Waratah Wandering

• Prize
  Silver in Nature/Trees
• Photographer
  Peter Ogden
• Technical Info
  Iso400 24mm F/10. 1/250s
• Photo Date
  MARCH 10th 2024

Ku-Ring-Gai Chase National Park, near Sydney, is just a 20-minute drive from home. It is an incredible place, and it has helped our family through many ups and downs - it is my photography muse. On mornings like this on the Waratah Track, with fog for miles and the sounds of wallabies jumping through the bush, the park becomes otherworldly; a magical realm where anything seems possible. In black and white, those timeless shades of wonder are accentuated…

Australia is a landscape unique in its savagery and spectacle. Being UK born, I first arrived in Perth and that first experience saw me in the Nambung National Park whilst using a big stick to fend off brown snakes. I was the art director on a commercial photography shoot – keeping one eye on the back of the camera, the other firmly on the red dirt around the tripod. That juxtaposition, the incredibly beautiful landscape combined with the incredibly scary natural critters, has fascinated me ever since.