The Beauty of a Waterfall

I’ve always loved waterfalls.  I remember dragging my mother along many long and steep bushwalking tracks in the searing heat, just to look at what sometimes was just a trickle of water flowing over the edge of a cliff.

At my recent holiday, I stayed at Hamilton in Victoria.  In a few of the brochures I got before my trip, it kept talking about two waterfalls close by.  Sounded interesting.  Then when I checked into the caravan park, the owner there also told me about the waterfalls (amongst other tourist destinations), and he said one was only a few minutes from town.  He also said it was easy to view with a platform only a few metres from the carpark.  Well that would keep mother happy!

The next day it was a little overcast- good light for waterfalls.  I packed the camera and tripod up and headed to the first of the falls- Nigretta Falls.  The guides weren’t wrong when they said it was only metres from the carpark to the viewing platform.  But not the best view.  There were a short set  of stairs that led to a better vantage point, so off I went.  I ended up nearly in the river trying to get the best spot, but even though it was overcast, the light was harsh and too bright to get the lovely flowing water I wished for.

I liked the composition of this photograph, and the colours of the rocks, but really wanted to have ‘soft’ water falling into the pool below.  In order to do that I needed to photograph the falls either early in the morning or late at night.  However, it seemed the weather was not going to be kind to me- it was raining most mornings and storms came through of an evening, so here I was thinking I’d missed out on getting back to the falls.

The second last night of my stay, the weather gods looked favourably upon me and gave me clear skies.  I packed my gear into the car and headed back to the waterfall.  The light was bringing out the colours of the rocks behind the falls and it was just getting dark enough to take a long enough exposure to get the effect I wanted.  I took numerous shots that evening, up to two minutes long and was so pumped to get back to my cabin and upload the pics to my computer. I was sure there was a good photo in amongst them all.  A couple of the photographs I had taken from half way down the stairs were looking promising, and after HDR processing  three images, I was surprised to see a swirl emerge in the pool of water below the fall.  I never noticed this whilst taking the photographs, but was happy I’d composed the photo to include it. I was also impressed by the colours of the rocks and the water falling is silky smooth.  Here is the end result-

I hope you enjoy my photographs as much as I enjoyed taking them.  They are both available to purchase, just click on the images to be taken to my RedBubble portfolio.

Have an awesome day

Johnah