one with overtly low contrast and another with overtly high contrast. the "digital grittiness" which comes with these contrast levels make them less impactful, while similar contrast in which the texture, detail and dynamic range is maintained will appear more natural.

I have to admit that some of the images up there are less than desirable in my own opinion as well. Strangely, it looked so different on my D70's preview LCD and how it was on the computer. I did a photo print of some of those photos and they do look different from the computer as well. Some of them I purposefully included the "digital grittiness" as I seem attracted to the effect it creates but it does pay to be prudent and to think twice about using it. I did however like the boats one though!

Originally Posted by zoossh much of the less successful shots (in my subjective opinion) are those in which there is a lack of an engaging subject in sufficient volume, without which the composition can look mundane even if you have post processed to fill it with vibrant colors. this becomes even more apparent where a "typical HDR-looking" processing is being done, becos the flattening of shadows and highlights all to midtone removes depth and subject of focus often cannot stand out. pictures where there is a lot of space, may require in replacement of the fine details, some pretty good patterns or colors with good texture.

Excellent point there. Perhaps you could point me in a general direction on how to go about this little dilemma I have. I am at a place. Presented with a breathtaking scenery which would really help if I have a panoramic camera to take in everything. Because capturing just one part of it just doesn't seem to be able to express how I felt at that time. What then should one do?

Originally Posted by zoossh and sometimes the forcing of a picture of single exposure to look HDR creates what i call loopholes, or patchy alterations, which i think perhaps is shown in #1 (i may be wrong, do point out if so). i presume you have adjusted to taste the exposure u like in most parts of the picture, but there are two areas that appears to be excluded, the blown highlight in the car window with a narrow gradient to colors, and the car door in shadow. if we imagine the frame to be under artificial lighting, then it would be seem to be a lighting that shines on all but with a lobang in the middle.

#1 is actually a true HDR. It did look correct in my LCD preview when I took the photo though and the blow out parts did not really look blown out. It is quite an old camera but I would still like to think that I have much more to learn instead of coming up more quid to get a new one! It really puzzles me what happened in Australia when I took some of the pictures. I never did seem to have similar problems when I took pictures here in Singapore. I suspect it might be the cold and the difficulty of keeping my hand steady or the fear since I am on someone's property but I was so disgusted with some of the photos I almost wanted to give up photography altogether!

Thanks once again zoosh. Looking forward to hearing more from you if it ain't too much trouble.