Victoria A Photography
A Photograph captures a moment in time, to view for eternity
Autumn leaves – Treasury Gardens & Fitzroy Gardens, East Melbourne
After an appointment in Melbourne’s CBD on Monday, I decided to walk through the two main Gardens on the eastern edge of the city to partake of a rare sight (in recent weeks) – flawless blue sky and a perfect Autumn day. I thought this year’s Autumn days strangely absent in recent weeks due to cold winds, rain and minimal sunshine.
When I saw the photo of St Peter’s Anglican Church (c 1846) on my computer screen, I immediately thought of a postcard – the sky was such a vivid blue and the Autumn leaves so pretty with their russet-brown, orange and gold colours.
My afternoon walk on Monday revealed Autumn’s true colours and bright green young grass (from all the rain we’ve had in recent months).
I couldn’t decide which photos to share, so you’ve got a whole series.
This post is about 2 gardens next to each other. The Treasury Gardens, a relatively small garden/park (for Melbourne) – mostly trees and a small pond below the Treasury Administrative Buildings on the eastern perimeter of the main CBD (Central Business District) is first. I was there just as the office workers were walking down to partake of the sun drenched seats to eat their lunch. I couldn’t find a park bench free so I had to eat my lunch standing up watching some Australian Wood Ducks having a snooze on the stone edging of the pond. The brown-headed one in the rear is the male and the one in the foreground with the stripe over its eye is the female.
A strong gust of wind blew the water plants in the foreground to the left in this next shot. I wish I hadn’t chopped off the city buildings, but did want to show you the vivid orange leaves of these two trees in this image. I don’t know what kind of trees they were and unlike the Royal Botanic Gardens to the south of Melbourne’s CBD, they don’t have plant identification markers next to them.
Then a quick walk across the road takes you into the Fitzroy Gardens which are much larger with the Conservatory near the western perimeter.
I thought the next photo was interesting in that the top part of the tree was bare – the wind having blown all the dry leaves to the ground. But the lower branches still had dried leaves clinging to the limbs.
I love the way the sun casts golden stripes across the grass and trees at this time of year.
The two storey cottage in the image below is probably the main caretaker’s residence for the Fitzroy Gardens. Outside the fence, there was a long row of bright red flowers which looked a nice contrast against the green grass and multi-coloured Autumn leaves.
There is a tiny stream winding its way across the Fitzroy Gardens with a fern strewn gully. The sun cast its golden glow intermittently between tall trees to highlight various ferns along the small gully edge.
During the lunch hours, these gardens, (like the Treasury Gardens), will be filled with office workers and hospital staff from the nearby main hospitals which are located on the eastern side of the CBD.
Autumn leaves will continue to collect on the walking paths until all the deciduous trees are bare for the coming winter months in Melbourne.
Not sure where I had the focal points on the DSLR placed in this next shot of some hazel branches. There look to be only about 3-4 few leaves on the right hand side of the frame in focus.
I couldn’t decide which of the two following images to post, so you’ve got both.
A few leaves remain on this tree located outside the caretaker’s residence.
This area of grass (below)was filled with shafts of sunlight and shows how lovely the gardens in Melbourne are at this time of year.
Late afternoon in a city laneway – Melbourne CBD
These photos were taken late afternoon as the laneway cafes were starting to close for the day.
I’ve walked this laneway full of cafes and bars many times in the past, but somehow never noticed that all these cafes had Street Art on their lock-up roller doors (to be viewed after business hours).
Golden Pheasant or “Chinese Pheasant”, (Chrysolophus pictus) – Melbourne Zoo
Wikipedia says………
The Golden Pheasant or “Chinese Pheasant“, (Chrysolophus pictus) is a gamebird of the order Galliformes (gallinaceous birds) and the family Phasianidae. It is native to forests in mountainous areas of western China, but feral populations have been established in the United Kingdom and elsewhere.
Despite the male’s showy appearance, these hardy birds are very difficult to see in their natural habitat, which is dense, dark young conifer forests with sparse undergrowth. Consequently, little is known about their behaviour in the wild.
And here in this second sentence lies the clue to why I have never before been able to get a decent photo of this beautiful, elegant, stunning male bird, for it’s the male that I have been trying to photograph since I first saw it last year. It is in a fairly small, dark cage and runs away behind the bushes as soon as I put the camera up to my eye. It’s so dark in its enclosure, that any shaft of sunlight which might fall on the cage only penetrates the gloomy interior to a small extent, so no light for photography and impossible to shoot from a tripod.
