I spent my last photo morning in San Diego where I spent most of my mornings, on the cliffs at La Jolla. The quality of the photographic opportunities on this trip has been amazingly good and my hard work has paid off handsomely. With thick fog I spent most of my time photographing Brandt’s Cormorant nesting behaviors. I ran down four 5DS R batteries. Patrick concentrated on flight photography, another area in which he is extremely skilled.
I kiss Robin and Patrick Sparkman goodbye tonight as I fly to Orlando on the Southwest 8AM nonstop to Orlando. They are hosting a Good-bye Artie Party” tonight. 🙂 It is hard to express how wonderfully they have treated and put up with me for so long. I arrived in San Diego on March 11. Patrick calls my visit, “March Madness/artie Style!”
The Streak
Today’s blog post marks 150 days in a row with a new educational blog post. Assuming that I will be making the trip to Namibia on April 11, this streak will come to an end soon. As always–and folks have been doing a really great job recently–please remember to use our B&H links for your major gear purchases. For best results use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. Please remember that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) we would appreciate your business.
Center AF point (by necessity)/AI Servo Expand/Rear Button AF as originally framed was active at the moment of exposure. The center AF point was just on the front of the bird’s chest right at the waterline. This was a decent crop from the front and below. Check out the tight crop below to see the incredible fine feather 5DS R detail.
Drake Surf Scoter swimming. Image courtesy of and copyright 2016 Patrick Sparkman.
The Proof is in the Pudding…
Below is a recent e-mail conversation that I had with Al Ahner. The office relayed his original e-mail to me. It began, “Hi Arnie.”
AM: Hi Abe, This is artie. 🙂
AA: I had dropped a comment about hand-holding this camera body. Your images are indeed sharp but I had heard from a friend that he had dismal results with his.
AM: Dismal photographers get dismal results.
AA: We had an event here in St. Louis called “Shutterfest”. Two full days of vendors, classes, workshops, etc. The Canon team was here and to a person they said: “This is a tripod only camera body.”
AM: You should have sent them to my blog 🙂
AA: Not your word against theirs, but just FYI.
AM: I understand. The proof as they say, is in the pudding. See Patrick’s pudding above and below. Some Canon employees routinely give wrong or misleading answers to simple questions both in person and on the help lines…
Yes Patrick is amazingly skilled. And yes, you need to hold this lens still. And yes, you need to focus each image accurately. And yes, having it properly Lens Aligned can be a great help. I will do a blog post soon based on this e-mail using one of Patrick Sparkman’s 600II/2XIII/5DSR hand held images of a relatively distant sea duck. You can show it to all the naysayers and to the folks at Canon the next time that you cross paths.
LMK if I may use your name in the blog post. No sweat either way.
AA: Hope all is well and you continue to recover from your surgery.
AM: I am, thanks, and thanks for your good wishes.
later and love, artie
The Follow-up
Al was a good sport; he wrote back saying that it would be OK to use his name. Thank you kind sir.
This is a 100% crop of today’s featured image.
100% Crop
This 100% crop of today’s featured image is a testament both to Patrick’s photographic skills and the amazing resolution of the 5DS R. I am hoping that this post will quiet the experts, internet and otherwise, who proclaim out of ignorance that you must use a tripod with a 5DS R… I realize, however, that that is not likely.
From upper left clockwise to center: Black Skimmer head portrait, American Oystercatcher dining on surf clam flesh, Common Tern at sunset, Common Tern adult swallowing flatfish, Black Skimmer in flight, newborn Common Tern chick, American Oystercatcher with chick, fresh juvenile Common Tern (with fill flash), and Common Terns copulating.
Meet and greet at 3pm on the afternoon of Monday, July 18. Limit 10.
The primary subject species of this IPT will be the nesting Common Terns. The trip is timed so that we will get to photograph tiny chicks as well as fledglings. There will be lots of flight photography including adults flying with baitfish. Creating great images of the chicks being fed is a huge challenge. In addition to the terns we will get to photograph lots of Black Skimmers courting, setting up their nesting territories, and in flight (both singles and large pre-dawn flocks blasting off). Midair battles are guaranteed on sunny afternoons. And with luck, we might even see a few tiny chicks toward the end of the trip. We will also get to photograph the life cycle of American Oystercatcher. This will likely include nests with eggs and tiny chicks, young being fed, and possibly a few fledglings.
Nesting Piping Plover is also possibly. There will be lots of gulls to photograph; most years I am able to find a few Lesser Black-backed Gulls of varying ages in addition to the Herring, Ring-billed, and Great Black-backed Gulls. You will learn to identify and age the various gull species. There will likely be some Willets feeding along the surf and with luck we might get to photograph a handsome juvenile or two. In addition to the locally breeding shorebirds, we will likely get to see some southbound migrant arctic-and sub-arctic breeding shorebird species such as Sanderling, Semipalmated Plover, and maybe even Red Knot.
From upper left clockwise to center: Black Skimmers with tiny chick, Common Tern landing with baitfish for young, fledged Common Tern chick in dunes, American Oystercatchers/display flight, adult Common Tern with pipefish for chick, Common Tern fledgling in soft light, American Oystercatcher on nest with eggs, American Oystercatcher 3-egg clutch, battling Black Skimmers.
The IPT Logistics
The tour will begin with a meet and greet on the afternoon of Monday, July 18, 2016. That will be followed by our first shooting session at the beach. From Tuesday through and including all of Friday we will have two photography sessions daily. Our morning sessions will start very early so that we are on the beach well before sunrise. We usually photograph for about four hours. Then we will enjoy a group brunch. We will always have a midday break that will include a nap for me. That followed by our daily afternoon classroom sessions that will include image review, workflow and Photoshop, and a review/critique of five of your trip images. Folks are always invited to bring their laptops to brunch for image sharing. I always have mine with me but heck, I am a big show-off. Afternoon in-the-field sessions generally run from 5pm through sunset.
Breakfasts are grab what you can. Four brunches are included. Dinners (if at all) will be on your own as we will often get back to the hotel at about 9pm. There is a fridge in every room and a supermarket within walking distance of the hotel so nobody should starve. You will learn a ton during the nine shooting sessions, the four in-classroom sessions, and even at lunch. Early morning and late afternoon parking is free. If we want to head back to the beach early we will need to arrange tight carpools and share the $30/vehicle parking fee. Non-photographer spouses, friends, or companions are welcome for $100/day, $450 for the whole IPT.
Save a space by calling Jim or Jen at the office at 863-692-0906 and arranging to leave your deposit of $599–credit cards are accepted for deposits only. Your balance will be due on April 18, 2016. I hope that you can join me for what will be an exciting and educational IPT.
Please Remember to use our Affiliate Links 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
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Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
Thanks to the kindness of Leon Shapiro, Patrick & Robin Sparkman, new blog regular Kerry Morris (a girl Kerry btw) and I spent several mid-morning hours creating spectacular sea- and wave-scapes from the sunroom of his 9th floor apartment right on the La Jolla coast, just north of Children’s Cove. Techniques and images coming soon. In the meantime thanks a huge stack to Leon who met me on Wednesday, hired me for a private morning on Thursday, and soon thereafter gave me the keys to his mega-luxurious dwelling.
The Streak
Today’s blog post marks 149 days in a row with a new educational blog post. Assuming that I will be making the trip to Namibia on April 11, this streak will come to an end soon. As always–and folks have been doing a really great job recently–please remember to use our B&H links for your major gear purchases. For best results use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. Please remember that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) we would appreciate your business.
To view the video full screen click on the expanding arrows symbol between the HD and the vimeo on the Play bar.
Thanks Patrick!
Huge thanks also to Patrick Sparkman for the great editing job in Final Cut Pro X. Once again Patrick amazed me with his technical knowledge and expertise. Thanks bro’.
Join Me on the AUG 2017 Galapagos Photo-Cruise
Guaranteed Waved Albatross!
Do consider joining me for this once in a lifetime trip to the Galapagos archipelago. There simply is no finer Galapagos photography trip. Learn why above.
An Amazing Value…
Do know that there are one week Galapagos trips for $8500! Thus, my trip represents a tremendous value; why go all that way and miss half of the great photographic locations?
The Logistics
August 6, 2017: We arrive in Guayaquil, Ecuador a day early to ensure that we do not miss the boat in case of a travel delay.
August 7, 2017: There will be an introductory Galapagos Photography session and a hands on exposure session at our hotel.
August 8, 2017: We fly to the archipelago and board the Samba. Heck, on the 2015 trip some people made great images at the dock in Baltra while our luggage was being loaded!
August 22, 2017: We disembark late morning and fly back to Guayaquil midday; most will overnight there (included).
Most will fly home on the early morning of August 23 unless they are staying on or going elsewhere (or catching a red-eye flight on the evening of the 22nd).
$12,499 includes just about everything: all transfers, guide and park fees, all food on the boat, transfers and ground transportation, your flights to the archipelago, and three nights (double occupancy) in a top notch hotel in Guayaquil. If you are good to go, a non-refundable deposit of $5,000 per person is due immediately. The second payment of $4,000 is not due until 11/1/16. The final payment of $3449 per person will be due on 2/1/17. A $200 discount will be applied to each of the balances for couples or friends who register at the same time.
Purchasing travel insurance within 2 weeks of our cashing your deposit check is strongly recommended. On two fairly recent cruises a total of 5 folks were forced to cancel less than one week prior to the trip. My family and I use Travel Insurance Services and strongly recommend that you do the same.
Not included: your round trip airfare from your home to and from Guayaquil, beverages on the boat, phone calls, your meals in Guayaquil, personal items, and a $600/person cash tip for the crew and the guide—this works out to roughly $40/day to be shared by the 7 folks who will be waiting on us hand and foot every day for two weeks. The service is so wonderful that many folks choose to tip extra.
Please e-mail for the tentative itinerary or with questions. Please cut and paste “Galapagos 2017 Tentative Itinerary Please” into the Subject line.
Please Remember to use our Affiliate Links 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack!
Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
On my post-op visit I was told, “You are well ahead of the curve.” I am feeling good and having fun and enjoyed a short session at La Jolla with Patrick Sparkman. At 8:30 he headed for work and I headed for the UCSD Medical Center for my appointment.
I snagged more than a few folks and all but one unhappy camper took the April Fool’s blog post as a good joke. I did answer every response personally. Till next year 🙂
The Streak
Today’s blog post marks 148 days in a row with a new educational blog post. Assuming that I will be making the trip to Namibia on April 11, this streak will come to an end soon. As always–and folks have been doing a really great job recently–please remember to use our B&H links for your major gear purchases. For best results use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. Please remember that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) we would appreciate your business.
This image was created at Hokkaido, Japan on the last Japan in Winter IPT with the hand held Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM lens (at 142mm) and the amazing mega mega-pixel Canon EOS 5DS R. ISO 400. Evaluative metering +1 stop: 1/200 sec. at f/16 in late afternoon light.
