Benz World Blog » Gold

Gold Coast

Jason Benz — Sat, 16 May 2015 23:02:35 +0000

This is the Gold Coast in Queensland, Australia. It is one of a set of Australian Skylines which I have used long exposures to photograph cities at night over water.

This image has been accepted by Shutterstock for Stock Photography and is be available for download here.

Old Mine

Jason Benz — Sun, 08 Jun 2014 11:01:49 +0000

Earlier this year we were exploring the gold towns of New South Wales. This “Old Mine” was part of a museum in the back of the tourist information centre in Cobar.

Photoshop and Fractalius were used to process the image.

Glen Innes

Jason Benz — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 03:32:54 +0000

This is the town of Glen Innes in New South Wales, Australia. It is twinned with Pitlochry in Scotland, UK. I suspect there have been a number of Scottish settlers, since many of the places in the area have Celtic names.

This shot was taken in what photographers call the golden hour. This is the hour before sunset or after sunrise, when the light is warmer, and it is easier to balance the exposure between the sky and the land.

We left Sydney on Monday and spent our first night camped at Burning Mountain. It was assumed to be volcanic, although when geologists investigated it was discovered that the smoke was due to an underground coal seam, which has been burning for thousands of years.

This image has been accepted by Shutterstock for Stock Photography and is available for download here.

Airport Gold

Jason Benz — Fri, 11 Apr 2014 01:07:38 +0000

I shot these gold bangles in the Dubai International Airport during our stopover between the UK and Australia. We have done this trip a few times now, but it is the first time we have stopped in the United Arab Emirates. We flew on a Boeing 777 for the first leg then switched to an A380. We left on Wednesday morning and arrived in Sydney at about 10pm last night. It is far easier to overcome jet lag this way round. In the past we have left the UK in the evening but then you have to stay awake much longer at both ends of the journey.

Although there was plenty of light, I set the camera to ISO 500. This forced the Canon 5D mark II to reduce the aperture size to f7.1 and so increase the depth of field, but not enough to keep the whole image in focus.

Broken Hill

Jason Benz — Tue, 25 Feb 2014 23:10:03 +0000

This is one of the many frame heads which are scattered around Broken Hill in New South Wales. The wealth of minerals under this isolated city made Broken Hill Proprietary (BHP Billiton) the world’s largest mining company. We have been here for a couple of days and will be heading for Sydney once we visit neighbouring Silverton which has been used in many films including Mad Max II.

This image has been accepted by Shutterstock for Stock Photography and is available for download here.

Gold Night

Jason Benz — Wed, 13 Nov 2013 22:55:04 +0000

Last night we went to Brisbane to film 3 bands for the YouTube channel MusicLive4U. Highlight of the evening for us was this 10 piece funk soul band called His Merry Men who were launching their new single Gold. I highly recommend you check it out.

To process this image yellow/orange split-toning was used to achieve the gold colour under the pink lights.

Barbaras Festival

Jason Benz — Mon, 08 Apr 2013 04:58:10 +0000

This is the St. Barbara’s Festival in Kalgoorlie in the Goldfields of Western Australia. This is what miners call the Baby Truck. I think it safely qualifies as Mechanography.

Ballarat Jewellers

Jason Benz — Sat, 30 Mar 2013 02:49:37 +0000

These buildings are in the centre of Ballarat in the Goldfields of Victoria in Australia.

Top Stock

Jason Benz — Tue, 23 Oct 2012 08:51:34 +0000

This is a shot of the Super Pit in Kalgoorlie, Western Australia. I remember the viewing area over the pit had one of the highest concentration of flies we experienced anywhere in Australia. This image has just become my all time best selling stock image at Shutterstock. It has only been online for 10 months but it has sold more then the old number one which has been online for 6 years.

Old number one

The Superpit image is available for high resolution download here.

The Firework is available for high resolution download here.

First Last

Jason Benz — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 07:04:30 +0000

This image was taken on the 2nd December 2011 when we visited the Mining Hall of Fame in Kalgoorlie. Unknown to us until we got there this would be the last time this tourist attraction would be open to the public. It’s a shame it closed as there was much to see and it gave a real insight into the history of mining in the area. After getting advice from Carole she helped me get this image printed, framed and hung at The Deck Gallery. To my surprise, it sold in less than a week. This was the first time I’ve sold a physical print and met the buyer of an image. It was great to know where the image would be going. The nature of selling via Stock Photography is such that I have only found out where one image has ended up by chance in 5000 stock sales.

This image has been accepted by Shutterstock for Stock Photography and is available for download here.