6 Years, 3 Months, and 5 Days

Ralphs Bay Twilight - June 22, 2010

Over 6 years ago, I was loving life here in Tasmania (who wasn’t), I was a bit younger (who wasn’t), and I was shooting with Digital SLR’s that couldn’t capture anything but noise in low-light (remember those days fellow photo-nerds?). And, along with my local community, I was also faced with a dire threat to our home, our way of life, and our values – a mainland developers plan to build a Gold Coast style canal estate in, over, and on top of the Ralphs Bay Conservation Area.

On March 17th, 2004, I began a personal project documenting what was to become the Save Ralphs Bay campaign. I could never have imagined where those first few noise-filled JPG images would take us, how they would test us, and how the events would change our lives. On June 22nd, 2010 I covered the final Save Ralphs Bay media event – where the Tasmanian Government announced that the proposed “Lauderdale Quay” development had been rejected and also signaled the intention to bring in a Tasmanian Canal Estate Ban.

For me, as a photographer and a coastal advocate, the 6 plus years of the Save Ralphs Bay campaign would end up teaching me much of what I know about photography, my community, politics, the media, and ultimately, myself. Most importantly it allowed me to meet so many amazing, courageous, and passionate people. The following visual document of the 6 Years, 3 Months, and 5 Days of the campaign is dedicated to them.

6 Years, 3 Months, and 5 Days (short version) from Thomas Moore – Photographer on Vimeo.

For those of you involved in the campaign – or if you are just interested – there is an even more indulgent and longer version linked here.

For Tasmania’s precious coastline – we fought them on the beaches – we all Saved Ralphs Bay.