Sunrises and dust prints

From Photo of the day 2012

At the start of the school year I was taking photos during the morning dog walk - back when I was getting up with the sun instead of before the sun. I got a series of cool sunrise shots over the course of a few days. I'm still waffling over purchasing some panorama software, so some of the cooler ones will have to wait.

From Photo of the day 2012

Also got this one of tracks in the clay dust road to the back of the property (before that became mud with the fall rains). A couple of small bird hops and what I assume is a mouse with the tail dragging a line between the little foot prints.

Doorway critters

From Photo of the day 2012

So I stayed out later than I should with friends, and then on coming home found my entryway invaded by large moths. I'd seen them the night before and took some useless photos of them, but had another go yesterday evening. They are about two inches long, and most of them were dark brown with pink secondary wings (they keep these covered when settled), but then I spied a couple of white ones and thought of the old pepper-moth example for natural selection. Anyways, it was dim so I had to haul out the tripod. Good thing they weren't moving at all - this shot needed an 8 second exposure so I could use a smaller aperture (increase the depth of field) and keep my ISO lower (minimize grain). Beyond about 500 ISO this camera seems to need some decent light or things end up horribly noisy. I tweaked the colour temperature a bit towards blues in Picasa and used my macro combo and tripod with the incandescent white balance setting.

From Photo of the day 2012

These sapsuckers had a nest somewhere near my house. This adult was around all summer and then started bringing its babies by in July. The willow tree he is on is just outside my front door and I was on my way out when I spied one of the babies and figured I should grab some shots. This guy grabed a bug and took it to a hole (I don't think it was the nest) and proceeded to eat it there. I managed to get one shot with it in his beak and the rest came out pretty good. Cropped, increased shadows and sharpened in Picasa. I used my 70-300mm long lens to shoot it.

Dew

From Photo of the day 2012

So I went out Sunday morning in the fog/dew and got a bunch of shots. This one is by far my favourite, though it takes a larger image to truly appreciate its sharpness. I could likely blow this up to at least 11X17 with no issues. Anyways, the butterfly must have been a bit cold and damp as he wasn't going anywhere and I got to take a number of shots. This was with my macro combo, only a touch of shadows and cropping in Picasa.

From Photo of the day 2012

The dew on part of a spider's web strung between the electric fence wires. I liked how you could see the world upside down in the bigger drop. It was an interesting challenge as it was blowing in the breeze and kept moving out of the focal plane. I used some continuous bursts to get the shot and kept the few that were in focus. I tweaked shadows and sharpening in Picasa here.

From Photo of the day 2012

Some of the last fireweed of the season - the light was a bit too warm from the morning so I changed my white balance to "incandescent" to compensate - a good choice because such light is too yellow and now the camera compensated for the yellowish morning light. I think I did a touch of shadows and minor sharpening here.

From Photo of the day 2012

And lastly, a leaf on the trail I walk with the dog in the morning. I loved how it was coated in little drops and then the big one magnified everything underneath it. Same deal as the others I think, a bit of shadows and sharpening.

Fair and Frost

From Photo of the day 2012

I took some photos at the fall fair last weekend - mostly of the draft horse events because I always find such big horses fascinating. At the end of the teams with carts they had the team of four horses - this was the set of grey Percherons - turns out I've been driving past (and admiring) the leading two mares on my way to work for the last year. At this point I think they were trotting. I sat on the ground and angled my wide angle lens up through the bottom bars of the gate to make them look as big as they seemed in real life. I might have increased shadows a bit in picasa but otherwise straight from the camera.

From Photo of the day 2012

This one I shot on my early morning dog walk yesterday - I guess its officially fall. We had our first frost out on the field. I took my macro combo and spent some time getting the right angle, focus, and aperture was the hardest. It wasn't very bright out yet - long morning shadows, so not a lot of available light. I had a fairly wide aperture so the depth of field isn't what I would have liked. If I'd been thinking I would have poked the ISO up to 400 and then shot with a smaller aperture. Oh well - still thinking like a film photographer with no shot to shot ISO (ASA) control. Still it's different and I quite like how it came out.

