About Diane Armstrong
Photographer. Speaker. Author.
Diane Armstrong is an award-winning Australian landscape photographer based in Rockhampton, Central Queensland. She began photographing seriously in 2020, at 55, when life as she knew it changed. Since then her work has won eleven first prizes at regional gallery art awards, hangs in homes and businesses across Queensland, and has taken her from Carnarvon Gorge to the Arctic.
- Based in
- Rockhampton, Central Queensland, on Darumbal country
- Photographs
- Landscape, aerial and wildlife, from Central Queensland to the polar regions
- Recognition
- 66 awards and honours since 2022, including 11 regional gallery first prizes
- Work with her
- Limited-edition prints, commissions, licensing, talks and workshops
Her story
Starting again, at 55.
For most of her adult life, Diane's days were filled by family and the land: marriage, raising four boys and the work of a rural property. Like many women, she became very good at doing what needed to be done, and lost sight of what she wanted for herself.
In 2020 that life came apart, and she faced a future that looked nothing like the one she had imagined. She had always loved taking photographs. Now photography became her way forward: a reason to get up in the morning, and a way to make her own decisions about where to go and what to notice.
A year later, on a week-long trip photographing the South Coast of New South Wales, she knew. Waiting for the light, with her mind nowhere else, she understood this was what she was meant to do.
She called her first Instagram account A Fortunate Lens. It grew into Diane Armstrong Photography, and now simply Diane Armstrong: photographer, speaker and author.
A Fortunate Lens
"I felt fortunate to be alive. For the first time in a very long time, I could decide what I wanted the next chapter to look like."
A Fortunate Lens is the idea behind everything Diane makes. It isn't about being lucky to own a camera or to travel. It's gratitude for a second chance, and a reminder that while we can't always choose what happens to us, we can choose how we look at it.
The work
Between the poetic and the precise.
Diane photographs light, texture, atmosphere and place. At home that means the sandstone of Carnarvon Gorge, the escarpments of the Blackdown Tablelands and the beaches of the Capricorn Coast. From the air, it's the colour and pattern of Kati Thanda–Lake Eyre, Lake Lewis, Shark Bay and Coral Bay. Further afield, polar bears in Svalbard, the Southern Ocean off South Georgia, lions in Africa, the Dolomites and Venice.
She has been mentored by some of Australia's most respected photographers, including Dani Watson, Tony Hewitt, Ken Duncan and Peter Eastway. Her limited-edition fine art prints are made to last, and she also creates commissioned work: for CityWalk Motor Inn in Rockhampton she photographed and curated 49 images of the Central Highlands and Capricorn regions, one for every room.
- Landscape
- Aerial
- Wildlife
- Black & white
- Fine art prints
- Commissions
Recognition
Awarded at home, noticed further afield.
Diane's work has been recognised at regional gallery art awards, in national and international competitions, by Australia's photography magazines and at the Rockhampton Show. A few highlights from the record:
- 66
- Awards, commendations and finalist places
- 11
- First prizes at regional gallery art awards
- 7
- Champion titles, Rockhampton Show and Photography Club
- 2022
- Earliest recorded awards, Australian Photographer of the Year
- 2026 · First Prize, PhotographyCentral Highlands Regional Council Emerald Gallery Annual Art AwardsMineral Pulse
- 2026 · First Prize, Black and WhiteBauhinia Bicentennial Art Gallery Annual Art AwardsStill, We Breathe
- 2026 · Grand Champion Overall OpenRockhampton Show
- 2025 · Silver AwardNZIPP Asia Pacific Photography AwardsPolar Playfulness
- 2025 · Top 10, PeopleAustralasia's Top Emerging PhotographerSoul Connection
- 2023 · Silver WinnerBEAM Business Awards, Making a Difference in Community
Exhibitions & collections
Where the work has been shown.
Diane's prints have hung in regional gallery award exhibitions across Central Queensland every year since 2024, and in a permanent collection in Rockhampton. Her first solo exhibition opens in 2027.
- 2027Solo exhibitionA new series about trees, seasons and quiet persistence. Venue to be announced.Join the list
- 2024–2026Bauhinia Bicentennial Art Gallery Annual Art AwardsFirst prizes in 2024, 2025 and 2026, including Black and White, and Photography and Digital Art.
- 2024–2026Central Highlands Regional Council Annual Art Awards, Emerald GalleryFirst prizes in Photography and Digital Art.
- 2024–2025Brigalow Arts FestivalFirst Prize, Photography & Digital Works, 2025; Highly Commended, 2024.
- 2025Martin Hanson 50th Anniversary Memorial Art AwardsFirst Prize, Digital Works.
- 2024–2026Rockhampton Show, open print exhibitionChampion Open Print three years running, and Grand Champion in 2024 and 2026.
- PermanentCityWalk Motor Inn, Rockhampton49 photographs of the Central Highlands and Capricorn regions, curated room by room.
Beyond the camera
The stories behind the photographs.
People began responding not only to Diane's photographs but to the stories behind them. That led to speaking, writing and a book of her own.
Talks on perspective, courage and starting again
Diane has spoken at International Women's Day in Rockhampton and in podcast interviews, sharing what the lens has taught her about change and identity.
See the talks WritingVoices of Impact, and a book of her own
A contributing author to Voices of Impact Volume 5, an Amazon bestseller within 24 hours of its March 2026 launch. Her first book is coming in 2027.
Read about the books JournalBehind the Lens
Essays and field notes: from the address she gave on International Women's Day to 2am in the Southern Ocean, off South Georgia.
Read the journalBeyond the lens
Let's make something together.
Beyond the awards, what matters most to me is inspiring others: awakening a reverence for nature, and helping people see the world through a fortunate lens of their own.