Welcome to
my blog
This is where critters, feelings, and the occasional photographic insight come together. I write about what I notice, how I work, and what photography means to me.
If you'd like to see my first blog post which also serves as a bit of backstory on this website’s evolution click below.
Photography Is My Mind's Eye
I was 16 when I first discovered that, maybe, not everyone's brains worked the same way…
I was 16 when I first discovered that, maybe, not everyone's brain worked the same way. I was in our small little family home talking to my mum in the living room.
I don't really remember how the conversation started but I think I'd been telling her about a bad dream I'd had the previous night. She suggested I just change the dream. I looked at her blankly. What was she talking about? "What do you mean just change my dream?! We don't just decide dreams". Now she looked at me blankly. "Oh" she eventually said, "I do. I fly every night above the trees, I like flying".
I was stunned. Doing whatever you wanted in a dream? How cool! I had to find out more. I discovered it's called "lucid dreaming", when you're conscious you're dreaming and can make changes. I researched how to do it. I spent months trying - I never succeeded.
It was like finding out someone sees the blue tablecloth you have in a different shade of blue to what you see. You can understand the words but it's impossible to see the blue they see.
Moving forward about a year, I'm in year 12 and one of my elective classes was art. This was a pretty cool art class – we could choose any medium we wanted. Some students did pottery, many chose drawing or painting, some vinyl prints.
Me? I was stuck on what to do. None of these art styles sat with me. I couldn't make sense of them and felt overwhelmed. I didn't understand how someone could translate an idea to paper. How did they know what it looked like?
Eventually I settled on photography. My logic was: I can't draw or sculpt so why not use something that visually captures things for me? Then I don't have to make anything. All I'd have to do was learn some technical stuff like how to use shutter speed with ISO with aperture - which didn't feel overwhelming for me. It just felt kind of computer nerdy adjacent and I knew my way around a computer better than most of my peers.
In hindsight this was the second time I was in a situation where I'm starting to see not all brains work the same way but I didn't quite notice it at the time. I just thought I was cruddy at art.
I did well in that class, perfect score in fact. 2 of my images were chosen to be entered into a competition for high school art students across the NT. With 5 winners both of my images were chosen and as a prize hung in NT's Parliament House for a year.
I've experimented with different types of photography over the years. Landscapes, portraiture, still life, wildlife, abstract, street, events and so on. But without fail I always go back to nature & wildlife related photography. It calls to me and how I operate as a human being in more than one way.
Fast forward about 15 years – when I'm around 31 and have been with my wonderful partner for about 6 years. I don't remember the specific moment but throughout our relationship I learned that if I had read about something bad in the news (a car accident for example) I shouldn't describe or recount what I read (at least without fair warning) because my partner would "see it all play out" in her mind. For a long time I didn't realise she meant it literally.
Was my partner the anomaly or was I? Here I was again, bamboozled and realising just how different brains can be. Again I went on a research mission. I googled like mad. "What is a mind's eye", "what does the saying 'imagine an x' mean?", "do you see images when you close your eyes"?
Because, dear reader, I do not. When I close my eyes it's black (unless I put pressure on my eyes for funky colours and patterns). When I'm told to picture an item, I do not, can not. I thought that was a figure of speech.
In my Google frenzy I discovered aphantasia (link). As I read in disbelief all these threads of my life started to suddenly come together. I'd had all these puzzle pieces of experiences that never fit together and now I was discovering aphantasia they all suddenly sprung together like magnets.
Before I get too ahead of myself, aphantasia is a condition that, it's estimated about 1 in 25 people experience. It's the lack or significant impairment of mental imagery. Like with almost anything it's on a bit of a spectrum and it would seem I'm far down the end where I have absolutely no mind's eye whatsoever.
Choosing photography in my year 12 art class wasn't exclusively a lack of drawing skill or willingness to learn. I was impeded by the fact I can not picture anything in my mind. Having an idea is one thing but trying to translate it to imagery when I'm unable to even vaguely imagine what that might look like, well, it was just too big of a task, too overwhelming. So I chose something that can display my ideas to me almost immediately.
I remember the relief I experienced when learning about aphantasia. So many little things that just didn’t have to be stressful any more were suddenly gone. I wasn’t bad at these things, I just literally can’t do them.
