The Burning Bush

What you see above is one of my more enduringly popular images. It almost didn't happen.

A few years ago we had a nice Australian gentleman working at my office whose name was Paul Materatzzo. Paul shared a passion with a few of us for taking photographs. There was also an Indian gentleman named Kaushal and a Sri Lankan gentleman named Reggie. Together we planned to take a trip out to somewhere wild in Qatar and do some shooting one day after work. After a month or so of attempting to plan this it all came together one Thursday and we left work in Paul's car headed for the Western edge of Qatar. A place called Zekreet.

Zekreet is a place where the normally flat and featureless landscape of Qatar is broken by some small buttes and valleys between the buttes. A lot of this area I had seen from the road but not explored because I don't have a four wheel drive. Paul had a four wheel drive.

We started out by exploring some places I had been before. The sun was setting on the water's edge and we took some photos like that but decided to start heading back. As we started back we saw a path that lead into a valley between some buttes and decided to explore. It was an interesting scene because it also contained some small trees which are otherwise very rare in unsheltered parts.

As we came to a halt in the valley I almost immediately saw this scene. I saw the shape of the bush, the colours in the sky and the position of the sun. I knew it was a scene that was not going to last and I ran out the car door almost before we had stopped. I grabbed my camera and tripod and raced to extend the legs as I ran to position. I was so enthusiastic that I actually ripped one of the legs completely off.

Panic!

I raced back to see if anyone else had brought a tripod along and there was only Kaushal's cheap and flimsy little video tripod. After asking if I could use it I raced to take my shot. I shot at full aperture in order to get as fast a shutter speed as possible for the ISO50 slide film I was using. I had a fast f1.9 lens mounted on the Mamiya and with this and the flimsy tripod I was able to get the shot. In fact, I had the presence of mind to turn around (something I always recommend when shooting dramatic skies) and see an equally amazing sight behind me.

It is not every shot that you know will turn out well but these two were so clearly seen by me at the time I just knew they would be strong.

P.S. Here is the other shot:

Moonrise Over Doha

The story of this photograph is one of exploration and adventure.

This began as many good photographs begin with an idea. A vision. The moon rising above the dramatic towers of Doha's new buildings. I knew I wanted a full moon. This would also ensure that the sun was setting at the same time, hopefully giving me a usable sky. As a man with a family and a day job, however, sunset is almost never a time of day when I am without responsibilities. The idea was on back burner.

As a photographer, I keep a weather eye on the upcoming moon phases. It did not escape my notice that an upcoming full moon was going to land on a weekend day. Of course there is no telling what a sky will be like until the sun actually starts to set but I took a chance on planning an outing to catch the moonrise and my son, Aaron, decided to come along as well. We set out in my old American muscle car full of hope and adventure.

Our first challenge on setting out was to find a good vantage point. I have several places that I favour for good views of the Doha skyline but none of them are from due west of the city. To have the moon rising over the city I would need to be due west because the moon would rise in the east. As the sun set lower in the sky we were able to start fine tuning our direction by using the lengthening shadows. We knew that a full moon is opposite the sun so that the shadows from the setting sun will point in the direction that the full moon will rise from. Using this information we started racing around areas west of the city, the V8 bellowing, looking for a place with a decent vantage that would view the city from the necessary angle.

By the time we found a hopeful looking spot we had already tried and ruled out a few others. The sun was already set as we scrambled over the deserted construction site to try to locate a decent place to set up. Photographing in the middle east is not the same as in my home country and we hoped that no one would think we were trying to photograph their homes or engaging in espionage.

The area we had found was a bare low hilltop that had been cleared for a construction project but not yet built on. It was covered with regular mounds of gravel and sand that were each the result of a single dump truck unloading. It made an interesting foreground that was both regular and irregular. However, I was still uncertain if the sky was going to do anything worthwhile and the moon was already rising high enough that it was going to be hard to get the moon and buildings into the same tight shot, which had been my original vision.

Part of getting a good photograph outdoors, however, is rolling with what you are presented with. I started thinking of a different shot, one that would encompass the whole skyline in a wider angle shot. The difficulty with a long narrow target such as the skyline of a city from a vantage such as this is keeping enough interest in the picture area. I found that a little of the foreground rubble was interesting but I was getting such a wide expanse of it that it was fairly monotonous. I started looking at nearby mounds and then I saw the tyre.

When I saw the tyre I knew how it had to be. The tyre would anchor the picture. As I took the picture I knew I had something. Since I shot it on Fuji Velvia slide film it would be some time before I saw it but my past experience with this film assured me that it would do magic with the light and deal gracefully with the extremes of lighting between the full moon and the shaded rubbish pile.

Driving back with Aaron was great. I was worried that he would have been bored but he said he had a great time. As I was working on this shot Aaron was working on another which turned out to be crazily creative and brilliant. It was truly a good day out.

And we each got our shot.