Before I launch in to a day by day “story” of my Larapinta Trail experience, here’s an overview of my trip as completed:

Day 1: Alice Springs to Wallaby Gap = 13.7km

Day 2: Wallaby Gap to Arenge View = 24km

Day 3: Arenge View to Pravda Spur = 18.6km

I'm always looking for places to go in the Top End region, new places to explore and photograph. I was recently looking for some information on Maguk (or Barramundi Gorge) in Kakadu National Park and although could find the basics from the Parks Australia website - http://www.parksaustralia.gov.au/kakadu/ - I found it difficult to find "real life" experiences on exploring and the location. When I say "real life" experiences, I mean blogs from travelers of where to go, when is best to go, different routes and walks, experiences on what people saw, what was great, where to look for certain things, etc etc. There's actually not much in depth, local information in a "kakadu blog" google search. What does show up are mainly short excerpts from people just doing the highlights of Kakadu as part of an extended trip.

Anyway. So what I want to start doing is sharing my experience and knowledge of these places in Kakadu….

A few weeks ago I bought the new Tamron 150-600mm f5-6.3 Di VC USD lens to use on my Canon 5D Mark III. I mainly shoot landscape and nature photography, and this lens was an upgrade from my Canon 300mm F4 L lens mainly for use on birds and other wildlife. The zoom range may also come in useful for me for more distant storm and lightning photography.

I was nervous to try out the new Tamron lens…

It's been a while since I posted a work-through of a particular photo. My processing techniquye and style has probably evolved quite a bit since then, so I thought it time to do another one.

This example is slightly different in that I'm going to use two versions of the same image, to blend together for a correct and balanced exposure. The image below is probably not the best example of when and why to blend two images together - the image below is more so just to show the technique….

We ended our 6 day walk with the final 5km down from Sweetwater Pools to Edith Falls. Edith Falls was a welcome site at the end of the walk - it's probably one of my favourite swimming/relaxing spots in the Top End…

Day 4 was the big day on the Jatbula trail - 17km. The walk was broken up in to two chunks, 12km and 5km with a stop at Edith River crossing after the first 12km. We got through the first 12km a supersonic speed and arrived at Edith River crossing when we thought we still had 3km to go. A lovely shady spot for lunch with a chance for a cool off! The first 12km on this day was an easy walk - flat and good terrain. The remaining 5km proved to be a little trickier…

Day 2 was a longer day than the first, travelling across the top of the escarpment. This day ended at Crystal Falls as the campground, although we actually didn't see any "falls" until the walk the following morning….

I’ve just returned from a hike in the Katherine region known as the Jatbula trail - a combined photo-trip/remote camping getaway! This walk is the first multi-day bush walk I’ve done in years and the first one my partner had ever done. The first thing I have to say about the Jatbula is that it was AWESOME! We loved it! The walk was really interesting and travelled through a variety of Top End habitats. Maybe we appreciated the varying landscape a little more than an interstate or overseas visitor, as we could really notice the smaller differences in the vegetation and the types of habitat as we were a little more familiar with the area.

We travelled through open woodlands on top of the escarpment, where we saw some amazing open views across hills, cliffs and buttes. There were monsoon pockets, bushfire-burnt regions, 2-metre high grasses, mushy marshy floodplains, amazing rock formations and colours, creek crossings and some of the best waterfalls I’ve seen in the Top End. We saw so many birds too (but thankfully only one snake and no face-to-face encounters with buffalo)!

For anyone considering walking the trail…

I’ve been using a Canon 5D Mark III since their release in 2013 (I think it was?!), along with a 17-40mm F4 L Canon lens. I’ve never been happy with that lens - it felt like a reduction in quality from where I had previously come (I was using a Canon 450D and a Sigma 10-20mm f4-5.6). I found the 17-40mm was never as sharp as I expected from an L lens, it suffered badly with distortion and chromatic aberration….

Last weekend was a public holiday here in the Northern Territory, and due to our light rain levels this year the Kakadu rangers and road-workers managed to get the awesome Gunlom pools open to visitors…

I'm going to do a short step-by-step work-through of what processing I did...

to achieve this image…

Although I have done a basic work through of my workflow before (that's a mouthful, isn't it!), I thought it was time to do another one where I've used a fairly new technique: luminosity masks. For those who already use Photoshop, you would probably already be using layers and masks. However for those who don't use Photoshop already, it is important to understand a little about layers and masks....

What is a Graduated Neutral Density (GND) filter? How would I use one?

GND filters are a square or rectangular filter.

They are 50% dark grey, and 50% clear.

The dark grey half will reduce the brightness over the area it is positioned, whilst maintaining an exposure for the clear part.

GND filters are useful for sunset photography as they darken out a bright sky…

There are two things I believe are the most important things to get right, in camera. The first is composition, you can't change that in post-processing aside from a little cropping. The only way to stop elements "overlapping" in a photo (e.g. no tree coming out of a persons' head, etc) is to move your feet and camera at the time of the shot.

The other most important thing to get right in camera is…

Took a trip out to Kakdadu National Park (again!) last week - the road to Twin Falls, one of the park's most spectacular waterfalls, had reopened again. As I hadn't visited Twin Falls for a couple of years, I decided it was time to make another trip Kakadu. Every "escape" to the park, I wish there was more time…