No more feeling stressed listening to a visually guided meditation because I’m in overdrive trying to form a mental image of something calm. No more awkwardly closing my eyes and staring into the black while being told to “see” something.
No more kicking myself about bad biographical memory. It’s just that my memories are very strongly connected to big emotions. If I want to remember the smaller less emotionally charged moments, it’s best I photograph them.
Which leads me to photography and now. Photography is not just a career or art form I like, it's part of me. It's almost a stand in for my "mind's eye".
Having aphantasia drives me to photograph things or moments in nature others might not get to see for themselves. That desire has grown from my own desire to be able to experience what having a “mind’s eye” would be like.
Aphantasia also makes my style of photography (and life) extremely in the moment. I very rarely plan photos - I can't imagine how a scene might look and then try to recreate it. I just go out with the camera and look in real time. Sure, I'll plan to go out at times the lighting is nice or perhaps I'll have a target in mind (macro, landscape, wildlife) but beyond that, no planning.
To be perfectly honest I usually pack my entire kit whenever I'm out for a shoot. What if I see a really cool bug and need my macro kit? What if the sunset is spectacular and I need my wide angle? What if – you get the picture (pardon the pun, it was accidental but I’m keeping it).
Since finding out I have aphantasia, my photography has greatly improved. I've spent more time out in the field, leaning into the lack of planning and seeing it as an asset rather than a limitation. Instead of getting frustrated at the level of research it would take to pre-plan a scene I'd conceptually put together, I just... go out and see what's there.
See “How a Visual Artist With Aphantasia Drew What She Couldn’t “See”” for a really good breakdown of how someone with aphantasia might try to create an image. I related to it a lot.
So next time you say 'picture this' or 'imagine you can see,' remember that some of us don't know that's literally possible - and realising it is can be a glimpse into a completely different way of experiencing the world.
If you have questions about aphantasia or want to share your own experiences, I'd love to hear from you in the comments below!
Life and Bats
Australian bat lyssavirus (ABLV) is in the news at the moment following a recent death, and it's got me reflecting on my own experiences with bats - experiences that, looking back, I'm incredibly lucky to have survived…
Australian bat lyssavirus (ABLV) is in the news at the moment following a recent death, and it's got me reflecting on my own experiences with bats - experiences that, looking back, I'm incredibly lucky to have survived.
I have encountered bats in need of help 3 times in my life, I’ll tell them in chronological order below but let me start with this: There have been 4 (that's including this most recent one in the news) reported ABLV cases in Australia and all of them have resulted in death. A 100% mortality rate. ABLV is contracted by coming in contact with infected bat saliva. The virus enters the body most commonly via a bite or scratch. It can also enter via your eyes, mouth, or pre-existing open wounds. Bats clean themselves a bit like cats so their bodies are potentially covered in their own saliva.
If you see a bat in need of assistance, call a professional. I can not stress this enough. Remember the 100% mortality rate. There is no treatment. Alright, without further ado, my stories:
So my first bat rescue was when I was about 8 or 9 years old. My childhood home was in a cul-de-sac, at the end of which was a footpath that led to my primary school. I was walking home one afternoon and ran into some kids on that footpath, right at the end, a stone's throw away from my house. They were standing in a circle around something. That something turned out to be a baby flying fox. How it got there we’ll never know but now that I know more about them it definitely should have been with its mother still.
I ran home to tell my mum about this poor baby bat. She got a bath towel and came over with me to help. My mum has always been really caring to all animals, her empathy definitely paved the way for mine and already had by that age.
I don't remember if it was her or I that wrapped up the baby bat but I suspect it was probably my mum as she took charge of the situation and disbanded the circle of kids.
I held it in the towel while mum went through the kitchen cupboards looking for a dropper so we could hydrate it. I remember just staring at its little face, its tiny exhausted eyes just staring back at me. Mum had told me to be very careful not to let it bite me as they “had diseases”. I don't think she even understood just how fatal a bite could be.
We dropped little bits of water near the bat's mouth and the little sweetheart drank a lot. I remember holding it in the car, still offering bits of water while dad drove us to the closest vet (link) that also cared for wildlife. It wasn't trying to break free by any means but it had definitely perked up a bit since cooling down and having a drink.