Center AF point/AI Servo Expand/Rear Focus AF on the center of the closest footprint and re-compose. Click here to see the latest version of the Rear Focus Tutorial. Click on the image to see a larger version.
Red-crowned Crane footprints in snow
Triangular Simplicity…
Please feel free to share your thoughts on today’s featured image. Does it bring anything to mind? How does it make you feel?
A DPP 4 Screen Capture of today’s featured image
Amazing Revelation Made Out of Ignorance?
There are lots of ways to get away from too BLUE snow. Play with the color temperature slider during the RAW conversion. With the 5DS R in DPP 4 there is a great Auto: White Priority WB setting that works well in certain situations. The same can be said about Click White Balance. I was not happy with either of those last two with today’s image so I opened the Color Temperature slider. As I moved the color temperature slider I noticed that the peaks for each color on the RGB histogram shifted and that when the snow looked totally neutral, I was amazed to see that the centers of the peaks for all three colors were perfectly aligned.
At this point I realize that some folks might be thinking, big deal, I’ve known that for years. For me it was a revelation. Perhaps I have just been plain ignorant for the past 14 years of doing digital. Does anyone use this in their workflow when attempting to balance the color?
On second thought: I am not sure that it is even possible to line up the centers of the peaks for each color with all images. And I am not sure that the results would be 100% desirable. But I do know that it worked for this image. Future experimentation and study to follow. Please feel free to share your experiences here.
Note: if an image is too BLUE after the RAW conversion you can always go to Hue Saturation, select the BLUE channel, and decrease the Saturation to taste.
Please Remember to use our Affiliate Links 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack!
Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
I had a wonderful Thursday morning with a private client from CT, Leon Shapiro. He was a quick study. When we met he said, “I cannot make any sharp images once I add the 1.4X TC to the 70-200 f/2.8L IS II.” I chose not to believe him. Right off the bat, he began making sharp images with the 70-200 f/2.8L IS II lens, my 2X III TC, and his 5D Mark II. Within the hour he was making great images using rear focus (which he thinks he might have heard of before…) And oh, did I mention that when we chatted on the cliffs on Wednesday morning he had been so frustrated by digital exposure that he had disabled blinkies. I had him set up in Manual mode and within minutes he began making perfect exposures without a problem. And that was before he hired me 🙂
The Streak
Today’s blog post marks 147 days in a row with a new educational blog post. Assuming that I will be making the trip to Namibia on April 11, this streak will come to an end soon. As always–and folks have been doing a really great job recently–please remember to use our B&H links for your major gear purchases. For best results use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. Please remember that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) we would appreciate your business.
Switching to Sony
After much thought, I have decided to switch to the amazing Sony System; here is my new gear bag. All will arrive in time for my Namibia trip.
If you would like additional info as to why I am switching, please shoot me an please shoot me an email and I will gladly get back to you.
Selling All My Canon Gear/Priced to sell immediately or sooner
Canon 600mm f/4L IS II lens in like new condition: $7999.00
Canon 500mm f/4L IS lens in like new condition: $6,999.00
Canon 400mm f/4 L IS II lens in like new condition: $5,999.00
Canon 300mm f/2.8L IS II lens in like new condition: $5,999.00
Canon 100-400mm L IS II lens in just good condition–I have used this one to death: $999.00
Canon 70-200mm f/2.8 L IS II lens in good condition–that means badly beaten up: $999.00
Canon 24-105mm L IS lens in very good condition: $1,299.
Canon 16-35mm f/4L IS lens in excellent condition: $899.00.
Canon 100mm f/2.8L IS lens in excellent condition: $799.
Canon 15 mm fish eye in terrible condition: $199.00
Two @ Canon EOS-5DS R in like new condition: $2499.00
Canon EOS 1D X in very good condition: $1999.00
Three @ Canon 1.4X III TCs in excellent condition: $329.00 each.
Two @ Canon 2X III TCs in excellent condition: $329.00 each.
All sales include insured ground shipping via UPS Ground. Your item will not ship until your check clears. No Phone calls please; to purchase, please shoot me an email to arrange payment and shipping.
Have a great day.
Please Remember to use our Affiliate Links 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack!
Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
Still feeling good. Got out on Wednesday morning for a few hours. Met a nice guy from CT; we are hooked up for a morning of private instruction and image review tomorrow. Friday am I have my post-op visit at 9am. On the plane home on Monday. But not for long. I leave for Namibia five days after I get home :).
The Streak
Today’s blog post marks 145 days in a row with a new educational blog post. Assuming that I will be making the trip to Namibia on April 11, this streak will come to an end soon. As always–and folks have been doing a really great job recently–please remember to use our B&H links for your major gear purchases. For best results use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. Please remember that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) we would appreciate your business.
On my second visit to Gatorland on March 10, just before I headed for San Diego, things were quite slow with mixed clouds and sun. There were no gorgeous Great Egrets in good positions or settings. Then I came across the bird featured in today’s blog post. It screamed out to me, “Photograph me. I am sublimely beautiful. So I did. I shot verticals and horizontals, all at 1200mm. I even created a few with mixed light on the subject violating one of my never press the shutter button edicts. I did not hate even those.
The Funniest Thing…
The funniest thing is that I pointed the bird out to several other photographers as being particularly beautiful. None bit. I suggested to one guy with a 7D II and a 100-400II that by adding his 1.4X TC that he could make some really nice images. “I don’t use any teleconverters. They ruin the image quality.” Good to know…
Your Call?
Do you share my enthusiasm for this image or do you think that it’s pretty boring because of the soft light and the sparsity of detail? Do you love it or hate it? Either way, be sure to let us know why?
AF Question
If you want the eye sharp, what is the best way to focus this image? One-shot AF? AI Servo AF? Rear focus? Shutter button? A combination of the preceding? Or something else?
Honest, I’ve Never Done This Before…
Working enlarged to about 250% with a tiny, hard (opacity 85%) brush, I sculpted the edges of several sections of the pupil for two reasons: to eliminate chromatic aberration along with edges of the filamentous feathers, and to increase the overall sharpness of the pupil.
Please Remember to use our Affiliate Links 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack!
Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
I headed out to La Jolla again on Tuesday morning. Conditions were not great with wind against sun. I thought that I might be headed home quite early but I wound up staying till 9:30 and made a few good images. After working for a while I enjoyed a great nap. Patrick and Robin and I are headed to the cliffs this afternoon for a rare late in the day session at La Jolla. And then dinner somewhere.
The Streak
Today’s blog post marks 144 days in a row with a new educational blog post. Assuming that I will be making the trip to Namibia on April 11, this streak will come to an end soon. As always–and folks have been doing a really great job recently–please remember to use our B&H links for your major gear purchases. For best results use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. Please remember that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) we would appreciate your business.
This image is another that was created at La Jolla, CA on my first day back in action with the hand held Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM lens (at 312mm) and the amazing mega mega-pixel Canon EOS 5DS R. ISO 500. Evaluative metering probably about -1/3 stop: 1/500 sec. at f/5.6. Daylight WB. On camera high speed synch fill flash at -2 stops with the Canon Speedlite 600EX-RT.
Two rows down and one AF point to the right of the center AF point/AI Servo/Surround/Rear Focus AF as framed was active at the moment of exposure (as is always best when hand holding). Click here to see the latest version of the Rear Focus Tutorial. Click on the image to see a larger version.
Image #1: Western Gull in early morning light
Sweet Light
When the sun first comes over the distant hill on a clear morning at La Jolla the light is oh so sweet as you can see in each of today’s featured images that were taken only moments apart.
The 100-400 II
Patrick Sparkman and I have used our 1-4 IIs so much since I have gotten here that we have begun calling it “The La Jolla Lens. From birds in flight to tight portraits from sea-scapes to flowers, the lens is simply amazing. And sharp. And the 4-stop IS is insane. If what you are reading here now inspires you to purchase one please do so by clicking on this link: Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM lens.
This image too was created at La Jolla, CA on my first day back in action with the hand held Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM lens (at 330mm) and the amazing mega mega-pixel Canon EOS 5DS R. ISO 500. Evaluative metering probably about -1/3 stop: 1/500 sec. at f/5.6. Daylight WB. On camera high speed synch fill flash at -2 stops with the Canon Speedlite 600EX-RT.
Two rows down and one AF point to the right of the center AF point/AI Servo/Surround/Rear Focus AF as framed was active at the moment of exposure (as is always best when hand holding). Click here to see the latest version of the Rear Focus Tutorial. Click on the image to see a larger version.
Image #2: Western Gull in early morning light squabbling with unseen neighbor below
Comparative Critique
Everyone is invited to do a comparative critique of today’s two images. What are the strengths of each image? What are the weaknesses of each image? Which do you think is the strongest image? Why?
The San Diego Site Guide
I have been pretty much stunned by the quality of the bird photography in San Diego on my March visit. If you own this Site Guide and would like a short primer on the dancing grebes location and the Brandt’s Cormorant colony, please shoot me an e-mail. For most stuff, the Site Guide directions intended for DEC through FEB are still plenty valid.
Whether you are visiting San Diego for photography for the first time or live in the area and have done the pelicans many dozens of times, you will learn a ton by studying the San Diego Site Guide. Why spend days stumbling around when you can know exactly where and when to be depending on the wind direction and sky conditions? In addition to the pelican primer, there is great info on the best beaches for the gorgeous gulls, Marbled Godwit, Lesser Scaup, and Wood and Ring-necked Ducks as well. Along with the down and dirty on the the lower cliffs.
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack!
Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
I have neglected to mention that both of my knees are doing great and that the scratch on my nose has healed up perfectly. I headed out early to La Jolla on Monday morning in heavy overcast with an occasional light drizzle. I concentrated mostly on some nice Double-crested Cormorants. The absence of light was a big challenge.
On Monday afternoon I began work on my 2015 income taxes.
Yikes, I almost forgot: I am feeling a bit stronger each day after the surgery and seeing several signs of improvement. Time will tell.
The Streak
Today’s blog post marks 143 days in a row with a new educational blog post. Assuming that I will be making the trip to Namibia on April 11, this streak will come to an end soon. As always–and folks have been doing a really great job recently–please remember to use our B&H links for your major gear purchases. For best results use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. Please remember that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) we would appreciate your business.
This image was created at La Jolla, CA with the hand held Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM lens (at 164mm) and the amazing mega mega-pixel Canon EOS 5DS R. ISO 1250. Evaluative metering probably about zero: 1/320 sec. at f/8. Daylight WB.
Two AF points to the left and two rows above the center AF point/AI Servo/Surround/Rear Focus AF as framed was active at the moment of exposure (as is always best when hand holding). Click here to see the latest version of the Rear Focus Tutorial. Click on the image to see a larger version.
