First drops at Ōraka

The remote Ōraka / Colac Bay lies at the bottom of Te Waipounamu, the South Island of Aotearoa / New Zealand. We travelled there for an early winter weekend getaway and, after tearing ourselves away from the cosy fireplace in the crib we were renting, went for a wander along the shore when a passing shower began to wet the sticks and stones at our feet.

I took several photos and later experimented processing them with flow_img to capture the moment. Static images were interesting but the win came from animation (via a hacky AF workflow involving parallel driven vpype, bash scripting Inkscape, After Effects layering and a final Photoshop massage into a ridiculously sized GIF – video compression destroys it).

For the best experience add a sound loop of rain falling on stones with distant waves crashing in the background plus a pinch of petrichor.

1920x1080 GIF

Ōraka, Aotearoa 🇳🇿 Photographed Jun 5 2022 Processed Jun 11 2022

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