Here’s the wild part. I remember trying to pet its little head and it bit my finger. It was too small to break the skin, in fact because it was a baby it only had tiny “milk teeth” which aren't really built for breaking skin. First bullet dodged. But not knowing that I merely had to get some of its saliva in my eye or mouth I suspect the second bullet I dodged (though I won’t count it) was not putting that bitten finger in my eye or mouth before washing it. In all likelihood, the bat just didn't have the virus. I wasn't stupid, I was just a kid and it's unlikely I did wash my hands before rubbing my eye or biting a nail.
Baby flying fox, nestled into mum’s wing
My next encounter with a bat in need, I was older. More cautious but still entirely unaware of how serious the danger was. I found an adult flying fox in the front yard (still living at home with my parents. I'm probably about 13 now). It was trying to crawl across the gravel but was pretty tired and green ants were already beginning to overwhelm it.
I got a wooden broom pole and put it near the bat. The bat latched on and when I picked up the pole the bat hung, like bats do. It kept twitching and readjusting because it was still being bitten by the remaining green ants determined not to let go of their catch.
I hung the pole up and offered some water. The bat drank. I then meticulously and slowly plucked all the ants off the bat. It just hung there, watching me but letting me. It seemed sweet, like it knew I was helping and at the time I truly believed that. But realistically and in hindsight it was probably just too unwell to do anything and I wasn't actually hurting it so it just hung.
After delicately plucking off all the ants (without gloves on I might add) I left it there for a couple hours to rest. When the sun was going down I took the pole over to a palm tree and put the bat end near the tree. The bat shuffled its way to the palm tree, grabbed on and climbed to the top. It worked its way over to a palm frond to hang from before dropping into flight and going on its way. Bye bye friend.
This was my second dodged bullet. Though I thought I was being careful at the time, I still didn't use gloves and touched its fur (remember cleaning like cats). My face was also inches away from its body the whole time I was getting ants off it. Had it freaked out and tried to fly or just throw a wing out I absolutely would have been scratched and easily bitten. Again I was just a kid, older and a bit wiser but still totally unaware of the danger.
The third one was a microbat and only a couple years ago. I stumbled across it lying on the concrete in the sun, I thought it was dead. I put a cloth over it to pick it up without touching it and heard the faintest squeaking. Oh my goodness, it was alive. I kept it wrapped in the cloth for the journey home, where I hung it from a hanging pot plant under my house. I got the little dropper I had and offered water, for it's tiny size it drank a lot!
Tiny microbat hanging from the chain of my hanging pot plant.
I put a hollow log (only about 40cm long) on a ladder near it, just touching the pot plant it was hanging from and intended to leave it there and check in at night but as I was making sure the log was steady I saw a mite running across the bat's wing. Eurgh, I couldn't help myself - I got the long tweezers (still no gloves mind you) and spent a minute waiting for the mite to reappear before plucking it off. The bat showed no signs of being particularly worried about me doing this so I felt safe. But I absolutely wasn't being safe at all.
I left it be. I went down and checked in a couple hours later, it was hanging inside the log. Tiny lil thing, like it was in a big cave. The next time I checked in was after sunset and it was gone.
My third encounter I should have and did know better. But some stupid overwhelming urge to help an animal in need got the better of me and I need to get better at that. Or at the very least convince a doctor to give me the injections carers and people that work with bats get as it seems I'll just keep choosing to literally risk my life to help them.
Some studies show that less than 1% of wild bats have ABLV at any given time, however “while the infection prevalence in the wild‐caught cohort is evidently low, the significantly higher infection prevalence in rescued bats in urban settings represents a clear and present public health significance”¹. So if you're encountering a bat on the ground, that's very bizarre and it's likely sick therefore it's likely that the bat may have ABLV.
It's funny to say “I'm lucky to be here” when talking about giving dehydrated wildlife some water. It seems so innocent, so far from life threatening. But alas, I'm lucky to be here. And I promise I will be far, far more careful if I ever encounter a bat in need again.
