Benz World Blog » Stone

Australia’s Twin

Jason Benz — Tue, 12 Sep 2017 21:34:29 +0000

These are some of the limestone cliffs in Victoria, Australia. Over 7200 km (4500 miles) out to sea is another set of cliffs which mirror this coastline. They belong to Australia’s twin. 80,000,000 years ago these cliff’s were connected to the land which now lies under the ice in Antarctica. Back then the earth was a lot hotter but it had started to enter an ice age as Australia moved towards the equator. The result was temperatures in Australia were stable for a very long time when the rest of the world’s wildlife was suffering from climate change.

Today Australia is in the opposite position. The continent is still moving north which is magnifying the effect of global warming.

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

Mabo Day

Jason Benz — Fri, 02 Jun 2017 14:01:16 +0000

Today is the anniversary of Mabo Day. It marks a historic decision in the High Court of Australia in 1992. This David and Goliath story resulted in overturning the legal framework used by the British Empire to pull off the biggest land grab in history. Eddie Mabo was an Indigenous Australian who spent the last ten years of his life battling the concept of terra nullius (nobody’s land) which attempted to justify disinheriting native people from their land.

This image is available for download here.

Indigenous Recognition

Jason Benz — Fri, 26 May 2017 14:01:24 +0000

Today is the 50th anniversary of the Indigenous Recognition Referendum in Australia. It seems self-evident that you would grant native people citizenship of their own country. However, in 1967 the politicians in Canberra decided a referendum was needed. At more than 90% of voters, it was the most decisive result in history.

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

Cedar Getters

Jason Benz — Fri, 31 Mar 2017 22:00:41 +0000

This engraving was carved into the rock by ‘cedar-getters‘ in 1886. Australian red cedar trees were so valuable that they kick-started a timber industry, in what is now the Border Ranges National Park in New South Wales.

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

Petra Treasury

Jason Benz — Tue, 18 Oct 2016 09:09:32 +0000

This is the Treasury in Petra, Jordan. It was made famous by Indiana Jones when Harrison Ford and Sean Connery “discovered it” while looking for the Holy Grail. It has of course been known to everyone in Jordan for thousands of years.

Dedicated to Rowan who loved this place.

Petra Monastery

Jason Benz — Mon, 22 Aug 2016 14:01:52 +0000

This is the Petra Monastery in Jordan. It is know as the rose city due to the colour of the rock. In 2008 it needed to be processed using HDR to get accepted by Shutterstock for Stock Photography. It is available for download here. This time I used standard tone adjustments in Camera RAW and a little split-toning to match the texture to this jungle temple. The RAW file developer in Photoshop has improved so much since this shot was taken it has made using HDR to extract detail redundant.

Esperance Stonehenge

Jason Benz — Sat, 17 Oct 2015 13:04:54 +0000

This is a full size granite replica of Stonehenge in Western Australia. Although it is not as old as the original Stonehenge in the UK, it is complete, and access is better. When we visited the owners let us stay in our van overnight so I could easily photograph it at sunset and sunrise. I experienced an unexpected sense of awe as the sun light filled the stones.

The Apostles

Jason Benz — Fri, 16 Jan 2015 11:28:19 +0000

These limestone stacks on the coast of Victoria, Australia are know as The Twelve Apostles, despite only ever having nine of them. On 3rd July 2005 a 50 metre tall stack collapsed into the sea leaving eight. Then in 2016 five under water stack were discovered by sonar mapping.

We are planning a road trip from Southport to Sydney to drop off Karen for her flight back to the UK in a few weeks. There will also be a chance to add to mining stock photography and visit an observatory.

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

Reprocessing Petra

Jason Benz — Mon, 31 Mar 2014 13:17:30 +0000

I took this shot in 2007 with an Olympus E-330. At that time the Adobe Camera RAW and Lightroom software were still in the early stages of development and we would not see highlight and shadow recovery tools for another 5 years.

Back then the best way to get detail across a high dynamic range image was to take several different exposures, and blend them using HDR software, which I did using Photomatix. I then altered the colour in Photoshop to produce this Stock Photo.

As an experiment I developed this image with a single exposure using a later version of Adobe Camera RAW. The advances in software since 2007 have made the recovery of detail across a high dynamic range far easier.

Left Lion

Jason Benz — Mon, 24 Mar 2014 18:17:32 +0000

This is the Left Lion in front of the Council House in Nottingham. Anyone who has lived in this city for more than a few years will have met someone at this historic rendezvous point. I have spent the last four days in Nottingham catching up with friends by meeting at various bars, cafes and this stone animal. We are back in Grantham now but we will be back to see the jazz band Polar Bear on Friday.

I used some Split-Toning to add a little colour to the grey image.