photoartflightBlackwater NWR Sunrise
Posted on May 23, 2020
This image is from a previous trip to Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge in Cambridge, Maryland. We arrived as the sun was coming up, so I stopped near the entrance to take a few shots of the trees along the entrance with the warm glow of the rising sun behind the trees. This was my favorite of the series, shot with a Canon 17-40mm lens @ 17mm. This is a lens I hardly ever use and is not my favorite lens for landscapes, but it was in my bag so I gave it a try anyway. In the end I liked the image. I usually use a 24-105mm and shoot multiple images @24mm for a slight panorama view.
Celery Farm Natural Area Panoramas – InfraRed BW & Full Color
Posted on July 24, 2019
We went to one of my favorite small Natural Areas that was close to where we used to live. The clouds were impressive so I shot a series of panoramas @ 17mm with a Canon 17-40mm lens and 12mm with a 12-24mm lens on a Canon R. I was mostly shooting with the Hoya R72 InfraRed Filter, but did a few without the R72 filter also.
The images below show the series of panorama images going from the raw image as shot with the Hoya R72 InfraRed filter, then the image balanced to the white card I also shot for color balance. Then going to the grayscale B&W Image.
IR Image Hoya R72 Filter – @ 17mm – 4 Horizontal Image Pano
Above Image color balanced with White Card Image for color balance
Featured Image Converted to BW Infrared after white balancing color infrared image
7 Images (vertical) @ 17mm – Converted to BW Infrared
7 image panorama -shot @ 12mm – 7 vertical images combined in Photoshop
Pre-Sunrise Clouds – 24 Shot Panorama @ 400mm
Posted on June 18, 2018
I like going to the Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge in Maryland for their colorful Sunrises and Sunsets. (Also for Eagles & Ospreys and…) On this day the clouds were very interesting so I was shooting a few different versions, compositions, focal lengths and Camera/lens combos. Then I noticed a thin long length of colorful clouds above the trees but below the main larger clouds. So I tried a 400mm with a 1.4X Teleconverter pano version. I shot 24 images with that combo, with large overlaps on each shot, all handheld. This is the Featured Image above. I used a lot of overlapping images because it usually lines up better, especially when the camera is handheld. If I do not need them I can just use a few instead. Below are more versions with different camera and lens combinations. Also some eagles that flew by in the colorful sky adding some interest and a subject in the colorful sky. In the featured image about 2/3rds over to the right there is a small dot below the clouds. That was another Bald Eagle flying through and I decided to leave it and not clone it out.
Blackwater NWR PreSunrise @ 24mm (2 image blend for foreground detail)
Blackwater NWR Sunrise, 2 Image pano @ 24mm
Blackwater NWR Sunrise @ 400mm, Canon 400mm DO lens
Blackwater NWR Sunrise @ 400mm, Canon 400mm DO lens w/ Canon 1.4X Teleconverter
Immature Bald Eagle Soaring in the Sunrise, Canon 400mm DO w/ 1.4X Teleconverter
Closer Bald Eagle Flying in the Sunrise, Canon 400mm DO w/ 1.4X Teleconverter
Early Morning Pre-Dawn Blackwater NWR Landscape
Posted on July 7, 2017
When we go to the Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge, it takes about 3 1/2 hours, so it is hard to get there sometimes before sunrise. So on this day we got there before sunrise so we had time to scout a good location. Shot at 17mm before the sun broke the horizon. I liked the cool colors before the sun rose above the horizon. Below is the sun slightly breaking above the horizon @24mm. Blackwater also has spectacular sunsets, being close to the coast.
Sun breaking above the trees – 24mm
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