The future is just going to be a vast, conforming ‘suburb of the soul’.  –  J.G. Ballard, 1982   28mm, ISO 2000. 30 secs at f9. Light balance 5000 deg K

Live courageously, and produce.  –  Vincent van Gogh  28mm, ISO 2000. 3 secs at f8. Sodium vapour light balance

To make the truth more plausible, it is absolutely necessary to mix a bit of falsehood with it.  –  Dostoevsky Staying three nights this week at Marahau, gateway to Abel Tasman National Park (Nelson), we had lovely evenings “to behold the waxing moon”. At Kaka Pa Point we discovered an easy path down to a sandy cove, Breaker Bay, above which […]

My imagination makes me human and makes me a fool; it gives me all the world, and exiles me from it.  –  Ursula K. Le Guin 28mm, ISO 2000. 1 sec at f11. Flash  

The world to me is a dream and the people in it are sleepers. I have known a few instances of intensity but that is all.  – Katherine Mansfield 28mm, ISO 2000. 6 secs at f2.8  

I do not want the peace that passeth understanding. I want the understanding which bringeth peace.  –  Helen Keller 85mm, ISO 2000. 30 secs at f16

All living creatures are making a great endeavour, struggling, to attain real everlasting happiness.  –  Srila Narayana Maharaja Happiness through illusion? This actually is twilight, but stirred with the flash for foreground and then thoroughly shaken in post-pro. The original sky is very blue because I was trying a tungsten light balance. However I wanted something more […]

What you do comes from what you think.  –  A Course in Miracles 85mm, ISO 2000. 13 secs at f11. Incandescent light balance

Diligence is the mother of good fortune, and the goal of a good intention was never reached through its opposite, laziness.  –  Cervantes, 1615 85mm, ISO 2000. 1/500th sec at f5.6

If only I could stand on a street corner with my hat in my hand, and get people to throw their wasted time into it!  –  Bernard Berenson, U.S. art critic Taken last year at Te Hapu, Golden Bay and recalled by our more recent stay. Moonset before midnight always means a crescent moon, a simple […]

 Life is a badly edited film.  –  Fernando Trueba This was taken without using a tripod or cable release – just holding the camera open on B, on a guard rail on the Cook Strait ferry, has done the trick. The cloud is lit by moonlight, the lower part of the image must be the motorway the […]

The greater part of our happiness or misery depends on our dispositions and not our circumstances.  –  Martha Washington, American First Lady. 85mm, ISO 320. 5 secs @ f5.6. Col balance 8330 deg K  

Blend a little foolishness with your wisdom: it’s nice to be silly at the right moment. –  Horace 28mm, ISO 2000. 30 secs at f8. Flash  

Health is the greatest gift; Contentment the greatest wealth; Faithfulness the best relationship.  –  Buddha 28mm, ISO 2000. 123 secs at f22. Flash

What’s gone and what’s past help, should be past grief.  –  William Shakespeare 50mm, ISO 2000. 2.5 secs at f4  

  With your silhouette when the sunlight dims, into your eyes when the moonlight swims, and your matchbook songs and gypsy hymns: Who among them would try to impress you? –  Bob Dylan (Sad-eyed Lady of the Lowlands) 85mm, ISO 2000. 5 secs at f11

… all our senses will be purified, and there will be nothing to criticize and no unhappy memories.  –  Srila Narayana Maharaja 28mm, ISO 2000. 2.5 secs at f2.8  

Tomorrow will be the same, but not as this is.  –  Colin McCahon “60mm”, ISO 125. 1 second at f2.8. Tungsten light balance  

When I admire the wonder of a sunset or the beauty of the moon, my soul expands.  – Gandhi 50mm, ISO 2000. 15 secs at f11  

The past is never dead. It’s not even past.  –  William Faulkner The epitome of the lonely grave, this one has extensive seafront views. Cecil Addison died of Tb, aged 16, on Christmas Eve 1924, and here lies in splendid isolation, some 800 m from the old homestead at Te Hapu. From numerous technical frustrations this test frame […]

A fool sees a tree, by moonlight. 11.49pm, 10 January 2012  A fool sees not the same tree that a wise man sees.  – William Blake 28mm, ISO 2000. 30 secs at f13. Flash

Summer’s night, Westhaven Inlet. 11.17pm, 10 January 2012 Everything in life that we really accept undergoes a change.  –  Katherine Mansfield 50mm, ISO 2000. 170 secs at f22. Flash.

The World is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page.  –  St Augustine  28mm, ISO 2000. 30 secs at f11

If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else’s, we’d grab ours back.  –  Regina Brett, at 90 85mm, ISO 2000. 10 secs at f1.4

 When in doubt, just take the next small step.  –  Regina Brett, at 90 28mm, ISO 2000. 30 secs at f10. Incandescent light balance