Western Gulls/pre-copulatory stand in early morning light
Back in Action…
Do appreciate the double entendre… This was one of the very first images that I made after getting back in action on Sunday morning past after a 3-day vacation from bird photography.
The Look of Love
Once I saw these two Western Gulls involved with each other I moved as quickly as possible to get into position. I created only two frames before he stepped off of her. I was thrilled to see that one of the images caught her looking up lovingly at her guy. For gulls and terns the pre-copulatory stand is actually a bit of balance practice for the male; it often does not wind up with a copulation.
Whitewash
Do you hate the image because of all the whitewash? Would you have removed some or most or all of it? Why do you think that I left all the whitewash as is?
Interactivity on the Blog
Before you click out without leaving a comment please consider that the more folks who participate, the greater the learning experience for all, including me.
NeatImage Noise Reduction
5DS R ISO 1250 and NeatImage Noise Reduction
The area in the blue square has been filtered by NeatImage Noise Reduction. The area outside of the blue box is unfiltered, exactly as it appears on the converted TIFF. While I will assume that everyone will be impressed by the virtually complete elimination of background noise by NeatImage, I need to point out the fine high ISO 5DS R control of the background noise at ISO 1250. Especially since the mid-toned sandstone is actually one stop under-exposed. Why one stop under-exposed? WHITES need one stop less light to be properly exposed than mid-tones in a given lighting condition; thus the mid-tones are one stop under what they should be, and therefore, more noisy. I am rather amazed that all of the internet experts including some very good photographers and good friends are all proclaiming that high ISO noise with the 5DS R is a problem. But heck, that’s why they are internet experts: they rarely if ever use the gear that they complain about.
The New Guide and NeatImage
The work on on Arash’s new Post Processing Guide continues to progress slowly as we attempt to iron out the kinks via e-mail and phone. The guide will teach you–as you can see in today’s featured image, to apply a small but effective amount of NR to the bird (while maintaining fine feather detail) and to apply greater amounts of NR to noisy backgrounds to smooth them out. The key to the success of these methods is a combination of Arash’s cleverly developed and innovative techniques and the great NeatImage plug-in. Arash recommends and uses only the NeatImage plug-in for advanced noise reduction. Both artie and Arash recommend only the Proversion as the Homeversion does not work on 16-bit images. Folks who are good with Layer Masking may wish to get a copy of NeatImage and get a head start on using this great program. If not, the new guide will make it simple for you. Learn more on the effectiveness of NeatImage in the blog post here.
DPP 4 Screen Capture
DPP 4 Screen Capture Lessons
Most importantly, note the RGB values with the (unseen in this screen capture) cursor on the brightest WHITEs on the male’s head: R=242, G=236, B=229. These values indicate a definite RED cast. I chose, however, not to color correct either by using Click WB or by adjusting the Color temperature. Why? I like the rich early morning light. In my opinion, it is not always the right move to color balance every image by coming up wWHITEs like this: R=235, G=235, B=235. Had I done so with this image it would have lost a lot of its glamor for me.
The illuminated in red AF point indicates that that point was both the selected AF point and that it was active at the moment of exposure. The more you practice moving the AF points and the closer you get the selected AF point to the bird’s eye, face, bill, or neck, the more accurately focused your images will be.
Note also that as I preach here on an almost daily basis that the there is data well into the fifth, rightmost, highlight box of the histogram. The red channel extending past the other two also indicates the RED cast.
Please Remember to use our Affiliate Links 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack!
Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
At dinner on Saturday evening with Dr. Cliff Oliver and his Annie and Patrick and Robin, Cliff explained that general anesthesia is about the most stressful thing that our body will ever experience; that our body shuts down because it thinks that we are dying; that the effects of being under last for months. When asked, he stated that I should continue to rest and not go to La Jolla on Sunday morning. So I brought only the 100-400 II, the flash, and the 1.4X III teleconverter. I did not climb over any fences nor did I climb down any cliffs. And I stayed only two hours.
Though I had a great time I did notice that simply keeping the lens steady while making a series of images seemed to require more effort than usual. Patrick and I enjoyed some great light and with love in the air, had a ton of fun photographing the Western Gulls. Images to follow. When we got back to Patrick’s place, I took a wonderful 1 1/2 hour nap. And then got lots of work done.
The Streak
Today’s blog post marks 143 days in a row with a new educational blog post. Assuming that I will be making the trip to Namibia on April 11, this streak will come to an end soon. As always–and folks have been doing a really great job recently–please remember to use our B&H links for your major gear purchases. For best results use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. Please remember that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) we would appreciate your business.
Missed Question
In the 30-second exposure blog post here, not a single person took a stab at the question below. As it is an important lesson, I am repeating it here. Remember that the more interactive the blog is, the more everyone learns.
Technique Question
Why is it unnecessary to use Live View, Mirror Lock-up, or the 2-second timer when doing 15- or 30-second exposures?
This image was created at La Jolla, CA with the hand held Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM lens (at 158mm) and the amazing mega mega-pixel Canon EOS 5DS R. ISO 1600. Evaluative metering probably about -2/3 stop: 1/1250 sec. at f/5.6. AWB.
Center AF point (Manual selection)/AI Servo Shutter button AF as originally framed was active at the moment of exposure (as is always best when hand holding). The selected AF point was on the bird’s breast just to our left of the bottom of the red on the bill pouch. Click on the image to see a larger version.
Backlit Brown Pelican with one clipped primary tip
So Whaddya Do With This Image? Cry?
Gorgeous backlight coming through the perfectly positioned wings. Sharp. A gorgeous bird. The perfect head turn. But I mis-framed the image and clipped a single primary. If I had simply been able to keep the sensor on the bird’s face I would’a been famous. What to do? Add canvas and the missing wingtip. Learn how I did it below.
100-400 II Versatility
Though I did not zoom out quite quickly enough when creating today’s image, I would have been dead in the water with a fixed focal length intermediate telephoto lens like the 300 II or the 400 DO II. Zooming out to 158mm gave me a chance. If only I hadn’t been so greedy 🙂
Just So You Know
This is still another image that was created on the “lousy” morning of March 22. You will get to see a few more good ones from that morning as the “What do you do when nothing’s happening? Get into the creative zone!” series continues.
Added canvas and wingtip repair
Added Canvas and Wingtip Repair
The wingtip repair here was the easy part. I added canvas here by grabbing one of the love handles on the Crop Tool and pulling it out. Filling in the canvas was the trick part. As none of the regular APTATS II techniques would have worked because of the unevenness of the background, I used the Rectangular Marquee Tool to grab a portion of the right side of the frame from top to bottom, placed that on its own layer, and flopped it. Then I cleaned up the primary feathers that I did not need with all of my favorite friends: the Clone Stamp Tool, the Patch Tool, and the Spot Healing Brush. Then I repaired the missing wing tip using techniques from APTATS I and II and used the same batch of tools to clean up most of the whitewash on the wall of the cliff.
Resources
My complete digital workflow along with dozens of great Photoshop tips can be found in our Digital Basics File. Advanced Quick Masking is covered in APTATS I, and Advanced Layer Masking in APTATS II. You can save some money by purchasing both together by clicking here.
The New Guide and NeatImage
The going has been slow while working on Arash’s new Post Processing Guide but we are ironing out all the kinks via e-mail and phone and making good progress. The guide will teach you–as you can see in the Animated GIF above, to apply a small amount of NR to the bird (to maintain fine feather detail)and apply greater amounts of NR to noisy backgrounds to smooth them out. The key to the success of these methods is NeatImage. As above, the main thrust of the book deals with Arash’s high level noise reduction techniques using NeatImage. Arash recommends and uses only the NeatImage plug-in for advanced noise reduction. Both artie and Arash recommend only the Proversion as the Homeversion does not work on 16-bit images. Folks who are good with Layer Masking may wish to get a copy of NeatImage and get a head start on using this great program. If not, the new guide will make it simple for you.
With this image the strong NR on the BKGR helped to clean up the artifacting mess in the area to our right of the bird’s left wing where the repairs were done. Learn more on the effectiveness of NeatImage in the blog post here.
Please also that the 5DS R BKGR noise at ISO 1600 (while properly underexposing for the bird’s white head) is not bad at all. More on that in tomorrow’s blog post.
IPT Updates
Learn to improve your bird and nature photography with the best instructor on the planet; join a BIRDS AS ART Instructional Photo-Tour. Learn more and see the schedule here.
immediately below) has lots of room.
From upper left clockwise to center: Black Skimmer head portrait, American Oystercatcher dining on surf clam flesh, Common Tern at sunset, Common Tern adult swallowing flatfish, Black Skimmer in flight, newborn Common Tern chick, American Oystercatcher with chick, fresh juvenile Common Tern (with fill flash), and Common Terns copulating.
Meet and greet at 3pm on the afternoon of Monday, July 18. Limit 10/Openings: 8.
The primary subject species of this IPT will be the nesting Common Terns. The trip is timed so that we will get to photograph tiny chicks as well as fledglings. There will be lots of flight photography including adults flying with baitfish. Creating great images of the chicks being fed is a huge challenge. In addition to the terns we will get to photograph lots of Black Skimmers courting, setting up their nesting territories, and in flight (both singles and large pre-dawn flocks blasting off). Midair battles are guaranteed on sunny afternoons. And with luck, we might even see a few tiny chicks toward the end of the trip. We will also get to photograph the life cycle of American Oystercatcher. This will likely include nests with eggs and tiny chicks, young being fed, and possibly a few fledglings.
Nesting Piping Plover is also possibly. There will be lots of gulls to photograph; most years I am able to find a few Lesser Black-backed Gulls of varying ages in addition to the Herring, Ring-billed, and Great Black-backed Gulls. You will learn to identify and age the various gull species. There will likely be some Willets feeding along the surf and with luck we might get to photograph a handsome juvenile or two. In addition to the locally breeding shorebirds, we will likely get to see some southbound migrant arctic-and sub-arctic breeding shorebird species such as Sanderling, Semipalmated Plover, and maybe even Red Knot.
From upper left clockwise to center: Black Skimmers with tiny chick, Common Tern landing with baitfish for young, fledged Common Tern chick in dunes, American Oystercatchers/display flight, adult Common Tern with pipefish for chick, Common Tern fledgling in soft light, American Oystercatcher on nest with eggs, American Oystercatcher 3-egg clutch, battling Black Skimmers.
The IPT Logistics
The tour will begin with a meet and greet on the afternoon of Monday, July 18, 2016. That will be followed by our first shooting session at the beach. From Tuesday through and including all of Friday we will have two photography sessions daily. Our morning sessions will start very early so that we are on the beach well before sunrise. We usually photograph for about four hours. Then we will enjoy a group brunch. We will always have a midday break that will include a nap for me. That followed by our daily afternoon classroom sessions that will include image review, workflow and Photoshop, and a review/critique of five of your trip images. Folks are always invited to bring their laptops to brunch for image sharing. I always have mine with me but heck, I am a big show-off. Afternoon in-the-field sessions generally run from 5pm through sunset.
