Sue’s images reveal the beauty she sights in life
Sue Gore sees beauty everywhere.
Regular “Orange City Life” photo contributor, her range of topical and technically-perfect images from our beautiful country and local wildlife, has delighted readers for years.
Sue exemplifies the wonderful photographers, columnists, short story writers, and club contributors who add so much variety, flair, and alternative voices to our publication.
Her amazing photos, that often feature in “Around the Region” are the product of her wonderful eye for an image with no formal training for this inveterate shutterbug.
“I don’t class myself as a photographer, I do it as a hobby. I’ve got a camera on the table at home and one in the car and, if I see something I like, I just take it,” she explained.
Sue found a love of photography from an early age guessing that her first images were: “probably just taking family pics or whatever.”
“I do it for rest and relaxation, I can’t help myself, even here at work (at Orange City Bowling Club) we started ‘Twilight Bowls’ back last night, and I took some pics and posted them on our website,” Sue said.
“There’s something nice to see every day; life has such beautiful things, why wouldn’t you want to photograph it?” she asked.
Fifteen minutes out of Orange on the Ophir Road and surrounded by the Mullions Range National Park, her natural surroundings provide the theme and location for much of her favourite works.
“There’s always something to see beautiful every day, birds, kangaroos, other animals, I’ve taken reflections of the light in the dam, anything that takes my fancy,” Sue said.
“I come from a farming background, so it’s natural in that sense that I would have a love of the land.”
Sue’s first contribution to “Orange City Life” was entering our old “Photo of the Week” competition which offered a small monetary prize each week for the best pic.
“I used to enter that and win quite often and, when they got rid of it, I stopped sending pics in,” Sue explained.
“But people started saying ‘we don’t see your photos anymore,’ and I said, ‘don’t think they’re doing it anymore,’ so then I just started sending them in again,” she said.
Sue has developed a loyal online following of friends, family, and casual acquaintances who she enlightens and entertains with her pictures.
“They sometimes say at the club ‘Sue’s got the day off’, because I take photos morning noon, and night,” she laughs.
“I put it on my Facebook page for my friends to brighten their day and I say, ‘I hope you all have a good day’,’ she added.
Her photography, she says reflects her positive outgoing view of life.
“It’s nice to have a positive thought, life’s too short to be grumpy…. To see the beautiful things in life — to see people smile for the day, it’s good,” she said.
Bar manager at the Club, she takes her outgoing easy manners with her in her working life also.
“I say, I do my job, have a laugh, and go home,” she added.
“If I had to follow religion, it would be Buddhism, you treat everyone the same,” she said.
Like all of us, she’s looking forward to the end of the two-years of stop-start lockdowns that have impacted all of us since February 2020.
“We’ve only just come back, I’ll be glad COVID’s over and we can get back to our lives,” she added.
“I never did one course in photography, but the lady bowlers here say, ‘you just capture the right moment.’ I just take my pics for the fun of it and, if someone comments, I think that’s nice,” Sue said.
Selling few of her works, she mostly views her hobby as a labour-of-love, she added.
Out of the thousands of images she has collected, Sue can’t easily pick her favourite every photo. “I haven’t got one, my hubby keeps asking me, but I say, ‘all pictures are nice’,” Sue concluded.