References:
--- ¹ Field, H. E. (2018). Evidence of Australian bat lyssavirus infection in diverse Australian bat taxa. Zoonoses and Public Health, 65(6), 742–748. Available at: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6249124/
A Green Ant’s Life
Imagine you're a doctor or nurse and you get to work to find a green ant, in a specimen jar, neatly placed in the middle of your desk. That'd be weird right? You'd have questions. I'm sure you have questions right now…
Imagine you're a doctor or nurse and you get to work to find a green ant, in a specimen jar, neatly placed in the middle of your desk. That'd be weird right? You'd have questions. I'm sure you have questions right now. Well, that hasn't happened to anyone (or maybe it has??) but, it very nearly did. Let me explain.
I clean a clinic most nights. One night recently I arrived, parked my bike in the end office I exit from and walked to the kitchen where I usually put the swipe card and my headphone case. On my way to the kitchen I felt a tickle on the back of my neck. A brush of my neck, nothing there. Another tickle. I placed my headphones and swipe card down and pulled my shirt collar around to inspect. With a bit of awkward twisting I got the collar of my shirt far enough around to see the tickle. It was a little green ant.
Immediately I knew she (worker green ants, in fact most any ant, are female) was from my front gate. They were very busy crossing the latch when I left. The curry leaf tree that their nest is in and that they use to access the fence often brushes me because I neglect to prune it.
My fence green ants
So what was I to do? I couldn't just flick her onto the floor to roam the clinic. Then when I thought about it, I really only had one choice. You see, these worker ants live for 1 to 3 years so she potentially had a couple years left in her life and if I were to just flick her off or put her outside on a random tree she would have died.
But hear me out, these ants are HARD working. Tireless. She would have spent the rest of her (shortened) life walking in vague circles seeking a familiar scent of her colony. Walking and walking and walking, starving and dehydrated yet still tireless. Until she just couldn't anymore. Or, she would stumble across a colony, but not hers, and they would quickly overpower her and tear her bits for food. Green ants are very hostile to outsiders.
You see, I could not leave her to this fate. So I got a specimen container and put it to the collar of my shirt expecting this to take a few goes. She walked straight in. I popped the lid on and put her on the desk in the end office, where I store my bike. Ant secure, conscious intact, I began work.
In the headphones went, on went the podcast (Extremely Accurate Bird Songs if you're wondering) and off I went doing all the cleaning things I do every night. When I get to a certain point mopping the hallway leading to the end office I take the bucket and my bike outside and turn the last light off. I packed up, finished mopping, cleaned up the bucket and blah blah blah, sorry, you don't need to know about my cleaning routine.
I ride home, park my bike up, flick my shoes off (or as I say to my little one "free the feeties") and make it a couple steps to the stairs before... Oh no. The ant. That's right, I left the poor ant in the container on the desk. Shit.
Well, OBVIOUSLY, I have to go back. The only thing worse than how I imagined she'd die if I flicked her off would be to walk endlessly in small circles in a plastic container in the bin. So, no shoes (because my feet were free for the night and they would not be caged again!) I got back on my bike and got back to the clinic. Before you roll your eyes TOO hard, it's only like a 2 min ride and my bike is really nice. At least, I think it is.
I collect this poor little ant who indeed is still walking the perimeter of the container and gently place said container... In my pocket. I spend the ride home hoping it's not too bumpy for her. Back home again and at the front gate. The moment is finally here. Release. I internally panic for a second. What if I'm wrong? What if this isn't her colony? I'll be releasing her to her immediate and brutal death. But no, it must be. It has to be. Right? It makes the most sense. From where else would a green ant fall on me? Lots of places probably. But less likely ones.
I open the container and place it against the fence, in the middle of an ant path. She exits, has a feel (sniff?) around. She is greeted suddenly by several other workers. This is the moment of truth. I’m tense. They greet, it's fine. It's her colony. Her sisters. After a brief exchange, it's back to work like nothing happened and her little 4 hour hiatus is over.
And my green ant rescue mission comes to an end. She was returned to her sisters to potentially live a few more years, traversing the tree I don't prune and my front gate. I hope she tells tales of her strange encounter.
Ode to Japan
Where immigration isn't scary, where the welcome feels sincere.
Where the chaos of airport to train station is somehow actually…
Where immigration isn't scary, where the welcome feels sincere.
Where the chaos of airport to train station is somehow actually very organised, where
huge crowds can part like a school of fish if you need to pass through against the direction of flow.