Breakfasts are grab what you can. Four brunches are included. Dinners (if at all) will be on your own as we will often get back to the hotel at about 9pm. There is a fridge in every room and a supermarket within walking distance of the hotel so nobody should starve. You will learn a ton during the nine shooting sessions, the four in-classroom sessions, and even at lunch. Early morning and late afternoon parking is free. If we want to head back to the beach early we will need to arrange tight carpools and share the $30/vehicle parking fee. Non-photographer spouses, friends, or companions are welcome for $100/day, $450 for the whole IPT.
Save a space by calling Jim or Jen at the office at 863-692-0906 and arranging to leave your deposit of $599–credit cards are accepted for deposits only. Your balance will be due on April 18, 2016. I hope that you can join me for what will be an exciting and educational IPT.
Please Remember to use our Affiliate Links 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack!
Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
I felt great and strong all day Saturday. My discomfort level is down 80% from Friday. Folks should know that with green light laser prostate surgery that the success of the surgery is generally not known until from 2 weeks to 2 months after the procedure. That said, there are lots of positive signs already. And I am thrilled that I am doing so well. Again, huge thanks to the many who sent prayers and good wishes.
The Streak
Today’s blog post marks 142 days in a row with a new educational blog post. Assuming that I will be making the trip to Namibia on April 11, this streak will come to an end fairly soon. As always–and folks have been doing an incredibly great job recently–please remember to use our B&H links for your major gear purchases. For best results use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. Please remember that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) that we would appreciate your business
One AF point up from the center AF point/AI Servo Expand/Rear Focus AF as framed was active at the moment of exposure (as is always best when hand holding). Click here to see the latest version of the Rear Focus Tutorial. Click on the image to see a larger version.
Image #1: trunk of birch tree in snow
The Backstory
On our trips to Lake Kussharo to photograph the Whooper Swans I noticed many lovely birch trees in the snow. But we were always in hurry to get to the lake or to get to the ramen noodle shop or to get back to our lodge. But a few seeds were planted as I loved the look of the patterns on the white bark of the birches set off by a fresh snowfall.
On the morning of February 21 we headed out early for a landscape photography session and then headed back to the lodge for breakfast. I did find some birches but they were lacking character… As I had already eaten (as part of my diabetes regimen) I grabbed my 1-4II and took a walk in the woods surrounding the lodge. Bingo! Fifteen minutes after finding this lovely birch tree we were all photographing Red-crowned Cranes at the sanctuary that is just down the hill from our Hokkaido country home.
Image Thoughts
I like the tilt of the trunk; introducing diagonal lines whenever possible adds interest to your compositions. And I like the little snow pile to our right of the trunk. And I love the patterns on the bark. My first thought was to do all verticals but this, the lone horizontal design, was my favorite by far.
This version was created from the original that opened this blog post.
Image #2: trunk of birch tree in snow/BuzSim III version
Topaz Simplify
I brought the image into Topaz Simplify and experimented with several of the BuzSim options. I liked BuzSim III the best.
Topaz Simplify
If you missed my first effort with Simplify, you can see it here. I was thrilled with what Topaz Simplify did with my pelican image so I decided to see how it might work with this birch tree image. You can help support my efforts here on the BAA Blog by clicking on the logo link above if you would like to join in the fun. After you click, be sure to watch the great instructional video.
Topaz Simplify:Turn your photos into works of art. Create paintings, sketches, watercolors, cartoons, and more. Make your art uniquely personal instead of using cookie-cutter filters. Get better results faster with specialized digital art technology
To use Topaz Simplify open your image in Photoshop, hit Filter > Topaz Labs > Topaz Simplify 4. Under COLLECTIONS, click on BuzSim and then click though the various presets. Here I chose the seventh preset, BuzSim III. And then hit OK.
This version was also created from the original that opened this blog post.
Image #3: trunk of birch tree in snow/NIK Silver Efex Pro Wet Rocks preset
NIK Silver Efex Pro 2
I use NIK Silver Efex Pro 2 (now free to all/click here) for all of my B&W conversions. Here I went with one of my favorite presets: Wet Rocks. The others that I am partial to are High Structure (usually smooth) and Full Dynamic (again, usually smooth).
Your Fave?
All are invited to leave a comment and let everyone know which is their favorite of the three images, and why. I have a clear favorite.
Consider joining me in Japan in February, 2017, for the world’s best Japan in Winter workshop. Click on the card to enjoy the spectacular larger version.
Japan In Winter IPT. February 9-24, 2017: $11,499 (was $13,999)/double occupancy-limited single supplements available. Limit: 9.Openings: 3
Price Reduced $2,500 on 3-8-16!
All lodging including the Tokyo hotel on 9 FEB, all breakfasts & dinners, ground transport and transfers including bus to the monkey park hotel, and all entrance fees and in-country flights are included. Not included: international flights, all lunches–most are on the run, and alcoholic beverages.
Please e-mail for couple and IPT repeat customer discount information.
This trip is one day longer than the great 2014 trip to allow for more flexibility, more time with the cranes, and most importantly, more time for landscape photography. Hokkaido is gorgeous. You will enjoy tons of pre-trip planning and gear advice, in-the-field instruction and guidance, at-the-lodge Photoshop and image review sessions in addition to short introductory slide programs for each of the amazing locations. Skilled photographer Paul McKenzie handles the logistics and supplies large does of inspiration. In addition, we enjoy the services of Japan’s best wildlife photography guide whom I affectionately call “Hokkaido Bear.” His network of local contacts and his knowledge of the weather, the area, and the birds is unparalleled and enables him to have us in the best location every day.
Arrive Tokyo: 9 FEB 2017 the latest. 8 FEB is safer and gives you a day to get acclimated to the time change. Your hotel room for the night of the 9th is covered.
Bus Travel to Monkey Park Hotel: 10 FEB: A 1/2 DAY of monkey photography is likely depending on our travel time… This traditional hotel is first class all the way. Our stay includes three ten course Japanese dinners; these sumptuous meals will astound you and delight your taste buds. There are many traditional hot springs mineral baths (onsens) on site in this 150 year old hotel.
Full Day snow monkeys: FEB 11.
Full Day snow monkeys: FEB 12.
13 FEB: Full travel day to Hokkaido/arrive at our lodge in the late afternoon. The lodge is wonderful. All the rooms at the lodge have beds. Bring your warm pajamas. A local onsen (hot springs bath and tubs) is available for $5 each day before dinner–when you are cold, it is the best thing since sliced bread. The home-cooked Japanese styles meals at the lodge are to die for. What’s the best news? Only a small stand of woods separates us from the very best crane sanctuary. During one big snowstorm we were the only photo group to be able to get to Tsurui Ito; we had the whole place to ourselves in perfect conditions for crane photography!
FEB 14-23: Red-crowned Crane, raptors in flight, Whooper Swans, and scenic photography. Ural Owl possible. An overnight trip to Rausu for Steller’s Sea Eagle and White-tailed Eagle photography on the tourists boats is 100% dependent on the weather, road, and sea ice conditions. Only our trip offers complete flexibility in this area. It has saved us on more than once occasion. The cost of 2 eagle-boat trips is included. If the group would like to do more than two boat trips and we all agree, there will be an additional charge for the extra trip or trips. No matter the sea ice conditions, we will do two eagle boat trips (as long as we can make the drive to Rausu; it snows a lot up there). We have never been shut out.In 2016 there was no sea ice but our guide arranged for two amazingly productive boat trips.
Lodging notes: bring your long johns for sleeping in the lodge. At the Snow Monkey Park, and in Rausu, the hotel the rooms are Japanese-style. You sleep on comfortable mats on the floor. Wi-fi is available every day of the trip.
FEB 24. Fly back to Tokyo for transfer to your airport if you are flying home that night, or, to your hotel if you are overnighting. If you need to overnight, the cost of that room is on you.
Life is short. Hop on the merry-go-round.
To Sign Up
To save your spot, please send your $5,000 non-refundable deposit check made out to “Birds as Art” to Arthur Morris/BIRDS AS ART, PO Box 7245, Indian Lake Estates, FL 33855. I do hope that you can join me for this trip of a lifetime. Do e-mail with any questions or give me a buzz at 863-692-0906.
Purchasing travel insurance within 2 weeks of our cashing your deposit check is strongly recommended. On two fairly recent Galapagos cruises a total of 5 folks were forced to cancel less than one week prior to the trip. My family and I use Travel Insurance Services and strongly recommend that you do the same.
Please Remember to use our Affiliate Links 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack!
Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
I was discharged from Thornton Hospital a bit before noon on Friday March 25. I saw Dr. Parsons who said that everything went perfectly and that I looked great. But for the expected discomfort I am feeling pretty good. I am back at Robin and Patrick’s home resting. The trick now is to avoid developing an internal infection. Many thanks for all the prayers and good wishes.
I was pleased to learn on Thursday that Barry and Marilyn Barfield of Brisbane, Australia signed up for the Japan IPT. Three slots are now filled.
The Streak
Today’s blog post marks 141 days in a row with a new educational blog post. Assuming that I will be making the trip to Namibia on April 11, this streak will come to an end soon. As always–and folks have been doing a really great job recently–please remember to use our B&H links for your major gear purchases. For best results use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. Please remember that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) that we would appreciate your business.
Center AF point (Manual selection)/AI Servo/Rear Focus AF on the closest part of the large rock on the left and re-composed (as is almost always best when creating tripod-mounted land- or sea-scapes). Click here to see the latest version of the Rear Focus Tutorial. Click on the image to see a larger version.
Offshore rocks and high surf
What do you do when nothing’s happening?
Another Option
What can you do when nothing’s happening? You can reach into your gadget bag and grab something that you have been meaning to try for quite some time…
With wind against sun conditions and bright blue skies, things were not looking too good. First I reached for my Singh-Ray Mor-Slow 10-stop Neutral Density (ND) filter. Then I screwed the Canon foot/Wimberley P-20 plate assembly onto the 100-400 II, mounted one of my two 5DS R bodies on the lens, and placed the rig on my Induro GIT 304 tripod. When I am hand holding the 1-4 as I usually do, I almost always remove the foot. In fact, it is usually not on the lens. I put it on only when I need to put the lens on a tripod as with today’s image.
More 100-400 II Versatility
Today we see the new 1-4 as a seascape lens with a wonderful focal length range for extracting a variety of elements from a wider scene.
