Posted on March 22, 2022
On one of our trips to Lake Woodruff National Wildlife Refuge in Florida we saw quite a few Swallow-tailed Kites flying above us. They were fun to see soaring as we were walking the trails. Usually they were really high up in the sky or far off in the distance so we never got good images of them. But the images here are from one visit when they were soaring right above us near the parking lot. They were still really high above us but I thought they were still interesting images. All images were taken with a Canon 400mm DO lens with a 1.4X Teleconverter on a Canon 1DmkIV.
Category: Birds, Birds, Blog, Equipment, Favorite Locations, Lake Woodruff NWR, Lake Woodruff, DeLand Fl, Swallow-Tailed Kites, Wildlife Tagged: Canon 1.4X Telconverter, canon 1D mk IV, Canon 400mm f/4 DO lens, Lake Woodruff National Wildlif Refuge, Lake Woodruff National Wildlife Refuge, Lake Woodruff NWR, Lake Woodruff NWR Florida, Swallow-Tailed Kite, Swallow-Tailed Kites
Posted on March 17, 2022
Many times when I am out walking in a Wildlife Refuge to photograph birds I either cannot get close because they are high up in the trees or there are other things in the way to get close. Or they are flying some what in the distance. So if you are shooting “RAW” camera files such as Canon CR3 Raw files you can use “Enhance” in Photoshop to nicely uprez your images for severe cropping. Or if you want to really Print Large images. Works well for both applications. It also helps to run a noise reducing software after uprezzing. I had made my own Photoshop actions to uprez images but using “Enhance” in Photoshop is easier to use. The Featured Image is severely cropped from my “Enhanced” File. Sometimes I also use Nik Define software to remove some “noise” in the image if I am using a high ISO.
Category: Birds, Birds, birdscapes, Blog, canon R, Equipment, Lake Woodruff NWR, Lake Woodruff, DeLand Fl, Photo Tips, Tips & Techniques, Wildlife Tagged: "Enhance" feature in Photoshop, canon 300mm f/4 IS lens, canon 300mm f/4 lens, canon R, Lake Woodruff NWR, Lake Woodruff NWR Florida, Photographing birds in the distance, Photoshop Enhance, Photoshop Enhance for severe cropping images, Uprezzing images in Photoshop
Posted on March 4, 2022
On our trip years ago to the Lake Woodruff National Wildlife Refuge in DeLand Florida we were surprised to see a few Whooping Cranes flying and forging with the Sandhill Cranes. It was fun to see them interacting with the Sandhill Cranes. They were mostly far out in the fields but I managed to get a few images with them flying together in a flock. Image taken with a Canon 1D mk III with a Sigma 300-800mm lens @ 800mm with a Canon 1D mkIII.
Category: Birds, Birds, birdscapes, Blog, Equipment, Favorite Locations, Lake Woodruff NWR, Lake Woodruff, DeLand Fl, Sandhill Cranes, Whooping Cranes, Whooping Cranes in Flight, Wildlife Tagged: Lake Woodruff National Wildlif Refuge, Lake Woodruff National Wildlife Refuge, Lake Woodruff NWR, Lake Woodruff NWR Florida, Sandhill Cranes, Sigma 300-800mm DG Lens, Whooping Cranes
Posted on January 11, 2022
Here are a few more Alligator images from our Florida trip a few years ago to Lake Woodruff NWR. Luckily they were mostly in the water channels along the paths or sunning on the shorelines in the refuge and not on the paths. The Featured image was taken with a Canon 7D with a Tamron 150-600mm @ 220mm.
American Alligator, Canon 7D, Tamron 150-600mm @500mm
American Alligator, Canon 7D, Tamron 150-600mm @ 329mm,
Posted on December 29, 2021
I am still going through Sandhill Crane images that were shot for making panoramas since they were so close to me as I was photographing them. Usually it is a reverse problem where your subjects are too far away as you are photographing them. All images in this post are taken with a 300mm lens on a Canon R. The Featured Image is a 2 horizontal image panorama combined in Photoshop.
Category: Birds, Birds, birdscapes, Blog, canon R, Favorite Locations, Image Stacking, Lake Woodruff NWR, Lake Woodruff, DeLand Fl, Nature Still Lifes, Panorama & Stacked Images, Panoramas, Sandhill Cranes, Stacked Images, Wildlife Tagged: canon 300mm f/4 IS lens, canon R camera, Lake Woodruff National Wildlif Refuge, Lake Woodruff National Wildlife Refuge, Lake Woodruff NWR, Lake Woodruff NWR Florida, Lake Woodruff NWR Panoramas, Sandhill Crane Panoramas, Sandhill Cranes
Posted on December 23, 2021
These are from a trip a couple of years ago to Lake Woodruff NWR. It is located in Volusia County, Florida near the community of DeLeon Springs. It is a very interesting NWR to visit and is surprisingly empty of visitors except for the Wildlife. If you see a few groups of visitors there it is not the norm. Many times you are there almost completely by yourself which because of the size it is a little strange feeling. The famed St Johns River forms the western boundary of the 22,000-acre refuge. The refuge contains a wide variety of habitats. Among them are marshes, swamps, creeks, hammocks and uplands. One of my favorite birds besides Bald Eagles are Sandhill Cranes which seem to really like this Refuge. On this day there were quite a few Sandhill Cranes roaming around the ponds close to the entrance. It is very strange to have a bird that large walk right up to you to check you out. Many times you are just a few feet from them. On previous visits they were more wary and did not get close. I was just using a Canon 7D with a 300mm lens for wildlife and my iP11 Pro for landscapes. The Featured Image is a 7 horizontal images panorama stacked vertically to get the whole Crane in. When shooting panoramas of slowly moving birds foraging you still have to shoot the sequence very quickly to have the images line up correctly without having to do a lot of touch-ups on the overlaps.