It seemed shy, but I caught it, finally, when it sized up its brown and rather dowdy female counterpart.
I quickly turned the ISO up on my camera to its highest at 3200. I’m actually surprised there is not more grain or noise in the image.
I was actually rather enjoying the male Golden Pheasant’s attempts to court the female. He stalked up to the female, looked her over from every angle and then came and stood over her prone position. The female didn’t bat an eyelid (if she had any eyelids). In fact, she didn’t move or twitch and acknowledge the multi-coloured male Golden Pheasant at all.
Then the male walked off in disappointment (I thought). So ended my one and only chance at capturing a photo of this gorgeous bird. I’m quicker off the mark these days and had actually increased the ISO setting as high as it would go and taken a shot before it stalked off.
That’s what constant practise at the zoo has given me in the last 6 months – more skill in following a moving object and I’m finally thinking a bit more quickly. This is probably the only image I will ever get. Didn’t have the opportunity to think about the composition or background and wanted to leave both their long tail feathers in the frame. The female’s tail looks a bit like a lizard’s tail with all those stripes.
Australian Shelduck (Tadorna tadornoides) ? – Japanese Garden, Melbourne Zoo
With the Great Aviary still closed due to building works nearby, my bird photography at the zoo is limited to the Japanese Garden, the pond next to the Kangaroo enclosure,the cages enclosing the various Finch families and the variety of birds in the budgerigars enclosure/cage for the most part.
The pond in the Japanese Garden varies from day to day, visit to visit. Yesterday, it was mostly seagulls plus a couple of bird varieties which I’ve been trying to photograph for quite some time.
I think the duck in the photo below is an Australian Shelduck, but it’s brightly coloured chest looked more orange than chestnut to me. It’s been hiding under bushes or in deep shade on previous zoo visits.
Note: I forgot to mention the Australian Wood Ducks, Common Mynas, Dusky Moorhens, other common birds in suburbia and, of course, the Peacocks and Peahens wandering around the general grass and footpath areas of the zoo. Also forgot the Cormorants, Nankeen Nigh Herons and Pelicans over in the Lagoon near the enormous Orangutan area.
Come to think of it, there are great numbers of Spotted Turtle Doves and other birds just about everywhere, so the closing of the Great Aviary for several months doesn’t mean that visitors to Melbourne Zoo miss out on the feathered variety.
Stone Ornament in the pond – Japanese Garden, Melbourne Zoo
Overall, I like simple shots of simple subjects in photography, although Black and White images remain my favourite. I took a lot of photos of birds in the Japanese Garden yesterday. Once again, with mixed results. Yesterday, the tall bamboo plants and other thick undergrowth on the island in the middle of the pond cast deep shadows on the rocky area where the birds normally stand.
Then I had the sun casting bright shafts of light across the pond which made it hard to decide which part to include in a photo composition.
I took one shot of the Japanese stone ornament in the middle of the water and after downloading it onto my computer last night, was surprised to see how many different colours were reflected on the surface of the water.
New Meerkat babies (Suricata suricatta) – Melbourne Zoo
Yesterday was such a beautiful warm blue-skied Autumn Day that I made an effort to get to the Zoo early in the hope of getting better lighting conditions for photography. Not so – for the most part, the sun was right in my eyes standing at the best places to get clear shots.
Wouldn’t you think they would have designed the zoo so that viewing areas are better for us photographers (Big Grin).
Despite the continued difficulties of bright sun and deep dark shade (which I’m not really experienced enough to shoot in), I got some wonderful photos to share.
The Meerkats have had babies recently. 
Most of the 4-5 babies I saw seemed to be slightly bigger than a large man’s hand, but there was one baby that was even smaller. Not sure whether this was an even more recent litter or just an under-sized Meerkat from the same litter as the others. I took about 60 photos trying to get them in focus and without the sun’s glare on their bodies.
Most of them looked like little fluffy toy dogs.
I had mixed results, but the photos taken kneeling down very low and through the thick glass viewing screen were the only ones which showed the babies clearly. I just had to sharpen the focus, edit the contrast and de-saturate the colour slightly to compensate for shooting through the thick dirty viewing window.
2 images got deleted straight away as they had a sun flare on the image.