Canon Foot/Wimberley P-20 Plate Notes
When I am hand holding, I generally remove the Canon foot/Wimberley P-20 plate assembly and place it in my vest, in my fanny pack, or in my Think Tank rolling bag, depending on whatever. Note that for best balance the P-20 plate should be mounted backwards on the 100-400 II with the flange at the front of the foot. The flange stops the plate from twisting. By mounting it backwards it is easy to balance the 100-400 II perfectly whether it is zoomed all the way in or all the way out. With this unorthodox configuration, the rear end of the P-20 plate sometimes prevents you from un-mounting the lens as it hits into the viewfinder box on the top front of the camera body; it is best to get into the habit of loosening the tripod collar before un-mounting the lens.
Singh-Ray 10-Stop ND Tutorial: making 30 second exposures in bright sun
When I tried the 10-Stop ND in Alaska on the last Bear Boat IPT, I learned that it is mandatory to have an absolutely stationary subject to go along with the moving water. If the subject is sloshing around in the current, it will not be sharp and the image will be ruined. The nice rock formation off the coast of La Jolla fit the bill perfectly. And the strong west wind was slamming big waves into the rocks.
Here is the technique that I developed for using the 10-stop ND painlessly and effectively.
With the rig on the Mongoose, frame the image as desired and tighten both the horizontal and vertical locking knobs. Turn the zoom ring a bit toward Tight to prevent an unwanted focal length change.
Level the image by rotating the lens in the tripod collar by using the electronic level. I prefer the in-viewfinder level to the one on the rear LCD. Then tighten the tripod collar snugly.
Set the ISO to 100 (or to 50 if possible).
You will need to focus accurately before you put the 10-Stop ND otherwise neither you nor the AF system will be able to see anything as the viewfinder will be too dark. Set up for rear focus and focus from 1/3 to halfway into the frame. Alternatively you could use One-Shot Shutter button AF and then turn AF off by moving the AF switch to M (for Manual focus).
Once you have set the focus, mount the 10-Stop ND; it is imperative that you use the Xume system with the magnetized rings otherwise you will likely screw up the framing and possibly the focus as well if you need to thread the filter onto the lens. See more on the amazing Xume system below.
Work in manual mode.
Set the exposure to 30 seconds and start with an aperture of f/16.
Make an image. There is no need to use the two-second timer, mirror lockup, or the 2-second self timer.
If it is windy, be sure to remove or tuck in your Black Rapid RS-7 Strap to prevent possible sharpness problems with the rocks; you want them razor sharp.
Check for blinkies and evaluate the histogram. As always, you want lots of data in the rightmost (highlight) histogram box, the fifth box for Canon, the fourth box for Nikon. Push the exposure just to the point of blinkies and then back off 1/3 stop. This will keep the WHITEs white despite the blend-blur effect. When you get the right exposure, you can mentally note the exposure compensation on the analogue scale; though the viewfinder will be close to black you will be able to see the analog exposure scale. Once you do that, you might wish to experiment with somewhat faster shutter speeds like 15 or 8 seconds. You will of course need to set a correspondingly wider aperture.
Once you have fine-tuned the exposure, make lots of images. Make some when the waves are really breaking, and make some when there is a lull between sets.
Questions Welcome
If you are confused by anything above, please leave a comment with your question.
Technique Question
Why is it unnecessary to use Live View, Mirror Lock-up, or the 2-second timer when doing 15- or 30-second exposures?
Singh-Ray 77mm Filters
I regularly travel with my Singh-Ray 77mm Warming Circular Polarizer and both the Singh-Ray 5-stop and 10-stop Mor-Slo glass Neutral Density filters. I can use each of them on the 16-35mm f/4L IS, the 24-105mm f/4L IS, the 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II, and the 100-400mmL IS II. With the intermediate telephotos I always use the Xume magnetized mounting system; this system makes it easy to mount the filters in just a second rather than having to struggle to get them properly threaded. (See more on the Xume system below). Do not use the Xume system with your wide angle lenses as it will cause serious vignetting at the wider settings.
Click on the logo link above to purchase and use the code artie10 at checkout to receive a healthy 10$ discount.
Singh-Ray Filters
Singh-Ray filters have been used by the world’s top photographers for many decades. Singh-Ray is and has been the name in quality filters. I own several of the 77mm filters so that I can attain slow shutter speeds in bright conditions. No other filter manufacturer comes close to matching the quality of Singh-Ray’s optical glass that is comparable to that used by NASA. And they continue to pioneer the most innovative products on the market like their ColorCombo polarizer, Vari-ND variable and Mor-Slo 15-stop neutral density filters. When you use their filters, you’ll create better, more dramatic images and, unlike other filters, with absolutely no sacrifice in image quality. All Singh-Ray filters are handcrafted in the USA.
Best News: 10% Discount/Code at checkout: artie10
To shop for Singh-Ray’s most popular solid ND filter, the 10-Stop Mor-Slo Glass Filter liter (for example), click on the logo link above, click on “Neutral and color Solid Neutral Density Filters (glass), then click on “Mor-Slo™ 5, 10, 15 and 20-Stop Solid Neutral Density Filters (glass),” choose the size and model, add to cart, and then checkout. At checkout, type artie10 into the “Have a coupon? Click here to enter your code” box and a healthy 10% discount will be applied to your total. In addition to enjoying the world’s best filter at 10% off you will be supporting my efforts here on the blog.
The 10- and 15-stop Mor Slo filters are great for landscapes with water and moving clouds. With the 10-stop, 1/125th becomes 8 seconds and with the 15-stop, 4 minutes. Next, I need to get my hands on a 15-stop Mor-Slo ND…
Xume Stuff!
Here is how I use the magnetized Xume system with my intermediate telephoto lenses:
First I screw one XUME 77mm Lens Adapter onto the front of my 100-400 II and another onto the front of the 70-200 f/2.8 L IS II.
Next I screw my Singh-Ray 77mm 3-Stop Resin Mor-Slo Neutral Density Filter, my Singh-Ray 77mm 5-Stop Glass Mor-Slo Neutral Density Filter, and my Singh-Ray 77mm LB Warming Circular Polarizer into their own individual XUME 77mm Filter Holders. Be sure not to screw the filters on too tightly to the Filter Holders. If you do, it can be a real challenge to remove the filter when you need it for a wide angle lens. Light pressure is fine.
The lens adapters stay on the lenses. The ND filters and the polarizer stay screwed into their own filter holders as noted above. The filter/filter holder combos are stored in the lovely labeled leather pouches that come with each Singh-Ray filter purchase. The three of them fit perfectly into the small upper left zippered pocket of my Xtrahand vest. When I wish to mount a filter onto the front of one of my intermediate telephoto lenses I simply remove the lens hood, grab the filter that I need, and pop it securely into place in less than an instant. Ah, it’s the magnetic thing!
Be sure to replace the lens hood so that you do not accidentally dislodge the filter by whacking it against some shrubbery when you are walking about. To remove the filter simply remove the lens hood, pop the filter off instantly, place it back in its leather case, and stow it. With the Xume system there are no more tears. You do not have to screw and unscrew the filters onto the front of the lens. There are no more jammed threads. The Xume lens adapters and the filter holders are precision-machined to guarantee fast and secure filter attachment every time.
It is an elegant system but I can recommend it only for intermediate telephoto lenses: when used with short lenses and short zoom lenses some serious vignetting will occur at the wider focal lengths. As noted above, you must use the Xume system when working with the 10-stop ND so that you can snap the filter in place after setting the focus without messing up either the framing or focus as you might if you needed to screw the filter on.
If you need Xume stuff for front element sizes other than 77mm please use this link; you will find two pages of good stuff!
Please Remember to use our Affiliate Links 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack!
Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
Me, from the hospital. Slept well, passed a few tests, and was discharged a bit before noon. I saw Dr. Parsons who said that everything went perfectly and that I looked great. But for the expected discomfort I am feeling pretty good. I am back at Robin and Patrick’s home getting ready for a few days of rest. Many thanks for all the prayers and good wishes.
This Just In
Thanks a stack to Nickerson Beach IPT veteran Scott Borowy who let me know that Google has made the entire NIK Collection free for everyone. You can learn more here. I am sure that the offer is for real but some folks are having trouble downloading the desktop suite. I use NIK Color Efex Pro on at least 75% of my bird photographs and use Silver Efex Pro for all of my B&W conversions.
IPT Updates
Learn to improve your bird and nature photography with the best instructor on the planet; join a BIRDS AS ART Instructional Photo-Tour. Learn more and see the schedule here.
immediately below) has lots of room.
From upper left clockwise to center: Black Skimmer head portrait, American Oystercatcher dining on surf clam flesh, Common Tern at sunset, Common Tern adult swallowing flatfish, Black Skimmer in flight, newborn Common Tern chick, American Oystercatcher with chick, fresh juvenile Common Tern (with fill flash), and Common Terns copulating.
Meet and greet at 3pm on the afternoon of Monday, July 18. Limit 10/Openings: 8.
The primary subject species of this IPT will be the nesting Common Terns. The trip is timed so that we will get to photograph tiny chicks as well as fledglings. There will be lots of flight photography including adults flying with baitfish. Creating great images of the chicks being fed is a huge challenge. In addition to the terns we will get to photograph lots of Black Skimmers courting, setting up their nesting territories, and in flight (both singles and large pre-dawn flocks blasting off). Midair battles are guaranteed on sunny afternoons. And with luck, we might even see a few tiny chicks toward the end of the trip. We will also get to photograph the life cycle of American Oystercatcher. This will likely include nests with eggs and tiny chicks, young being fed, and possibly a few fledglings.
Nesting Piping Plover is also possibly. There will be lots of gulls to photograph; most years I am able to find a few Lesser Black-backed Gulls of varying ages in addition to the Herring, Ring-billed, and Great Black-backed Gulls. You will learn to identify and age the various gull species. There will likely be some Willets feeding along the surf and with luck we might get to photograph a handsome juvenile or two. In addition to the locally breeding shorebirds, we will likely get to see some southbound migrant arctic-and sub-arctic breeding shorebird species such as Sanderling, Semipalmated Plover, and maybe even Red Knot.
From upper left clockwise to center: Black Skimmers with tiny chick, Common Tern landing with baitfish for young, fledged Common Tern chick in dunes, American Oystercatchers/display flight, adult Common Tern with pipefish for chick, Common Tern fledgling in soft light, American Oystercatcher on nest with eggs, American Oystercatcher 3-egg clutch, battling Black Skimmers.
The IPT Logistics
The tour will begin with a meet and greet on the afternoon of Monday, July 18, 2016. That will be followed by our first shooting session at the beach. From Tuesday through and including all of Friday we will have two photography sessions daily. Our morning sessions will start very early so that we are on the beach well before sunrise. We usually photograph for about four hours. Then we will enjoy a group brunch. We will always have a midday break that will include a nap for me. That followed by our daily afternoon classroom sessions that will include image review, workflow and Photoshop, and a review/critique of five of your trip images. Folks are always invited to bring their laptops to brunch for image sharing. I always have mine with me but heck, I am a big show-off. Afternoon in-the-field sessions generally run from 5pm through sunset.