Where the trains are punctual enough to make Swiss watches nervous. Always on time, always clean, always quiet - even when full.
Where everyone is so polite, coming home feels rude. Where walking home at 11pm, toddler in tow, feels so safe it's jarring.
Where konbini are shrines to convenience, Holy places of fried chicken, oden, and egg sandwiches that are so soft it's like biting a cloud.
Where there’s always tea, and always pickles. Where pride in service is second to none.
Where toddlers are treated like VIPs, handed toys, given tiny cutlery, and welcomed like regulars by strangers who’ve never seen them before.
Where the streets are spotless, despite the baffling absence of bins. Where wildflowers sprout from every crack and a forest can border a city happily co-existing.
Where everything makes sense, despite not speaking the language.
Delicate and beautiful, busy yet peaceful. Safe.
Thank you, Japan. For the pickles, the famichiki, the peace, and the promise that I can walk home at night knowing 1: I’m safe and 2: there's a vending machine.
I can’t wait to see you again.
A note on my line “Where everything makes sense, despite not speaking the language.” My partner can speak and understand some Japanese - more than she gives herself credit for. Her being able to do this had a huge impact on the quality of our trip. We had countless beautiful encounters with people that would have passed us by if she was unable to communicate.
Many of my favorite memories involve an encounter that would not have been possible without her. What I mean when I write that line though is that all the times I was alone - ordering food, catching a train, buying yet another piece of fried chicken from a konbini, things operated in such a consistent and efficient way it just made sense even though nothing I read made sense (because I couldn’t read it).
From the way a crowd of thousands can effortlessly flow without anyone bumping into one another, to people always lining up on one side of the escalator so if you’re in a rush or just don’t like standing still on them (me) you have a clear runway to just cruise past everyone standing still.
Or the magical self checkout in UNIQLO (and I’m sure some other places) where you just put your basket full of items in a box and it just instantly knows exactly whats in there, no need to scan anything. Or trains being so reliably on time that if you didn’t hear the announcement and aren’t sure when to get off all you have to know is when the train is meant to arrive at said stop…(thanks google maps). If it’s meant to be 6:57 then just get off at that time, you’ll be in the right place.
I could go on and on, but you get the idea - Japan just works.
The Quiet Work of Noticing
I’ve been told I have great eyesight. Usually after I’ve pointed something out no one else has noticed—a baby frog the size of my thumbnail tucked up on a leaf three metres away or a…
Why Paying Attention Matters in Nature Photography (and Life)
I’m often told I have great eyesight. It’s usually after I’ve pointed something out no one else has noticed… A baby frog the size of my thumbnail, tucked up on a leaf, three meters away or a small bird perched amongst the dense foliage of the trees high up for example. My good eyesight goes out the window when I’m trying to find something in the fridge and it's not exactly where I expect it to be.
But the truth is, my eyesight’s pretty average. One of my eyes has astigmatism due to a mishap where I was lifting a roller door after the rain, my hand slipped and I punched myself in the eye (like the actual eyeball) so hard I literally changed its shape. I don’t wear my glasses nearly as often as I should. It's not sharp vision that helps me see these things, it's pattern recognition. An unconscious ongoing scanning of the world around me.
This habit, this way of seeing, it's what shapes me as a wildlife photographer. And a person.
I don’t remember when it started or when I became aware it was even happening and perhaps wasn’t to everyone else. But a particular memory comes to mind when this stood out to me.
I was out the back at a mate’s place, having a beer. I spotted this tiny frog, brand new and barely lost its tail, sitting on a leaf near some basil. To me, it stood out straight away, a soft little adorable jewel folded up in the middle of a leaf. I pointed it out and my mate just couldn't see it. I had to explain exactly where to look. It was like trying to explain to someone which star you're pointing at. When they finally did see it, they were gobsmacked. “How the hell did you notice that?”
I didn’t really have an answer. I felt the opposite - how didn't they ?
This lil friend was about the size of a cherry tomato
Noticing is my default mode. I don’t flick it on when I go out or pick up the camera, it’s always running. It’s knowing how a tree usually sways, and catching the fractionally different movement when something disturbs that pattern. Or what the ambient sound of the bush is and picking up the disturbance, was that a gecko running under a leaf? That kind of attunement is what makes nature photography possible for me.