Category: Birds, Birds, Blog, Equipment, Favorite Locations, iPhone, iPhone photography, Lake Woodruff NWR, Lake Woodruff, DeLand Fl, Panorama & Stacked Images, Panoramas, Sandhill Cranes, Uncategorized, Wildlife Tagged: bird panoramas, Handheld bird panoramas, iP11 Pro video, iPhone 11 Pro, iPhone multi-image panoramas, Lake Woodruff National Wildlif Refuge, Lake Woodruff NWR, Sandhill Crane Panoramas, Sandhill Cranes
Posted on October 11, 2021
Many times when we are out walking in Wildlife Refuges I carry a main camera with a 400mm lens or a 150-600mm zoom lens and a m43 camera with wide angle 14-140mm lens. I also have in my photo vest a few Teleconverters just in case I see something interesting farther out for the full frame camera. But as I am getting older I am using my iP11 Pro more for the Wider or Multi-Image Landscape Panorama shots. The Featured Image is made with the iP11 Pro using the 1.5mm lens (Full Frame Camera Equivalent ~13mm). I shot 14 images, shooting 3 rows of 4 images and then 2 images in the center just as a precaution to make sure the images line up successfully. When using the iP11’s 1.5mm lens I overlap the images even more than if I was using the 4.3mm or 6mm lens. Photoshop does a good job lining up and blending the multi-rowed images from the iPhone..
Category: Blog, Cloudscapes, Equipment, Favorite Locations, Image Stacking, iPhone, iPhone multi-image panoramas, iPhone photography, Lake Woodruff, DeLand Fl, Landscapes, Nature Still Lifes, Panorama & Stacked Images, Panoramas, Photo Tips, Skies and Clouds, Skyscapes & Clouds, Stacked Images Tagged: iPhone 11 Pro, iPhone 11 Pro multi-image panoramas, iPhone 11 Pro Panoramas, iPhone 11 Pro Photography, iphone image panoramas, iphone image panoramas in Photoshop, iphone image stacking, iPhone landscapes, iPhone multi-image panoramas, iphone panoramas in photoshop, iPhone photography, Lake Woodruff National Wildlif Refuge, Lake Woodruff National Wildlife Refuge, Lake Woodruff NWR, Lake Woodruff NWR Florida, Lake Woodruff NWR Landscapes, Lake Woodruff NWR Panoramas
Posted on October 7, 2021
This is from a previous trip a couple of years ago to Lake Woodruff National Wildlife Refuge in DeLand Florida. We saw quite a few female Anhingas, but we only saw this one male Anhinga preening on a branch and just hanging out there. Usually there are lots of them, but not on this visit.
Category: Birds, Birds, Blog, canon R, Favorite Locations, Lake Woodruff, DeLand Fl, Wildlife Tagged: 300mm, Anhinga, canon 300mm f/4 IS lens, canon R camera, Lake Woodruff NWR, Male Anhinga
Posted on April 19, 2020
During a walk at Lake Woodruff National Wildlife Refuge this hawk did a fairly close fly-by as we were walking on the trails. I was able to get a few shots as it went by using a 100-400mm lens @ 400mm with a 1.4x teleconverter. The featured image was as it was almost overhead giving me a better image.
Posted on April 6, 2020
Another panorama from our trip to Florida in February. For this panorama I chose to shoot with the 1.5mm lens on my iPhone 11 Pro. This would be an equivalent field of view of 13mm on a full frame camera. I shot 2 rows of images, top row 4 images and bottom row had 3 images. Somehow I miscounted on the bottom row, but it worked out anyway. I selected the files and adjusted the phone jpegs in Adobe Camera Raw before opening them into one layered file in Photoshop. I have my Adobe Camera Raw setup to open jpegs as raw files with settings. I tried setting the iPhone to shoot HEIC raw files, but that just slowed down the camera and did not see much of a difference in quality only a much larger file size. The panorama images below are multiple images in one row, combined and blended in Photoshop.
Another Multi-Image version of the same view. This time a one row, multi-image blend shot with the 1.5mm lens. (Each Image in Series Full Frame Equivalent 13mm)
2 image iPhone panorama, shot with 4.3mm lens. (Each Image in Series – Full Frame Equivalent 26mm)
Category: Blog, Favorite Locations, iPhone photography, Lake Woodruff, DeLand Fl, Landscapes, Panorama & Stacked Images, Panoramas, Skies and Clouds, Skyscapes & Clouds, Tips & Techniques, Uncategorized Tagged: iPhone 11 Pro, iphone image panoramas in Photoshop, iphone image stacking, iPhone photography, Lake Woodruff NWR, Panorama