photoartflightMergansers Swim-By In Late Afternoon Warm Light
Posted on October 31, 2021
I was going through some of my Backup Drives to clean-up unneeded files & found this 2 image panorama of 4 Mergansers swimming by in the warm late afternoon light at the Celery Farm Natural Area in Allendale NJ. The image was taken with a Canon 1D mkIV with a 400mm DO lens with a Canon 1.4X Teleconverter .
Black-Crowned Night-Heron Enjoying Breakfast
Posted on October 16, 2021
This is from a visit years ago to the Celery Farm Natural Area in Allendale NJ. The Celery Farm is a 107-acre freshwater wetland with Lake Appert. It is open to the public during daylight hours every day of the year. The centerpiece is Lake Appert, a freshwater marsh that attracts waterfowl, herons, and rails. Even though it is smaller in size, it is Great for photography. Often times you will see birds & wildlife fairly closeup. But you will still need a long lens to get very Closeup Images. This Black-Crowned Night Heron was close to shore by one of the paths to the Lookout Platform. Earlier in the morning the wading birds are closer to the shoreline so you can get fairly close images. According to the Camera Raw Data this image was taken @ 5:16 AM with the early morning warm light warm giving a glow to the out of focus Lake behind the Heron. I found the best times there to be in the early morning. The Lake also attracts quite a few Ospreys and being a smaller lake you can usually get some interesting Osprey fishing images. Image here was taken @ f/5.6 for a smoother background with a Canon 400mm DO lens with a 1.4X teleconverter.
Great Egret Catching A Snack
Posted on October 12, 2021
Going through Backup Drives working on images that I did not have time to adjust or work on when I was still working. This is from a photo trip to the J.N. Ding Darling NWR in Florida 2 years ago. As we were walking along the Wildlife Drive I noticed this Great Egret working its way in the water channel along the Drive. It got to a sunlit section and I was able to get a couple of images before it flew off. Images taken with a Canon R with a Tamron 150-600mm with a 1.4X Teleconverter @ 840mm, f/16, 1/640 sec. Because it was in the bright sun I also set the Camera to a -2/3 exposure compensation to hold detail in the white Egret.
Common Buckeye Butterfly From Brigantine
Posted on September 26, 2021
I am going through images to post and found this image of a Common Buckeye Butterfly. This was from a trip to the Edwin B. Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, Brigantine Division in Galloway, New Jersey. We were traveling light and I was using a Canon 300mm lens with a 1.4X Canon Teleconverter on a Canon 1D mkIV. The Canon 300mm f/4 lens has fairly close focusing especially with the 1.4X Teleconverter. But to get even closer I used a Canon 25mm extension tube behind the teleconverter. Image taken @ f/11, 1/400 sec, ISO 400.
Blue Dasher Dragonfly In Our Garden
Posted on August 7, 2021
I was looking for a Praying Mantis in our gardens to photograph when this male Blue Dasher dragonfly landed on a branch by our carport. Not a great background but decided to photograph it anyway since I did not see any other interesting bugs. To minimize detail in the background carport siding I chose f/8 to minimize the carport detail. Since I was @ f/8 I shot a handheld series of images to retain detail on the dragonfly. I shot 3 images to focus stack on the dragonfly from wingtip to wingtip, then a 3 image series head to tail. After the main image stack, I moved in closer & closer for a few different closer versions since it seemed to be tolerating my being there.
Tiny Spider – Large Web
Posted on August 2, 2021
I was looking for bugs or dragonflies in our garden and noticed this tiny spider in the middle of a very large web. The spider was only about 1/4 inch long so it was interesting it had such a large web. I shot a few images with my iPhone then went in to get my 150mm Macro with a Canon 1.4x Teleconverter. I should have also shot a wider shot showing the whole web. I did not confirm the type of spider but think it is an Orchard Orb-weaver.
Redbelly Turtle Panorama From Davidsons Mill Pond Park
Posted on May 8, 2021
We went to Davidsons Mill Pond Park looking for Dragonflies, but I only saw a few off in the distance out in the water on some plants. But by the small pond near the entrance to the park I saw this Redbelly Turtle basking on the edge of the water. It was at the bottom of the incline with tall grasses before & around it. I was using a 300mm lens with a 1.4x teleconverter so if I backed up to get the whole turtle in the shot the grasses in front of it would be in the way. So I got very close and shot 15 images, 3 rows of 5 overlapping shots to get the whole Turtle in. Working on the files when I got back I loaded all 15 images into 1 layered Photoshop file. Then I used the Edit >Auto Align, then >Auto Blend to automatically align & blend the 15 images for the final layered image. After that I cropped the image because hand holding the camera I had uneven border edges around the image.
Blackwater NWR Snow Geese 28 Image Panorama
Posted on February 26, 2021
These images are from a trip to the Blackwater NWR in February 2017. The original panorama image is made from 28 images, shot handheld from left to right. The final image @300 ppi is 248″long x 10.3″ high. I was using a Canon 1DmkIV with a 400mm DO lens with a 1.4X Canon Teleconverter. The featured image is reduced so much to fit the featured image format that I broke them down below into 6 individual images so you can still see some of the the detail in the full 248″ image. Posting size in this blog really reduces the sharpness in the images but hopefully they hold up somewhat.
Osprey Defending Nest
Posted on February 23, 2021
On a visit years ago in the Spring to Blackwater NWR there was a lot of activity around the Osprey Nests along the Wildlife Drive. It was in mating season and the Ospreys were busy on the nests. This image was when an other osprey kept trying to get to the nest. On this pass the defending Osprey almost went upside down with claws out defending the nest. Plus there was a lot of screeching of the birds going on. This was the best image of the series because the more it was going up to defend the nest I cut off some of the Osprey in the image. Not sure if there were eggs in the nest or just wanted the nest. Image taken with a 400mm f/4 DO lens with a 1.4x Teleconverter on a Canon 1D mkIII.
Juvenile Red-Tailed Hawk From Brigantine
Posted on January 28, 2021
I am still going through backup drives for images to post here. These are from a trip to the Brigantine Division of the Edwin B. Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge in March of 2014. We were out of the car along the 2 way section of the Wildlife Drive when I noticed a hawk on one of the treetops. I am not great at ID’ing hawks, but I believe it is a juvenile Red-Tailed Hawk. Let me know if I am wrong! Anyway, it posed for me for quite a while. I slowly moved closer, little by little & did not want to bother it or scare it off. I was able to get some interesting images before others gathered to see what I was photographing and got to close to the tree it was on. Here are a few of the images taken as I was slowly getting closer until others noticed what I was photographing and scared the hawk off. All images were taken with a Canon 400mm DO lens with a 1.4x Teleconverter on a Canon 1D mkIII, handheld.
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