Is this the face of Pele?

Image by Danielle Lancaster

Kīlauea, the youngest and most south-eastern volcano on the Big Island of Hawaii, is the home of Pele, the Hawaiian volcano goddess.

Kīlauea’s magma-plumbing system extends to the surface from more than 60km deep in the earth. This week I have had the fortune to photograph this massive volcano that has been erupting constantly since 3rd January 1983 though this is not when she started her fiery fury.

In fact, yesterday while on the volcano, more than 100 earthquakes were recorded. Hawaiian chants and oral traditions tell in veiled form of many eruptions fomented by an angry Pele before the first European, the missionary Rev. William Ellis, saw the summit in 1823. The caldera was the site of nearly continuous activity during the 19th century and the early part of this century. Since 1952 there have been 34 eruptions.

Kīlauea ranks among the world's most active and accessible volcanoes with many saying she tops the list. Lives and houses have been lost and this is a site where you can truly see the landscape change before your eyes.

Fast Facts about Kīlauea
The Hawaiian name "Kīlauea" means "spewing" or "much spreading".
Type: A Shield volcano
Elevation: 1,277 m
Area: 1,430 km2 and growing.
Located around 48km southwest of Hilo in the Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.
Currently produces 250,000-650,000 cubic yards of lava per day! That’s enough to resurface a 32km, two-lane road daily.
By January 1994, 491 acres of new land have been created on Hawaii's Big Island – much more than that now.

Image by Danielle Lancaster

Where we stayed:
Kilauea Lodge, located in the quiet village of Volcano around 2.5km from Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.

The Lodge was originally built as a YMCA camp in 1938. Owned and operated by chef Albert and his wife Lorna Jeyte it also has a great restaurant and hot tub! Their cats, Meatloaf and Lamb Chop, patrol the grounds and during your stay you are sure to meet them.

Rooms were nice and clean. Ours had a fabulous fire place which kept us very warm as the cool night air came in. All rooms decorated with art works and feature stained glass windows. Rooms start from $170.00 US and include a full breakfast. We got our room for $120.00 through Bookit.com\

Free Wi-fi available. Common room with DVD’s, games and books. Beautiful gardens.

Our rating: 8/10 and we’d stay here again.

More: http://www.kilauealodge.com/

Image by Danielle Lancaster

Tips for photographing lava fields

Do a search on the internet for ‘why use a polariser filter’ and you’ll get great tips on this fantastic filter that should be in everyone’s camera bag. There is information on why to use it for landscapes, reflections and colour saturation. However there is one landscape that does not get any mention – lava landscapes! I found a circular polariser invaluable during my shoot this week at the most active volcano on Earth – Kilauea – and its expansive lava fields.


Lava contains high levels of silicone and silicone reflects light. So my advice: when visiting lava fields be sure to use a polariser.

The Mauna Ulu Lava Flow of 1974 from Kilauea with a polariser filter.

The Mauna Ulu Lava Flow of 1974 from Kilauea without a polariser filter.

Fun in Photography with Apps

Sick of blown out skies or dark foregrounds when taking photos on your iPhone? Well they are a thing of the pasts tells gadget girl Anita, with the App Pro HDR!

With a simple tap on your screen your iPhone will take two images, one exposed for the highlights and one for the shadows and quickly merge the two images to create an evenly exposed image.

One of the great things with this is App is it allows you have the choice to let the camera decide what part of the image is the brightest and darkest or you can switch to Manual mode and select those parts of the image yourself. Once merged you have the option to move sliders and adjust Brightness, Contrast, Saturation, Warmth and Tint. After you use this app for the first time you'll be hooked - even if you're not a fan of HDR images in general you'll love the effect you get, in camera from this application. A great App that is certainly well worth the $'s
(Works on iPhone 3Gs, iPhone 4 & iPod Touch 4th Gen)
Pro HDR - $2.49

Guest blog by Anita Bromley
Anita Bromley is a photographer and tutor with Bluedog Photography. Her main passion is low light/night photography, however she is happy simply to have the camera in her hands and the opportunity to click away.

Images by Anita Bromley

Hasselblad and the Masters

The night before last I won a copy of the Hasselblad Masters Volume 2 Emotions. Just another photography book? Not likely.

Back in June this year I keenly clung to Hasselblad’s new H4D-60 camera, the only one bought into the country for ‘showing’, yet I would call it teasing. This week we saw the official launch here in Australia of this state of the art camera.

It bought back memories: the feel of a good quality medium format digital in your hands is something not to be taken lightly and as a fan of the medium format this little box excited me greatly.

The rep, keen I didn’t snap too many frames and wind up the shutter count, I think, breathed a sigh of relief when I finally took the camera away from my eye. This baby boasts a 60 megapixel 40 x 54mm sensor and with it sets new industry standards.

The unprecedented resolution delivers an ultimate level of image detail, making it ideal for commercial shooters who demand ultimate image resolution or for any extremely discerning photographer who demands both creative flexibility and ultimate image quality and this is where I see Hasselbald’s audience growing. 

