[Only the camera can express] the full majesty of the moment. –  Paul Leopold Rosenfeld Looking down on the tops of the persimmon. You can only do this on a very still night, as the slightest breeze blurs the detail. However, to get a really creative blur, you need a gusty evening – nothing in-between […]

I can gather all the news I need on the weather report.  –  Paul Simon (The Only Living Boy in New York) Still lifes by moonlight are formidable propositions because of the problems in seeing what you have, particularly with close framing and the shallow depth of field of a mild telephoto. This scene was […]

 I often think that the night is more alive and more richly colored than the day.  –  Vincent van Gogh 28mm; ISO 2000. 66 seconds at f10

 At their best, photographs as symbols not only serve to help illuminate some of the darkness of the unknown, they also serve to lessen the fears that too often accompany the journeys from the known to the unknown. – Wynn Bullock 28mm; ISO 2000. 30 seconds at f11

The moon develops the imagination, as chemicals develop photographic images. – Sheila Ballantyne 28mm; ISO 2000. 1/1.3rd second at f18. Flash

 I see magic in the quiet light of dusk.  –  John  Sexton 85mm; ISO 250. 30 seconds at f16. Incandescent light balance

Photographing at night can be fascinating because we lose some of the control over what happens in front of the camera.  –  Michael Kenna  28mm, ISO 2000. 464 seconds (7 min 44 sec) at f13. Sodium vapour light balance      

High tide by moonlight, Turtle Cove, Golden Bay. 7.35 pm, 2 June 2012  The night has vast potential for creativity.  –  Michael  Kenna 28mm; ISO 2000. 30 seconds at f11

Daylight is too easy. What I want is difficult – the atmosphere of lamps and moonlight.     – Edgar Degas 28mm; ISO 2500. 30 seconds at f11

Twilight photography is unfortunately neglected; what may be drab and uninteresting by daylight may assume a magnificent quality in the halflight between sunset and dark.  – Ansel Adams 28mm; ISO 2000. 1/200th sec at f5. Flash

Ah the moon’s too bright, the chain’s too tight, the beast won’t go to sleep… – Leonard Cohen (I’m Your Man) 85mm; ISO 500. 294 seconds (5 mins) at f16  

I’ve had a lot of trouble in my life – most of which never happened.  –  Mark Twain 28mm; ISO 2000. 30 seconds at f13. Flash

How much more grievous are the consequences of anger than the causes of it.   Marcus Aurelius 28mm; ISO 2000. 15 seconds at f8. Flash

There are many ways to be free. One of them is to transcend reality by imagination, as I try to do. – Anaïs Nin 50mm; ISO 2000. 15 seconds at f8. Incandescent light balance  

Yet my moon always hung faithfully in the sky: constant companion, luminous and remote, gentle symbol of mystery, femininity and noctural wisdom.  –  Michael Leunig 85mm, ISO 2000. 10 secs at f8  

It is good to have an end to journey towards; but it is the journey that matters in the end. – Ursula K. Le Guin 85mm, ISO 2000. 30 secs at f7.1. Flash      

Let it go, let it out / let it all unravel; Let it free and it can be/ a path on which to travel.  – Leunig 28mm; ISO 2000. 30 secs at f8. Incandescent light balance  

Wise sayings often fall on barren ground but a kind word is never thrown away.  –  Arthur Helps 28mm; ISO 2000. 6.6 secs at f10. Incandescent light balance; flash

 The problem with the youth of today is that one is no longer part of it. – Salvadore Dali 50mm, ISO 2000. 30 secs at f11. Flash  

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 […]

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 […]

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 […]

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