Jan Breckwoldt is the man behind the image, and explains there was a lot more involved than just clicking the shutter button. 

Horse Head Rock was the final destination of a five-day tour for the Sydney based photographer, inspired by posts found on Instagram.

 "I left Sydney on Thursday, and travelled through Canberra and the Snowy Mountain Highway, before I reached the coast," he said.

"I got back to home by Monday evening, so there and back was about 1500 km in total."

When he reached the iconic rock formation, he had to plan ahead how he was going to capture it. 

"I explored the cliffs to try to find a good vantage point the afternoon before I actually took the shot," he said.

"I had to get a good sense of the location because I was taking the photo at sunrise the next morning, so it would be dark when I was setting up."

And it didn't help that the weather was miserable while he was scouting the location.

"It was windy and rainy and wet, but I had to do it,” he said.

Mr Breckwoldt knew that he had to work around nature to capture his photo. 

"The next morning, I had to look at the position of the sun, and I had to look at the tides to make sure I could access the location without me or my equipment being surprised by the high tides,” he said.

The final image of Horse Head bay is actually a combination of nine different photographs stitched together to enhance the depth of the image.

"So, the foreground of the rock pool is three images layered together, one normal exposure, one over exposure and one under exposure, this allows you to capture all of the colour and detail in the rocks," Mr Breckwoldt explained.

"Then I just repeat that technique for the rest of the image, so three different shots focusing on Horse Head Rock, and three different shots of the sky,” he said.

“This was important for the sky because it gives a strong purple colour, rather than a dull blue the sky actually was that day."

The final image was selected from a pool of 16,630 submissions over eight weeks.

Mr Breckwoldt says he was surprised that his work was chosen out of so many others. 

"It came out of the blue for me because of the sheer amount of photos submitted, and obviously Horse Head Rock is a popular location so many people would have taken pictures of it too,” he said.

Even if he hadn't won the competition, Mr Breckwoldt says he still got exactly what he wanted out of his journey.

"For me, I went specifically to take a really good picture of Horse Head Rock," he said.  

"So it was worth it, because I had the experience of driving the country and I've got these great pictures i can keep forever." ​

Mr Breckwoldt's photography trip to the Sapphire Coast was his first, but he doesn't believe it will be his last.

"I will be back on the coastline some time," he said.

"I didn't get the time to shoot any of the other rock formations there, like Camel Rock,” he said. 

I'll come again when I have the time and the right lighting to do it."

Mr Breckwoldt's photograph is displayed alongside the other winners on the Destination NSW website.