In the months ahead I’d like to use my website to elaborate on some of the themes in my upcoming book.

Firstly, as a photographer its possible I’m guilty of believing that “a picture tells a thousand words” so the need for actual words is somewhat diminished – the pictures should speak for themselves, right?

My book includes a little text, a few short paragraphs, to introduce each chapter; and of course descriptions of each image. I also wrote an introduction, which upon re-reading, I feel raises some points that could be interesting to elaborate on and introduce my book a little more fully for everyone 🙂

The Title

The best place to start of course has to be the books title ~ “Timeless Tasmania”.

I did some brainstorming for a title and the word “Timeless” stuck from fairly early on. It has a good vibe. It is evocative. Upon a quick google search it seemed like it hadn’t been used before!

“Timeless” relating to nature obviously conjures up images of craggy mountain ranges shrouded in mist, or mossy green forests covered in lichen and debris fallen long ago. The Tasmanian coastline too, formed over millennia of constant battering by waves and winds churned up from half a world away – timeless to a T.

Future Timelessness

As the weeks and months went by, and the image selection became closer and closer to final, it occurred to me that although the landscapes depicted throughout the book were indeed “Timeless” looking backwards in time, what does the future hold for them?

What does the future hold for wild areas as popular areas only increase in popularity, and more remote areas start to be looked at with development in mind?

What does the changing climate and continued and somehow even accelerating clearing of native forests, not just in Tasmania but all over the world, mean for the forest landscape?

Tasmania despite having an amazing reserve system, continues to demolish forests of very significant conservation value. As many other places end native forest logging Tasmania seems to actually be ramping it up!

The Tasmanian Wilderness evolved during glacial times, before fire was a big player in the landscape. As the climate becomes warmer and drier, what becomes of the wonderful old Pencil Pine and King Billy pines of the alpine regions? The Huon Pines that depend on metres and metres of annual rainfall? Or the giant eucalypts and old myrtle beech rainforests that are so unique to this part of the world?

There are no easy answers to questions like this but they must still be asked.

1000 words

All of a sudden I have spent 20 years photographing Tasmania and it seems that including some words to elaborate on what motivates my imagery is perhaps worthwhile.

Maybe 1000 words per image is not quite enough after all 🙂