I took 4-5 shots of an adult Meerkat standing up ‘keeping watch’ (as Meerkats do in the wild) from over the top of the 4 foot high screen which turned out well. I had the added advantage of being able to lean on the screen to steady the camera.
In the end I scored about a dozen reasonable shots out of the 60 and 3-4 really good images.
………………and a shot of an adult standing upright in the sun on top of a sawn-off log, which also doubles as an eating table. I took 3 photos of this particular animal and the shot below turned out the best. I usually have the white balance setting on ‘Shade’ at the zoo as this gives much warmer colours and backgrounds. I prefer this warmer tone, even though it was a sunny day and this white balance setting probably wasn’t necessary.
I suppose you could call this photo (below) a Meerkat Portrait, as the pose and sunlight almost made it look like a studio photo with special lighting.
One mean, scary Emu (Dromaius novaehollandiae) – Melbourne Zoo
I’ll come clean and admit this fully grown Emu walking straight towards me last Monday scared the ……….out of me. I thought I was in big trouble and got ready to run, but it walked straight past me (Phew!).
This is not the first time I have been scared of a BIG bird and I can assure you these Emus are really big when they’re fully grown and have very sharp claws. Even though they have no discernible wings and are flightless, apparently they swim surprisingly well.
Whoops!
I mean this bird in the following photo…………….
Bongo (Tragelaphus eurycerus) – Melbourne Zoo
I first saw this beautiful antelope with its striking reddish-brown coat back on the 21st April this year. I took several photos, but only the image below, where the female was facing the wrong way, turned out to have reasonable focus and minus the cage wire. Back in April, the mother and baby were located right at the far back of the enclosure which was some 40-50 feet away.
It is a mostly nocturnal animal in the wild and takes flight easily.
This family of 3 Bongos were right near the front of their enclosure last Monday, so I had the opportunity to get a better look at their striking markings and beautiful coloured coats.
I started off with the photo below. It looked pretty faded and of course the bars of the fence got in the way.
Then the sun came out from behind some dark rain clouds and I got a better idea of the rich, vibrant colour of their coat. They are truly a beautiful animal with the curly horns. The second photo (below) also got the animals in focus, but again with the bars. Sometimes it takes 3-4 shots before I get the distance and focal point right and the cage bars (or wire) disappearing.
I managed to get several photos of them through the cage bars but most were poor compositions as I couldn’t get the one focal point of the DSLR on their eyes.
I ended up with only the one good shot and that was portrait sized of the female Bongo’s head. Until the next zoo visit I’ll have to be content with this one clear image.
Boxing Kangaroos – Melbourne Zoo
When I was at the Zoo on Monday, I was lucky enough to see a couple of Kangaroos ‘Boxing’ (or should I say, a very tame version of ’boxing’ – looked more like a quick cuddle to me. The zoo kangaroos didn’t use their powerful hind legs on Monday, so no doubt it was not the aggressive fight one would see in the wild).
I might add that I have seen the real thing on my brother’s farm in country Victoria. They do indeed ‘box’ and it’s such an amazing sight.
This very blurred photo (below) of the kangaroos boxing in a distant field on my Brother’s farm was too far away for my 18-200mm telephoto lens (& 12 months ago my skill at taking photos of subjects this far away is not as good as it is today). My excursions to the zoo in the last 6 months have given me plenty of practise at photographing moving animals and I suspect I might be able to take a better shot if I saw these kangaroos in this pose again. .
In some areas Kangaroos are almost in plague proportions, whether it be near farms or in the outback of Australia. The photo below shows a group in a distant field (next to my brother’s farm). Once again, a long distance away for my DSLR telephoto lens. The tall kangaroo standing in the middle of the field would probably be close to 8 feet tall.
Wikipedia gives some of the history of the term ‘boxing’ kangaroos for those interested, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boxing_kangaroo
And now to my slide show which actually looks very tame. I might have done better to put the camera on continuous shooting or made a short video clip of it. If anyone is interested, there are plenty of YouTube clips of the real thing, although I DO wonder if some of those YouTube clips have been doctored a little. After watching this slide show, you almost get the feeling that the kangaroos are putting on a brief act and at the end, that one kangaroo looked straight at me as though to say “was that a good performance – we did our very best for your PhotoBlog and hope that your followers from overseas enjoyed that short performance.”
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