Lightening

From Photo of the day 2012

So I finally fetched my tripod from school and had a go at the lightning that has been happening over the past few days. I missed out on the most intense storm I have seen on Saturday night because I had no tripod. I managed not too badly last night with a more spread out storm. This first shot was taken on my way home along the side of the highway - you can just make out the blur of car lights and the red glow was from the streetlights at the intersection. I shot these with either a 15 or 30 second shutter, hoping some lightning would happen in that spot during that time. Most of these are quite heavily cropped, though the first was shot with my wide angle lens with less cropping (the rest were with my 50mm lens at f 2.8). Hard to see in these sizes but there is a fair bit of ISO grain, one of the few times I got the D300 instead of the 200... ah well. Cool all the same - new type of photos for me!

From Photo of the day 2012

From Photo of the day 2012

From Photo of the day 2012

Damselfly

From Photo of the day 2012

Took me close to an hour to get this shot - not because I had an active subject! I rescued this damselfly from near drowning in my kiddie pool and set him up on the wall of my house to dry, then got to work with my macro converter-lens setup. It works great, it just has a really shallow depth of field and at that size any slight sway will make parts in focus or out of focus. I couldn't use a larger aperture to help because I didn't have enough light. A tripod is the obvious solution but I have left mine in my office. I improvised with a 12 ft long 1X4 piece of lumber propped up against the roof of entry way and resting on the ground. I couldn't quite lean on it, but I could easily steady my hand and camera for the shot. Very sharp when you look at it close. I think its going to make it to the local fair. Now just to decide if I want to print it 5X7 or 8X10. Kind of depends if I really want to stick it on my wall. 

Enjoy!

Rufous

 

 This little guy, a rufous hummingbird, has been hogging my feeder since I put it up on Wednesday. He chases off all the other one and has his set perches from which he maintains his guard. Unfortunately, he also chased off the male calliope hummer I saw the other morning - a first for me. They are a bit smaller then the rufous with purple streaks on their throat. Anyways, finally got around to taking some shots of him on some of his guard posts, they look good this size, ok at full. I will likely try again in better light. 

Instruments

 

 Spent the day out in Shelley BC listening to my favourite local band, Rosewood's Diary and having awesome potluck put on by the very hospitable CBC radio host from Prince George. Took some good photos of the band, but got these as well and figured they wouldn't get any screen time anywhere else.

The first is of one of the band member's violin, taken inside with no flash - a surprise for my old D200 as it didn't come out too grainy at ISO 500. Didn't like it on the back of the cam but like how it looks here. That old manual fixed 50mm lens is actually a lot of fun. I think I may have had the macro-converter on here as I was quite close, but don't recall. Love the very shallow depth of field, managed to get the F-hole and bridge sharp.

This one is of a locally made guitar, also brought out by a stand-in band member. He made it himself! Very nice sounding as well as looking. The colours on this came out very calm, I like how it was angled in the stand. Awesome band, awesome food, and fabulous weather made my afternoon.

More Macro Fun

Continued fun with my "new" macro combo - macro converter + a 50mm lens

From Photo of the day 2012

 A local cat outside the school during photography class. He was sunning himself and was particularly amenible. One of the most photographed cats in town I imagine, the kids use him for assignments.

From Photo of the day 2012

Macro shot of some ice in the parking lot of the school after it had thawed and re-frozen with neat crystals in it.

From Photo of the day 2012

A leaf in the snow I found yesterday while supervising kids. I like the curl and the way the light hit it.

From Photo of the day 2012

Claws of the same cat as top, he was getting playful on the playground. I managed to get a close up with the full macro on it. Great textures of both the paw and the wood. Cool!