Back to the book................

“The Hasselblad Masters represent photography at its finest; at its most inspired, most communicative, most beautiful. They are young, old, western, eastern, classical, experimental, traditional, modern, and futuristic. They have perhaps but one thing in common: they are masters at conveying an instant, an emotion, with images. Masters of the art and craft that is photography.”

In commoner terms, it’s a mighty impressive ‘read’ or should we say viewing. 

Nice work Hasselbald on both the book and the camera (the camera is on top of my Santa list), that can really deliver what we want from in-camera so perfectly. Now that has to keep loads of us happy!

My favourite quote from the book:
“Emotion is the electoral current that flows through an image”. Joao Carlos

Image by Hasselbald Master Chinese Bang Peng is the winner of this year’s Hasselblad’s Landscape and Nature award. A series of his from his western region of Sichuan Province in China captures the culture and colour of a maybe barren environment.

Image by Hasselbald Master, Mark Holthusen, USA

They're off and racing!

Around Australia there will be a buzz tomorrow with the running of the Melbourne Cup, however in Melbourne and at the renowned Flemington Race Track that buzz will be a little louder as the Victoria Racing Club (VRC) celebrates the 150th running of the ‘race that stops a nation’.

From humble beginnings in 1861 the Melbourne Cup today draws international attention and is said to now be part of Australian culture. For those that are not making it to the main track there is plenty to keep shutter fingers happily snapping around the tracks.

Here’s a couple of horse racing photograph tips:

Positioning is important and of course you want to be as close to the action as you can. But don’t go climbing the rails or hanging over them.

Don’t forget the bookies....there can be a myriad of opportunities in the betting rings.

Never fire a flash towards the horses racing – it can spook them and Thoroughbreds are highly excitable!

Look down. It’s amazing the patterns and objects discarded on the ground that can make interesting images.

Turn your camera towards the crowd – there are some great reactions there to capture especially as the race ends.

Try keeping the sun to your back so the horses are nicely lit. Shooting into the sun is more likely to produce silhouettes.

If you can get near to the fence as the horses pass the finishing post you may capture some exciting finishes which always look better!

On the bend is another area that can provide fabulous photography opportunities. At this point the riders are spurring the horses on for the best position plus you can (depending on your position) have some tremendous lead in lines with the rails.

Starts are exciting photography opportunities – just give the horses room to move.

Let the best horse win!

Tonight in my Backyard: Ray Flash, Ringflash

Tonight in my backyard.....
The frogs are croaking loudly and what else is one to do, but have a little play.

I found this little fellow close to my back door and decided to put the Ray Flash through a few paces.

The Ray Flash ring adapter is a flash light modifier that turns your flash gun into a ring flash. Now, I have never been a fan of ring flash – yes it has its place in dental, medical and some fashion fields, however I have generally found the frontal lighting of ring flash to decrease texture of the subject.

And again I found this so tonight. The other glaring disadvantage of using ring flash is the reflection of the ring flash itself in the subject’s eye.

While the design of Ray Flash unit is quite complex, it does an impressive job of loosing just one stop of light – this can be seen either as a disadvantage or an advantage depending on the field you are working in. It acts merely as a reflector and changing the quality of light always comes at a price of light loss and reduced shooting range.

Some of the benefits of working with it included allowing me to get in close, between the fronds, so I was working the minimum focusing distance of the 105mm macro lens while no matter what, due to terrain I could not set up a flash/s to emit side lighting.

Another great benefit of being an adapter to a modern flash is to be able to work with TTL systems. As many other flash light modifiers, Ray Flash does not affect the TTL metering, so you can, if you prefer, enjoy the convenience of the modern technology of TTL. I prefer to do my flash work manually. Why in macro? For two reasons, I want my whites, white and my blacks black and by controlling my aperture I can also control how much of my subject is sharp plus the flash output.

Another advantage of the Ray Flash is it is colour neutral and does not change white balance.

The overall opinion: An exciting tool in budget. Great for creating a unique look specific to fashion photography, works great as a shadowless fill light in the same situation.

Still to be proved for macro images as the drop off for night photography is far too evident and frontal light continues to decrease texture and exaggerate highlights. If it’s not a main tool in your kit and just used to grab that moment, then maybe a worthy investment as cheap.

Did you know:
The ‘backyard’ to Bluedog studio is the oldest National Park in Queensland and the third oldest in the world! A unique environment indeed! To see more on what to do when visiting Tamborine Mountain visit: www.blue-dog.com.au/Tamborine-Mountain-information-walks-photography.htm

Image by Danielle Lancaster (c) 2010

Images that inspire.

Sometimes images keep coming back into my head.
Some of them by other photographers and some of them actually mine.
Other photographer’s images inspire me. No matter if they are professional or amateur.
My own bring back memories and challenges I set myself.
Nick Brandt’s images do inspire me greatly and a book or print of his, is on my wish list this Christmas!
http://www.nickbrandt.com/