Breakfasts are grab what you can. Four brunches are included. Dinners (if at all) will be on your own as we will often get back to the hotel at about 9pm. There is a fridge in every room and a supermarket within walking distance of the hotel so nobody should starve. You will learn a ton during the nine shooting sessions, the four in-classroom sessions, and even at lunch. Early morning and late afternoon parking is free. If we want to head back to the beach early we will need to arrange tight carpools and share the $30/vehicle parking fee. Non-photographer spouses, friends, or companions are welcome for $100/day, $450 for the whole IPT.
Save a space by calling Jim or Jen at the office at 863-692-0906 and arranging to leave your deposit of $599–credit cards are accepted for deposits only. Your balance will be due on April 18, 2016. I hope that you can join me for what will be an exciting and educational IPT.
Please Remember to use our Affiliate Links 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack!
Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
Robin Sparkman drove me to Thornton Hospital early on Thursday morning. Check-in went smoothly, the staff here is great, and my green light laser surgery went well. I was feeling very good right after I woke up (but understandably a bit drowsy at first) with none of the horribly ill effects of anesthesia that I experienced when I had major spinal surgery for a ruptured disk in 1990. Kudos to Dr. Chen for that. The always smiling Dr. Parson reported that all went well. I have zero pain and just a bit of the expected discomfort that will magically be abated tomorrow morning. I expect to check out on Friday morning. Robin will be picking me up and we will head back to the Sparkman’s home.
Patrick and Robin have been amazingly wonderful to me. They were in the recovery room right after I awoke “just because” even though I had not had a chance to text anyone. They brought my insulin and my food along with my beloved laptop. Once I was in my room both Robin and Pat were beyond helpful. Robin is like a second mother to everyone, even those are are not recuperating from surgery. 🙂 Patrick kindly helped me with several laps of walk-the-hallways. They stayed for several hours until I booted them out at about 7pm. I will be forever appreciative of the kindnesses they have proffered; thank you guys!
Elegant Tern Blog Post Answer
In the blog post here, I asked folks to try and figure out the two things that bugged me about the image, an image that I loved very much. As mentioned yesterday, several folks hit on one of the things that bothered me: the bird should have been placed just a bit more forward in the frame as the tail is a bit too tight to the right frame edge.
Here is the second thing that bugged me, the one that nobody came up with. The tern’s lesser (wing) coverts were slightly disheveled, blown out of place by the wind. This caused what for me is a distracting shadow. My great preference would have been that all of the bird’s feathers had been neatly and smoothly in place.
Do understand that it is possible to love an image yet wish that it were still better.
The Streak
Today’s blog post marks 140 days in a row with a new educational blog post. Assuming that I will be making the trip to Namibia on April 11, this streak will come to an end soon. As always–and folks have been doing a really great job recently–please remember to use our B&H links for your major gear purchases. For best results use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. Please remember that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) that we would appreciate your business 🙂
This image was created at La Jolla at 7:37am on the morning of March 22, the same morning that I created the three very different images in yesterday’s blog post here. I used the hand held Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM lens (at 400mm) and the amazing mega mega-pixel Canon EOS 5DS R. ISO 1600. Evaluative metering at about zero: 1/1250 sec. at f/5.6. Daylight WB.
Center AF point (Manual selection)/AI Servo Shutter button AF as originally framed was active at the moment of exposure (as is always best when hand holding).
Image #1: Backlit Brown Pelican with bill pouch distended
What do you do when nothing’s happening?
Important Point #1
Take a walk. Get out of your box; for me, that meant shooting against the light. In quickly changing light, take risks with the exposure when something unexpected happens. For the image above, the bird distended its bill pouch only for a second; I raised the lens and fired hoping that the exposure would be good. It was not bad. Had I taken the time to check the exposure, I would have missed the action (however subtle).
Saving Both Images
With strongly backlit pelican images you will almost always toast the white or yellow on the top of the bird’s head as I did in the RAW files for both of today’s images. Unless you are using lots of flash, you will have to live with more than a few over-exposed pixels and attempt to fix them in post. For the top image I simply used a 10% opacity Clone Stamp Tool to tame the brightest whites. The over-exposure in Image #2 was more problematic so I painted a crescent-shaped Quick Mask of the properly exposed yellow feathers, put it on its own layer, moved it into place, reduced the opacity a bit, re-shaped it via Tranform > Warp, and then refined the mask by adding a Regular Layer Mask.
Everything above is detailed in Digital Basics and in APTATS I & II. You can check out all of our educational offerings by clicking here.
This image was created at La Jolla at 9:19am (!) on the morning of March 22, the same morning that I created the three very different images in yesterday’s blog post here. I used the hand held Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM lens with the Canon Extender EF 1.4X III (at 504mm) and the amazing mega mega-pixel Canon EOS 5DS R. ISO 1600. Evaluative metering at about -2/3 stop: 1/1000 sec. at f/9. Daylight WB.
Center AF point (by necessity)/AI Servo Expand/Shutter button AF as originally framed was active at the moment of exposure (as is always best when hand holding).
Image #2: Backlit Brown Pelican in daisies
Get into your creative zone!
A backlit bird in daisies at a quarter after nine on a sunny day? You gotta be kidding me. But when conditions are poor as they were that morning with wind against sun, you’ve got to try to create something different.
Important Point #2
With wind against sun conditions, traditional front-lit bird photography opportunities (including and especially flight photography) will be few and far between. Backlit opportunities, however, will abound.
100-400 II Versatility
The new 1-4 continues to amaze me; I have used it probably 70% of the time on my San Diego trip. And I do not hesitate to add the 1.4X III TC when I need the additional reach. This makes the lens even more versatile.
Here We Go Again
Everyone has been great with the image comparisons and the questions; all is greatly appreciated. So here we go again: which do you feel is the stronger image? Please let us know why you made your choice.
IPT Updates
Learn to improve your bird and nature photography with the best instructor on the planet; join a BIRDS AS ART Instructional Photo-Tour. Learn more and see the schedule here.
immediately below) has lots of room.
From upper left clockwise to center: Black Skimmer head portrait, American Oystercatcher dining on surf clam flesh, Common Tern at sunset, Common Tern adult swallowing flatfish, Black Skimmer in flight, newborn Common Tern chick, American Oystercatcher with chick, fresh juvenile Common Tern (with fill flash), and Common Terns copulating.
Meet and greet at 3pm on the afternoon of Monday, July 18. Limit 10/Openings: 8.
The primary subject species of this IPT will be the nesting Common Terns. The trip is timed so that we will get to photograph tiny chicks as well as fledglings. There will be lots of flight photography including adults flying with baitfish. Creating great images of the chicks being fed is a huge challenge. In addition to the terns we will get to photograph lots of Black Skimmers courting, setting up their nesting territories, and in flight (both singles and large pre-dawn flocks blasting off). Midair battles are guaranteed on sunny afternoons. And with luck, we might even see a few tiny chicks toward the end of the trip. We will also get to photograph the life cycle of American Oystercatcher. This will likely include nests with eggs and tiny chicks, young being fed, and possibly a few fledglings.
Nesting Piping Plover is also possibly. There will be lots of gulls to photograph; most years I am able to find a few Lesser Black-backed Gulls of varying ages in addition to the Herring, Ring-billed, and Great Black-backed Gulls. You will learn to identify and age the various gull species. There will likely be some Willets feeding along the surf and with luck we might get to photograph a handsome juvenile or two. In addition to the locally breeding shorebirds, we will likely get to see some southbound migrant arctic-and sub-arctic breeding shorebird species such as Sanderling, Semipalmated Plover, and maybe even Red Knot.
From upper left clockwise to center: Black Skimmers with tiny chick, Common Tern landing with baitfish for young, fledged Common Tern chick in dunes, American Oystercatchers/display flight, adult Common Tern with pipefish for chick, Common Tern fledgling in soft light, American Oystercatcher on nest with eggs, American Oystercatcher 3-egg clutch, battling Black Skimmers.
The IPT Logistics
The tour will begin with a meet and greet on the afternoon of Monday, July 18, 2016. That will be followed by our first shooting session at the beach. From Tuesday through and including all of Friday we will have two photography sessions daily. Our morning sessions will start very early so that we are on the beach well before sunrise. We usually photograph for about four hours. Then we will enjoy a group brunch. We will always have a midday break that will include a nap for me. That followed by our daily afternoon classroom sessions that will include image review, workflow and Photoshop, and a review/critique of five of your trip images. Folks are always invited to bring their laptops to brunch for image sharing. I always have mine with me but heck, I am a big show-off. Afternoon in-the-field sessions generally run from 5pm through sunset.
Breakfasts are grab what you can. Four brunches are included. Dinners (if at all) will be on your own as we will often get back to the hotel at about 9pm. There is a fridge in every room and a supermarket within walking distance of the hotel so nobody should starve. You will learn a ton during the nine shooting sessions, the four in-classroom sessions, and even at lunch. Early morning and late afternoon parking is free. If we want to head back to the beach early we will need to arrange tight carpools and share the $30/vehicle parking fee. Non-photographer spouses, friends, or companions are welcome for $100/day, $450 for the whole IPT.
Save a space by calling Jim or Jen at the office at 863-692-0906 and arranging to leave your deposit of $599–credit cards are accepted for deposits only. Your balance will be due on April 18, 2016. I hope that you can join me for what will be an exciting and educational IPT.
Please Remember to use our Affiliate Links 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack!
Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
I enjoyed my last morning of photography at La Jolla for at least a few days with old friend Aidan Briggs, a fine young bird photographer who has co-led two Morro Bay IPTs with me. Mazel tov to Aiden who will be graduating from UC Santa Barbara this June with a major in aquatic biology. He would like to become a professional nature photographer.
My green light laser surgery is scheduled for 9:05am today, Thursday, March 24, 2016. I have complete confidence in Dr. Parsons while at the same time realizing that there are always risks with any type of surgery and that there are no guarantees. But as they say at the start of each UFC fight, “It’s time!”
Elegant Tern Blog Post Update
In yesterday’s blog post here, I left this comment early on Thursday morning:
Clarifying things a bit:
Several folks hit on one of the two things that bother me: the bird should have been placed just a bit more forward in the frame as the tail is a bit too tight to the right frame edge.
Nobody has come close to identifying the second thing about the image that bugs me, the one that I could not control. Many are grasping for straws. Answer on Friday. a
The Streak
Today’s blog post marks 139 days in a row with a new educational blog post. As always–and folks have been doing a really great job recently–please remember to use our B&H links for your major gear purchases. For best results use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. Please remember that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) that we would appreciate your business 🙂
IPT Updates
Learn to improve your bird and nature photography with the best instructor on the planet; join a BIRDS AS ART Instructional Photo-Tour. Learn more and see the schedule here.