Macro fun

From Photo of the day 2012

 So I finally got my macro converter hooked up with the old Nikon series E 50mm 1.8 lens. I took it to school and took some photos while the photography class was out getting photos for their assignment. Had a blast with some really basic subjects. Above, a pine branch in the school courtyard with some snow on it (very nice) and the end of a small icicle below. I had a student with a dark sweater stand behind it so that I would get the nice contrast. I like this combo!

From Photo of the day 2012

From Photo of the day 2012

And one more of the little common redpoll on my window feeder because he's cute. This one was just with the 50mm lens, no macro.

From Photo of the day 2012 A little Common Redpoll chowing down on my window mounted bird feeder.

From Photo of the day 2012 Black-capped Chickadee on the same feeder, not cropped.

Suddenly remembered that the D200 I bought nearly 2 years ago can actually make use of my old lens that came with my old Nikon EM film camera. I had been talking to a friend in Vanderhoof who recently got a new fixed 2.8 50mm-ish lens. I decided I'd double check this old lens and see what it had going for it - f1.8 fixed 50mm! Not bad! Fairly useless for wildlife unless they come to your window, but this revelation also means that my macro-converter I had for the old film camera will also work on my D200. Unfortunately I left it at work, so I dont have any macro shots to show off today. Loving how sharp it is though - the top photo is heavily cropped, but you'd never guess. I love how Nikon never changed its lens mount through the years.

Green

Ok, old pictures but I'm getting back into the swing of things. I doubt it will be daily again soon, if ever.

From Photo of the day 2012  Anyways - found this toad outside my house in June when I came home from work. Likely the last day of school because I finally brought the camera home and so had it to take pictures with. I am considering either of these shots as an entry in the fall fair under the photography category "green". Not sure which, currently leaning to the top one because I think it is a better photo technically and if someone else is judging it.

From Photo of the day 2012 Find the toad! Its actually not as hard as I thought it would be compared to the back of the camera version.

Scenery and Wildlife

From Photo of the day 2012

My front yard on Monday morning. We got some snow over the weekend and I liked how all the branches on the deciduous trees were highlighted against the black of the conifers. On a somewhat related note, I also like that its now LIGHT when I leave my house in the morning at about 7:30 am and STILL light when I get home in the afternoon, which enables me to actually take pics for this blog. This one is straight from the cam with my wide angle lens, unfortunately don't recall the exact settings.

From Photo of the day 2012

This one I took on Friday (I think - I know its late being posted) when I hoofed out to the round bale stack in my back field after school. I liked the light on the hay and and the pretty evening sky. Oddly, this is taken with my long lens at minimal focal length (70mm) because I wasn't packing my whole kit and had only brought that lens. I had to stand way back. I wasn't sure this was actually the shot I wanted when I took it, tried a bunch more with a barn in the background, and then ended up using this one anyways. The moose have been chewing on the one in the bottom corner, a number of times last week I had to go walk the dog in the other field because they were still there and I didn't her (or me) to get trompled by and angry/startled moose.

From Photo of the day 2012

Taken on the way back from the hoof out to the round bales - I liked the lighting and the contrast of the plant (I always called them ant flowers as a kid, no idea what they are actually called) with the shadowy background. The stems came out nice and sharp too. Another successful straight from the camera shot.

From Photo of the day 2012

This one is a short-eared owl I spotted on the way home from school yesterday. I went out way past him as I was driving fairly quick then pulled a u-turn and came back on the other side of the road. He put up with a bunch of shots before this one (him taking off) but I botched most of them by underexposure. This one was salvageable and he was in an interesting stance. I have cropped this, increased highlights and fill light and slightly sharpened in Picasa 3.

From Photo of the day 2012

And the rouge pack of deer on the way home from work last week. They were considering crossing the road, one had even hopped the fence, but when I slowed down they turned tail. Got to love being in northern BC where you can stop in the middle of the road for 5 minutes and take pictures with the window rolled down and not get in anyones way. Of course I had my wide angle lens on and by the time I got the long one on they were a considerable distance away so I got a trail of butts. I cropped it to remove most of a distracting blurry bit of grass or fence in the bottom left. I suppose the deer create a bit of a leading line, the shot is mostly included because I thought the deer were cool (hence its included at the bottom).