It’s mostly visual but sound is a huge part of it too. Absence of sound when I’m in nature is often a really good sign I need to slow down or stop because I’m disturbing everything too much. I’m being watched too much.
When I was a kid, we had a spa out the back of our house in Darwin. Frogs would sometimes leap in during the night, thinking they’d found a great place to lay eggs, not realising it was full of chlorine and there was no easy way out. I learned to wake at the sound of a splash—not the loud ones, but the gentle little “plip” that meant a frog was in trouble. I’d go out in the rain, half-asleep, and rescue them. I don’t remember how old I was when this started but it remained that way until I moved out. I remember how it felt: like unconditional love. Like being in tune.
Noticing, over time, grows empathy. You watch a lizard long enough, you start to get a sense of its habits. Its little decisions. What makes it pause. What makes it dart. You stop thinking of the little scaly friend as an “it.” I guess its the same with people. Paying attention to someone over time, noticing their rhythms and silences—you learn them, a little. You know when to make space.
This habit of attention shapes everything about how I approach photographing wildlife. I rarely plan images beyond choosing a general place and a rough time of day. I let the noticing do the rest. It’s not passive or lazy it’s deliberate stillness. I go where the details lead me. I don’t often chase a subject. I wait for it to get comfy with my presence.
And although I believe I've partly developed this kind of pattern recognition because I have aphantasia it doesn't mean I'm special in this. Anyone can notice more. You don’t have to hike into the bush or go on a silent retreat. You can start by sitting on your driveway for ten minutes, with nothing in your hands to distract. You’ll probably get bored. That’s fine, good in fact. Let yourself be bored. Boredom is the crack where curiosity gets in.
And then maybe you’ll spot some ants doing something cool. Or hear the creak of a branch to look up and see a bird you've never seen before. Or maybe it's about to rain and you'll wonder what that smell in the air actually is.
You don’t have to become a monk or learn to sit cross-legged without losing circulation. You just have to stop long enough for the natural world to get a word in.
New Site, No Shop — Am I a Real Artist™?
So. You’ve found my new website. It’s shinier, simpler, easier to manage—and filled with more of my brain, neatly offloaded into little paragraphs. Now, when I started working with another…
You’ve found my new website. It’s simpler, easier to manage and filled with more of my brain, neatly offloaded into little paragraphs.
When I started working with another Real Artist to redesign and rebuild the whole thing for me (if you like what you see, click his name: Linus) I did what any sensible artist does in the middle of an overhaul: I spiraled out of control about whether I’m a real artist or not.
Not in the “do I create meaningful work?” kind of way (we’ll save that for later I’m sure). But in the “should I have an online store?” kind of way. You know, what “successful” people have. Buy Now buttons and product variants and maybe a very professional Shipping & Returns policy written in Helvetica.
Because somewhere along the line (thanks, capitalism), I internalised the idea that selling your work is what makes you legitimate. No shop, no checkout button = just a guy with a camera and some feelings about nature.
And I wanted to feel professional. And to feel professional I had to be seen as professional. I wanted the validation of aesthetic legitimacy.
The realisation started with money and trying to be smarter about what I was spending. Culling things I wasn’t really using, like that streaming service I only use for one program I almost never watch anyways. And the expensive Webflow subscription my previous website was hosted on. Does it really need to cost that much? Do I need the ecommerce plan?
That’s when I had to stop and face some hard thoughts. Because the deeper I dug, the more obvious it became: the shop wasn’t about sales. It was about feeling professional. It made me feel like a Real Artist™.
But what was it actually maintaining?
An illusion.
Most of my income comes from services I offer in the small town I live in (Nhulunbuy). When someone wants a print, they message me. When someone’s curious, they ask. It’s less automated, more human, and more honest to how I actually work and none of it actually requires an online shopfront.
So, when I can beat the little voice of capitalism back into its cage (it does not go without a fight!) What makes me feel like a real artist?
It's the impulse to make something out of noticing the everyday things around me. The ache to try and share the beauty I see with anyone who will look – and hope they see it, feel it, too.
So, without further ado, welcome. Have a look around. Ask questions if you have any. And if you do want a print, reach out. But most of all, I just really hope you enjoy your little moment here. Thanks for visiting.