This image was created at La Jolla, CA with the hand held Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM lens (at 188mm) and the amazing mega mega-pixel Canon EOS 5DS R. ISO 1600. Evaluative metering at about -1/3 stop: 1/1250 sec. at f/5.6. Daylight WB.
Center AF point (Manual selection)/AI Servo Shutter button AF as originally framed was active at the moment of exposure (as is always best when hand holding). This was a small crop from below and from our right. The selected AF point was on the base of the bird’s left wing.
Image #1: Backlit Brown Pelican in flight
The Situation
It was cold and windy. Worse than that, it was wind against sun at 25mph from the west. There were mixed clouds and sun making getting the right exposure a challenge. There were no birds on the main cliffs.
How do you get into the creative zone?
How do you get into the creative zone? Simple. Make a conscious effort to get out of your comfort zone. My comfort zone is working right down sun angle. But I am always aware that a bad wind for traditional flight photography is a good wind for backlit flight photography. For those, a dark background is pretty much a necessity. And I knew just the right spots for the conditions. Needless to say, I was the only one there.
I made one of my very best ever pelican in flight images but just barely clipped a primary feather or two. I will share that one with you here as part of this series.
Noise?
This ISO 1600 5DS R image was noise reduced in NeatImage using the techniques in Arash Hazeghi’s new guide. The background is virtually noise-free and the bird is pretty clean too. Are you seeing any noise anywhere?
This image was created at La Jolla, CA with the hand held Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM lens (at 400mm) and the amazing mega mega-pixel Canon EOS 5DS R. ISO 400. Evaluative metering at about +1 stop off the white water alone: 1/1000 sec. at f/8 was about 1/2 stop under-exposed. Daylight WB.
Center AF point/AI Servo Expand/Shutter button AF as originally framed was active at the moment of exposure (as is always best when hand holding). This one too was a small crop from below and from our right. Though neither the selected AF point nor any of the assist points were on the bird the image is tack sharp.
Image #2: Brandt’s Cormorant leaving the scene…
What do you do when nothing’s happening?
So just what can you do to get out of your funk when conditions are terrible and nothing seems to be happening? Take a walk to a different spot. When I did that I noticed the cormorants taking flight over the breaking surf. It took me a while to recognize the situation and most of the birds had flown out to sea by the time I made this one decent image. It is something that I might be able to re-create on a day with high surf conditions.
Center AF point (by necessity)/AI Servo Expand/Rear Focus AF as framed was active at the moment of exposure. This image is full frame. Click here to see the latest version of the Rear Focus Tutorial. Click on the image to see a larger version.
Sidelit Brandt’s Cormorant displaying
Look all around and keep your eyes and your mind open
I made my way back into my comfort zone: long lens with the 2X III TC working right down light angle doing head portraits of a displaying Brandt’s Cormorant. By force of habit I am always looking left and right and even behind me. On one swing of my head I noticed another displaying bird well off light angle; it was about 30 degrees to my right. While most of the bird was in shadow, its azure gular sac was spotlit and the head angle was such that it was beuatifully lit. I moved only a foot to my right and created a quite dramatic sidelit image, a rarity for me.
Note that this image was created at 10:47am in full sun.
Getting the Right The Exposure
Working down sun angle on the same subject I was perfect at 1/640 sec. at f/9. Without giving it much thought I simply slowed the shutter speed two clicks from 1/640 to 1/400 sec. Why? I was far off sun angle.
Which is the Strongest Image?
Please leave a comment and let us know which image you feel is the strongest, and why. In this race, I have a very clear favorite.
Summing Up
Conditions were so bad that I thought originally that I would be back at Patrick and Robin’s house by 8:30am. Working. I wound up not leaving until a bit after 11 when it was blue sky sunny. I thought that I had done pretty well and though I did not create a lot of images, only about 400 in all, I kept 54 and loved many of those. You will be getting to see a good number of them and learning a ton more in the coming weeks.
Please Remember to use our Affiliate Links 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack!
Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
Conditions were really lousy in La Jolla on Tuesday morning but I persisted and made a slew of really wonderful images. I will present three of those in tomorrow’s blog post: What to do when nothing’s happening? Get into the creative zone! Part one of many.
The BAA Online Store
The current BAA Online Store was back online on Tuesday morning after being down for several days. If it should fail again folks always can place their orders via telephone by calling Jim or Jennifer at 863-692-0906. The best news is that we will soon be unveiling a brand new store that should be pretty much problem-free.
The Streak
Today’s blog post marks 138 days in a row with a new educational blog post. As always–and folks have been doing a great job recently–please remember to use our B&H links for your major gear purchases. For best results use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. Please remember that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) that we would appreciate your business 🙂
IPT Updates
Learn to improve your bird and nature photography with the best instructor on the planet; join a BIRDS AS ART Instructional Photo-Tour. Learn more and see the schedule here.
Upper Left Zone/AI Servo/Shutter Button AF as framed was active at the moment of exposure. The AF system selected a single point that fell on the base of the bird’s bill just forward of (and below) the eye. Click on the image to see a larger version.
Elegant Tern in breeding plumage
Elegance Personified
I photographed Elegant Tern about a zillion years ago in San Diego on film with the birds sitting on ugly black mud at the mouth of the San Diego River. When I was hanging with Bryan Holliday last week we were hoping to find a few on the low cliffs in La Jolla. The day after he headed back to Arizona, bingo: three flew in and landed right in front of me at the Green Patch! I love the blue Pacific background. I love that I perfectly paralleled the subject and I love the slight head turn toward me. And I love the perch rock.
What Don’t I Like?
There are two things about the image that I am less than thrilled about. If you think that you know what they are, please leave a comment.
A Note On Exposure
Here I went with the equivalent of my standard ISO 400 bright white in full sun exposure: 1/2500 sec. at f/8 (1/3200 at f7.1 = 1/2500 at f/8). Note that that approach worked perfectly here with Highlight Tone Priority (HTP) enabled. But as we have cautioned here often, only those who convert their RAW files in DPP should have HTP enabled. If set HTP and do not convert in DPP 4 you will have a false sense of security with your WHITEs.
Only DPP 4 recognizes the HTP settings. That means that folks converting their RAW files in ACR or Lightroom should start with 1/3200 sec. at f/8 as their standard ISO 400 bright white in full sun exposure. As in all digital exposure situations it is your responsibility to check for blinkies and to make sure that you have at least some data in the fifth histogram box… And then fine-tune the exposure if need be.
The DPP 4 Screen Capture
The DPP 4 Screen Capture
Note that I used click White Balance on the brightest part of the neck; this yielded a nearly pure WHITE with RGB values of 235, 235, 236. As I have written here many times before I want to bring my converted RAW files into Photoshop with the RGB values no higher than the mid-230s. In this image I would not have wanted the WHITEs any brighter. As it was, I moved the Highlight slider in DPP to -2 to bring up more detail. Note that I cleaned up four tiny limpets on the rocks. I moved the Shadow slider to +3 to lighten the blue water. Noise reduction with NeatImage.
Image and Exposure Question
In the original image as seen in the DPP 4 screen capture immediately above, why was the ocean rendered as an unnaturally dark, almost blackish blue? If you do not understand exposure theory and wish to learn it you are advised to study the section on exposure theory in the original The Art of Bird Photography.
You can order your copy of “The Photographers’ Guide to Canon Digital Photo Professional 4.0” (aka the DPP 4 Raw Conversion eGuide) by Arash Hazeghi and Arthur Morris by clicking here.
Learn how and why I and many other discerning photographers choose and use only DPP 4 to convert their Canon RAW files in the DPP 4 RAW Conversion Guide by Arash Hazeghi and yours truly. The latest version supports all of the newer Canon camera bodies and several older models including the EOS-7D and the EOS-1D Mark IV.
Please Remember to use our Affiliate Links 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack!
Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
I felt much better on Monday morning with just a bit of left knee pain. Got some unexpected good news on Monday: the time of my check-in for surgery was moved up from 12:30pm to 7:00am with the surgery now scheduled for 9am on Thursday.
IPT Updates
Learn to improve your bird and nature photography with the best instructor on the planet; join a BIRDS AS ART Instructional Photo-Tour. Learn more and see the schedule here.
The Streak
Today’s blog post marks 137 days in a row with a new educational blog post. As always–and folks have been doing a great job recently–please remember to use our B&H links for your major gear purchases. For best results use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. Please remember that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) that we would appreciate your business 🙂
Center AF point (by necessity)/AI Servo Expand/Rear Focus AF as framed was active at the moment of exposure. The selected AF point fell on the lower mandible. Click here to see the latest version of the Rear Focus Tutorial. Click on the image to see a larger version.
Image #1: Brandt’s Cormorant gular panting on a sunny afternoon
Gular Panting
Gular panting or gular fluttering is a thermo-regulatory mechanism by which cormorants and (I think…) several other bird families cool down on hot days. It is similar to your dog panting on a hot summer afternoon.
Three AF points up and one to the left of the center AF point/AI Servo Expand/Shutter Button AF as framed was active at the moment of exposure (as is always best when hand holding). The selected AF point was on the base of the bird’s beak. Click on the image to see a larger version.
Image #2: Brandt’s Cormorant displaying
Sometimes You Win, Sometimes You Lose…
While my primary reason for visiting San Diego was to explore the possibility of undergoing green light laser prostate surgery–now scheduled for this coming Thursday, March 24, I figured that there would be excellent chances to photograph both Double-crested and Brandt’s Cormorants in their spectacular breeding plumages. There have been only one or two of the former species at their usual location, and they have been looking rather plain. There had been and still are lots of Brandt’s around but again, none in their spectacular breeding plumage… Last Thursday afternoon I discovered several pairs of nesting Brandt’s Cormorants. Each bird sported their amazing azure blue gular sacs and their spiffy white head plumes. And best of all, many of the birds spent a good portion of their time displaying. I returned with Pat Sparkman on Thursday afternoon. We were blessed with mixed clouds and a bit of sun. The photography was so amazingly good and so easy that we both felt a bit guilty. 🙂
Center AF point (by necessity)/AI Servo Expand/Shutter Button AF as framed was active at the moment of exposure (as is always best when hand holding). The selected AF point was on the gular sac forward of the eye. Click on the image to see a larger version.
Image #3: Brandt’s Cormorant displaying tight
Too Good to Be True?
I have spent the better part of the last four mornings photographing the spectacular breeding displays of Brandt’s Cormorant. I am at the point where I see a gorgeous bird in a clean setting displaying up a storm and I barely give it a second glance. I have been trying for flight images of the incoming birds and for pair interactions.
I have learned a ton: I have never come across so many thieving and unfaithful birds. If a bird walks away from its nest for ten seconds its neighbor steals the seaweed, usually in one fell swoop. I watched one bird, presumably the male, bring in about 15 loads of nesting material and pass it lovingly to his potential mate. Wow, they had a beautiful nest going. When he flew off for number 16, she hopped two nests down to copulate with a third bird, knocking the entire nest into the ocean.