Obviously my students are beating me at keeping up with the whole 3 shots posted a week thing. Hope to do better next week!

Ungulates

From Photo of the day 2012

Spotted this big white-tailed buck on the way home from school on Monday with his girlfriend. I think he has 5 points, regardless he was big. I'm not really happy with this picture because it was waay to dark and I had to tweak it too much in Picasa 3 - highlights, fill light, too much sharpening, etc. Looked at anywhere other than here it would be grim. But it works and a neat subject. I liked how he held his head up and looked fairly regal.

From Photo of the day 2012

These two moose I spotted on the way home from school on Friday. It was intended to be posted as part of last week, but I got too busy. Again, the shot was far to dark and this is much over edited. After marking my student's work I am beginning to think I am getting horribly out of practice, as their current shots put these to shame. The moose were cool though - these are the first moose I have seen since moving up here, though there are loads of tracks in my backyard.

Catch-up and recommit

I am now teaching two photography classes and have challenged my grade 11 and 12 students to keep a photo blog as part of their course work. That said, I didn't think it was fair for me to not hold to the same standards. So. Three photos a week, taken in that week, not necessarily posted in three separate posts (because of time constraints) but hopfully so. Here goes....

From Photo of the day 2012

Technically this one doesn't count because I took it over the Christmas break a few weeks ago. This is at Echo lake outside of Vanderhoof on the frozen lake. I went snowshoeing with Meg in the -20C or so, and there were a number of abandoned ice fishing holes. I'm not sure how they cut these giant chunks (or got them out of the hole) as they were square. Maybe someone here will enlighten me. I think I tweaked the lighting in Picasa 3 afterwards. I used Meg to give the blocks and the hole a sense of scale. She wasn't to sure about the black part.

From Photo of the day 2012

Another taken at the same time - the contrast of the white crystals against the smooth black ice was cool. I think the dog came by to check out what I was doing and had a go at digging the hole again (ruining the smoothness of course). Ah well, I liked it. I may have tweaked the lighting in Picasa, don't really remember.

From Photo of the day 2012

This one I did take yesterday - after work no less! Those down south don't appreciate their longer winter days enough. It is now light to about 5:30 pm (bliss!) so I don't have to run Meg in the dark in the morning AND the evening. This is almost straight from the camera - I liked the long red light and the fence leading off into the back - I did have to touch up a big sensor dust spot in the sky with Picasa 3. Now I just need to find my sensor cleaning stuff so I don't have to fix all my pictures... where did it get put after the move??

From Photo of the day 2012

The side of my house - this has made me laugh over the last week or so. It makes me think that the house must have an itch and is trying to scratch it with its 4 ft long curly chunk of snow. I like how the icicles are no longer verticle and get a curve as the gravity has changed for them. Not the most spectacular picture, but one I've been meaning to get for a while (hard when its dark most of the time you are home). I did take some others from other angles but they just didn't work. I guess thats two for this week. I will have to find another.

A few more

So I've got a bit of time to update this.

From Photo of the day 2011

I took this while helping some of my photography students find pictures around the school yard - to be honest, I think I swiped the idea from one of them, or at least partly. I like all the textures in the worn out swing, and the sharpness and colour around the rust stains. I will fully admit the blue post in the corner is a bit distracting and perhaps should have been cropped out. Anyways, one that just kind of worked. This is straight from the cam with my wide angle lens.

From Photo of the day 2011

This one I took at my house just as the sun was going down on a friday evening a few weeks ago. The temperatures were down around -15 or -20 C and still falling. That weekend it got down to -33 C at my house - and this was just the first of my windows to display frost. Later in the weekend this little feather was lost in more frost. I liked the fading light in the background too. Straight from the camera, wide angle lens.

More to come later.

Back online

I've been offline since my move to Vanderhoof in Northern BC in August so I have a fair bit of catching up to do. I have still been taking photos, not as often as I should, as I am teaching a photography course as part of my employment. I will post a few photos at a time over the next couple of days and weeks as I have some time.

