Saturday, February 27, 2010

Cormorants flying past Moon


Here is another shot taken at the FW Nature Center on Wednesday. Late in the afternoon hundreds of Double Crested Cormorants leave the nature center and fly South for the night to some other location ( not sure why ). I was looking for a better formation but am pretty happy with this one. Hope you like it as well!

Image Data:
1/500s. | f/8 | ISO 200 | cloned out straggling bird :)
click image for larger size.

Thursday, February 25, 2010

Yellow Rumped Warbler


I made it out to the Fort Worth Nature Center yesterday to see if I could get any photos of the Belted Kingfisher that hangs around the bird blind along the river. I did see him but he never came close enough for a good shot, maybe next time! I am hoping to purchase a kayak soon, I just need to decide which one. Cannot wait to paddle around the nature center. After having little luck with the kingfisher I decided to hike along the Riverbottom trail. I didn't see many ducks nor the Grebe that I saw earlier this week. I did see a lot of cormorants, sparrows, chickadees and this Yellow Rumped Warbler ( I think that is what it is ). Not a fantastic image, but I was happy to add this species to my list. Every month the nature center displays photos that photographers have made at the refuge, I will be displaying in December, this months are excellent and I invite you to check out the guy's website here. A lot of his bird images were taken at the refuge and around my area. Enjoy!

Image Data:
1/800s. | f/8 | ISO 200 | Fill Flash

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Lesser Scaup


I will lay off of the Goldfinch images for a bit, just so you know that I do shoot other species! This image was taken yesterday at a park next to where I have my guitar lesson. There are an abundance of Lesser Scaup as well as a handful of Northern Shovelers, what I think were Black Bellied Whistling Ducks, Mallards, Canada Goose, Coots and probably some others that I just didn't see. I am going to try and focus on this location whenever I can, I think there will be some great opportunities presented. For now I hope that you like this one. I wish for a lower angle and better light here, but will do better next time!

Image Data: 1/1250th. | f/8 | ISO 250
click image to see larger size.


Saturday, February 13, 2010

American Goldfinch - High Key



American Goldfinch in Snow 2

Sorry for all of the Goldfinch images lately, they are extremely easy to photograph! Here is one from Thursday, I was testing out my new flash and love it so far, but cannot wait to try it out at the Nature Center hopefully on Monday. All of the snow is melting at a good pace, sad to see it go so soon, but that is Texas.
Hope you like this shot.

Image Data:
1/250s. | f/8 | ISO 320 | Fill Flash -3EV

Friday, February 12, 2010

Snowy Woods - Record Day for North Texas


Thursday, February 11, 2010 was a historic day here in North Texas. For 24 hours it snowed non-stop starting early on Thursday morning and as a result we are left with almost 1ft. of snow, more in some places! It probably does not sound like much especially to those in the east, but it is huge here! Never does North Texas see snow twice in less than 2 months and rarely in a year at that. All that to say it was very exciting! We went to the Nature Center hoping to get some landscapes but arrived too late as they closed early. I took this on the side of the road at the Nature Center gate, nothing special but it does give the feel of what we had. Hope you like it.

Image Data:
1/160s. | f/11 | ISO 400
EF-S 17-55mm at 17mm
Click image to view larger size.


Monday, February 8, 2010

American Goldfinch 3

Here is American Goldfinch image number three taken in my backyard on Saturday. This is probably my favorite AG shot taken so far. I hope that you too like it! The weather here has turned rainy again, there might be a break tomorrow, but it will stay cloudy until Friday. I ordered an external flash and Better Beamer today and cannot wait to get them and try them out.

Image Data:
1/640th. | f/8 | ISO 250
Click image to view larger size.

Saturday, February 6, 2010

American Goldfinch 2


Here is another bird image taken in my backyard, this one from this morning. This morning has been my most productive morning of trying to get good shots of the American Goldfinches
that visit my yard daily. I got shots of them on two different perches. I hope that I can get some even better ones now that they are cooperating with me! What do you think of this one?

Image Data:
1/500s. | f/8 | ISO 250

Important! Click image for full view, blogger is not showing the whole image for some reason!

Thursday, February 4, 2010

Greater Yellowlegs in Habitat


It has been cloudy and wet most of this week, so not a lot of shooting has been done. The sun did come out Tuesday afternoon so I headed over to the reservoir for a couple of hours. I did not see much aside from the usual's, except for this Greater Yellowlegs. I was was waiting for some Savannah sparrow's to come out of some high grass ( they never did ) when I heard the yellowlegs calling overhead. I watched him land about 50-80 yards away from where I was. I started to slowly approach him using the high grasses as cover when I could. I got to within about 20 yards from him and took a few photos, this is one of them. I took a few more steps and that spooked him. Next time, now that I know he is around, I will wait at one of the pools of water or the creek and see if I cannot get a better shot. As disappointed as I was for failing to get a more frame filling image, I still like this image showing the birds surroundings.
Let me know what you think.

Image Data:
1/800s. | f/8 | ISO 400
Click image to see larger size