From Photo of the day 2011

Low bush blueberries - the whole plant is about an inch or two tall, and the berries are very small, but absolutely delicious. I took this shot at the end of August off the trail to Echo Lake under the powerlines. Once Meg discovered what I was doing it was a race to pick them. As she didn't have to bother with hands I think she won by practically sucking the berries off the plants.
I think this was straight from the camera, but I have long since forgotten.

From Photo of the day 2011

A frosty, single-seeded dandelion. These pictures look odd now, as there is several inches of snow outside, but at the time I was kind of excited by the frost in early September. The back-lighting made this shot interesting - I like how it illuminates the fluff of the seed so dramatically compared to the shady background. The other stuff around it is alfalfa from one of the many hay fields around my house.

Dog Walks

Just a couple shots from my dog walking and other outings over the last couple of weeks.

From Photo of the day 2011

I took a trip up to the Crow and Gate pub outside of Nanaimo last week. The food was pretty good, the gardens were great. Lots of hummers, mostly Rufus hummingbirds like this guy, I took around 30 pictures of them but this one was the best. I like it because it looks a lot more natural than the usual one with the feeder in the shot and I managed to (almost) freeze his wings. Shot handheld with my 70-300 lens, cropped and (can't remember) I think I might have tweaked the shadows.

From Photo of the day 2011

This was an on the spot shot. I walked down to McKenzie bight yesterday with the dog and a friend. The tide was out, but coming in, and the foam was trickling in among the rocks. It must have woke up all the shore crabs hiding under the gravel because everywhere you looked there were crabs poking up or crawling in the water underneath. You could hear them there were so many - I liked how some were emerging from the foam so you couldn't see the whole thing. I was crouching for this shot, again with my long lens. This is cropped for aspect ratio and framing only.

From Photo of the day 2011

This guy I found today on my walk at Elk Lake with Meg. He was only about 4-5 inches long and he didn't look like the typical garter snakes (red or yellow stripes on the side) so I thought I would brave the snake stink and grab him to see if he was something different. He coiled himself firmly around my fingers and actually let me swap my long lens for my wide angle with him there! I wanted a bit more zoom but the focusing distance on my long lens is further than my arm length and I'm awful at trying to shoot without aiming through the viewfinder.

Anways - this is straight from the camera. I think he's just a young garter, but all my vertebrate ID books and notes from school are packed so I can't check.

From Photo of the day 2011

And another find from Elk Lake today - a red squirrel. Actually - it could be a douglas squirrel - one has an orange tummy, one white. Anyways, I spotted him as he scampered to the far side of the trunk as I was coming up the path so stopped and got the camera all ready. He came around and went up the tree - I have some shots of that too - but then turned around and was glaring at the dog in this one. I liked his stance - it just oozes squirrel. I did have to tweek it a bit - a fair bit of shadows in Picasa 3, nothing else.

Scaley

From Photo of the day 2011

This is a European Wall Lizard - introduced into BC. I though they were alligator lizards until 5 minutes ago when I looked it up to make sure. They are all through my friend's rock garden in Brentwood and, yes, they do crawl up his walls (the outside!) This was shot through a lot of grass, so I was impressed with how it came out. He is quite sharp, and I had to be sneaky. As you can see he is watching me, any quick moves and he would run down a hole. This guy was about 5 inches long. I cropped it a bit to get rid of some of the more distracting grass, sharpened (a touch) and gave it a little bit of highlights to bring out his colours and brighten it up a bit.

From Photo of the day 2011

Also from my friends garden - a swallowtail butterfly on mock orange flower. I cropped and sharpened only in Picasa 3. Technically butterflies have scales too, hence the title.

From Photo of the day 2011

And not the best photographic quality - but Mr. 6V was back at my place today, so I thought I'd throw this in. I had a few of him preening but they are a lot darker. This was cropped only. Maybe he will find a mate for next year and nest near here.