The Strongest Image?
Please leave a comment and let us know which image you feel is the strongest, and why. I am stuck between two of them.
San Diego offers a wealth of very attractive natural history subjects. With annual visits spanning more than three decades I have lot of experience there….
2017 San Diego 4 1/2-DAY BIRDS AS ART Instructional Photo-Tour (IPT) JAN 11 thru and including the morning session on JAN 15: 4 1/2 days: $1999.
(Limit: 10/openings 8)
Meet and Greet at 7:00pm on the evening before the IPT begins; Tuesday 1/10/17.
Join me in San Diego to photograph the spectacular breeding plumage Brown Pelicans with their fire-engine red and olive green bill pouches; Brandt’s and Double-crested Cormorants; breeding plumage Wood and Ring-necked Duck; other duck species possible including Lesser Scaup, Redhead, and Surf Scoter; a variety of gulls including Western, California, and the gorgeous Heerman’s, all in full breeding plumage; shorebirds including Marbled Godwit, Willet, Sanderling and Black-bellied Plover; many others possible including Least, Western, and Spotted Sandpiper, Whimbrel, Black and Ruddy Turnstone, Semipalmated Plover, and Surfbird; Harbor Seals (depending on the current regulations) and California Sea Lions; and Bird of Paradise flowers. And as you can see by studying the two IPT cards there are some nice bird-scape and landscape opportunities as well.
With gorgeous subjects just sitting there waiting to have their pictures taken, photographing the pelicans on the cliffs is about as easy as nature photography gets. With the winds from the east almost every morning there is usually some excellent flight photography. And the pelicans are almost always doing something interesting: preening, scratching, bill pouch cleaning, or squabbling. And then there are those crazy head throws that are thought to be a form of intra-flock communication.
Did I mention that there are wealth of great birds and natural history subjects in San Diego in winter?
Though the pelicans will be the stars of the show on this IPT there will be many other handsome and captivating subjects in wonderful settings.
The San Diego Details
This IPT will include five 3 1/2 hour morning photo sessions, four 2 1/2 hour afternoon photo sessions, four lunches, and after-lunch image review and Photoshop sessions. To ensure early starts, breakfasts will be your responsibility.
A $599 non-refundable deposit is required to hold your slot for this IPT. You can send a check (made out to “Arthur Morris) to us at BIRDS AS ART, PO Box 7245, Indian Lake Estates, FL, 33855. Or call Jim or Jennifer at the office with a credit card at 863-692-0906. Your balance, payable only by check, will be due on 9/11//2016. If we do not receive your check for the balance on or before the due date we will try to fill your spot from the waiting list. Please print, complete, and sign the form that is linked to here and shoot it to us along with your deposit check. If you register by phone, please print, complete and sign the form as noted above and either mail it to us or e-mail the scan. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me via e-mail.
Please Remember to use our Affiliate Links 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack!
Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
Learn to improve your bird and nature photography with the best instructor on the planet; join a BIRDS AS ART Instructional Photo-Tour. Learn more and see the schedule here.
The BAA Online Store
The current BAA Online Store has been down for much of the weekend. We hope to have the problem fixed this morning. In the meantime, folks can place their orders via telephone this morning by calling Jim at 863-692-0906. The best news is that we will soon be unveiling a brand new mostly problem-less store soon.
The Streak
Today’s blog post marks 136 days in a row with a new (educational?) blog post. As always–and folks have been doing a great job recently–please remember to use our B&H links for your major gear purchases. For best results use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. Please remember that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) that we would appreciate your business 🙂
artie with bloodied nose/courtesy of and copyright 2016 Patrick Sparkman
Patrick was so shaken by my fall and possible demise, that he forgot to focus the image above… But it still tells the story.
Cheating Death/Face Plant!
Patrick Sparkman, Chris Mayne–a distant cousin of ESPN’s Kenny, and I were having a great time photographing displaying Brandt’s Cormorant when I came up with a brilliant idea. Climb over the fence with the fish eye lens and create an image of the daisies with some cormorants along the rim of the cliff. So over the fence I went. I’m not sure how, but down I went, face first and hard into the cliffside daisies. I was pretty sure that I was not gonna go over the cliff to my death. Patrick, who was right there, was not so sure. It was about 50 feet down to the rocks and beach below. My face, which hit first as I pitched forward toward the Pacific, took the brunt of the fall. At first I thought that I might have broken my nose. And I was worried that I might have screwed up my Thursday surgery date. My right knee hit hard and wound up with a few scrapes. My right elbow hit too as I protected the lens and the 5DS R. Worst of all, my left knee, which had been bothering me that morning, was twisted pretty good.
To keep from going over the edge, I reached out with both arms so that I was spread-eagled, face down in the dirt. At that moment Patrick realized that I was not going to die. But I learned well later that he thought that I had been knocked out cold.
I sat up, rested for a minute, and realized that my nose was a bit bloody. When I stood up, I did not relish climbing back over the fence. Then I realized that there was no need to climb the fence. There was an unlocked gate just 30 feet away. “What an idiot” I said. “I could have used the gate in the first place!”
Photo courtesy of and copyright 2016: Chris Mayne.
Close up of the damaged nose.
What’s with the tongue?
Folks often ask, “What’s with the tongue sticking out?”
Early on in my career when folks photographed me photographing with a long lens, I would notice in their photos that invariably, my tongue was sticking out. I realized that I did that often when I was concentrating hard, sort of like Michael Jordan did when on his way to the rim for a big dunk. So now, whenever folks point a camera at me, out comes the tongue. Go figure.
i-Phone 6 image courtesy of and copyright 2016: Patrick Sparkman
artie searching for missing lens from his reading glasses. This image gives you a bit of an idea as to why Patrick was a bit worried when I fell and headed for the ocean.
Reading Glasses and Determination…
Early on in the trip, I lost the left lens from my prescription reading glasses while photographing at the low cliffs in La Jolla. No problema, I always travel with a back-up pair. After Patrick took the fish eye image that opened this post, I had a sick feeling as I looked down… Yup, the left lens was missing from my back-up pair of prescription readers. So through the gate I went to look for the lost lens. The vegetation was quite dense but try as I might, I could not find itns. So I did what I always do, I did not quit.
i-Phone 6 image courtesy of and copyright 2016: Patrick Sparkman
artie finds the missing lens!
artie finds the missing lens!
While I was happy that I did not go over the cliff to my death, and happy that I has not been seriously injured, I was really happy to find the missing lens.
Photo courtesy of and copyright 2016: Chris Mayne.
This image gives you a really good idea that I was not exaggerating the potential danger…
The potential danger…
I am not sure, but I think that I fell with one foot on the concrete base of the fence. You can see a pretty decent slope towards the ocean. At times, engaging the brain before acting can avoid lots of tsuris (informal Yiddish for trouble or distress).
The Aftermath as of Sunday Afternoon
Nose: healing nicely.
Right Elbow: just fine thank you.
Left knee: the bad one: hurting pretty good.
Right knee: hurting a bit, mostly bruised.
Ego: seriously bruised. 🙂
Please Remember to use our Affiliate Links 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack!
Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
Patrick and I had a pretty decent morning with the grebes and met new friend Chris Mayne in Coronado for godwits, gulls, and Surf Scoters.
IPT Updates
Learn to improve your bird and nature photography with the best instructor on the planet; join a BIRDS AS ART Instructional Photo-Tour. Learn more and see the schedule here.
The Streak
Today’s blog post marks 135 days in a row with a new educational blog post. As always–and folks have been doing a great job recently–please remember to use our B&H links for your major gear purchases. For best results use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. Please remember that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) that we would appreciate your business 🙂
This image was created on March 14, 2016, a cloudy morning at La Jolla, CA. I used the the hand held Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM lens (at 400mm) and the mega mega-pixel Canon EOS 5DS R. ISO 800. Evaluative metering +2/3 stop: 1/250 sec. at f/8 in Manual mode. Cloudy WB.
Brown Pelican stitched pano
25 Lessons
In the “Blog Post With No Words: What are the unspoken lessons?” here I wrote, “There are at least 25 lessons in today’s blog post. If you learned something or figured something out, please leave a comment to share with the gang.”
Below please find my take on that situation. Kudos to Den Bagwell for his excellent list and his correct follow-up on the most important point, #20.
#1: Your choice of perspective controls the appearance of the background.
#2: Choose an interesting, beautiful, pleasing (or venerable) subject.
#3: Do your best to parallel the subject or wait for the proper head turn toward you.
A + B = C
A + B = C
#4: Learn to think digitally in the field by being aware of stitched pano opportunities when a given subject is too big in the frame.
#5: You must be in Manual exposure so that the exposure does not change with the framing.
#6: You must set a White Balance other than AWB so that the WB does not change with the framing.
#7: In situations like this, you must use either rear focus of One-shot AF.
#8: First focus on the eye of the subject and make an image. Then release the rear button if you are using rear focus or keep the shutter button half pressed if you are using One-shot AF.
#9: Recompose allowing for at least 15% overlap. When re-composing for the 2nd frame it is imperative that you keep the lens as close to perfectly level as possible. See more below…
#10: Keeping the lens level is a lot easier when working on a tripod but that was not at all possible in this situation
Artie and friends. Image courtesy of and copyright 2016: Bryan Holliday
Artie and Friends
#11: By getting low and moving slowly it is possible to get ridiculously close to many free and wild birds.
#12: Hand holding allows for tremendous latitude as far as framing and background choices.
#13: Only by getting very low was I able to come up with a pleasing background.
#14: Good photographers are willing to get down and dirty in order to get the shot.
#15: Good photographers are willing to get dirt, sand, dust, mud or whatever on their cameras and lenses in order to get the shot.
#16: Folks who are passionate about photography are very likely to be good to go as far as #s 14 and 15 are concerned.
#17: Maintaining good overall health is a plus as far as photography and life are concerned.
#18: Knowing bird behavior is a huge plus for photography and included knowing which bird might be easily approached.
#19: Being willing to accept a bit of pain can help you get the shot. Here I struggled to get as left and as high up the mound as possible to better parallel the subject and get the background that I wanted. It was a pretty good test of core strength and it hurt in several places to do so.
Yours truly on the cliffs at La Jolla. iPhone 6s cell phone image courtesy of and copyright 2016: Bryan Holliday
#20: One of the two biggest keys to the success of this image was using the viewfinder level for both the first image and the second, re-composed image to keep both images fairly level. In the position that I was in your kinesthetic sense is hopelessly confused…
#21: The second was to maintain the same elevation when re-composing. As one of the commenters noted, I did not do real well with that and thus lost more than I would have liked from the bottom of the image of the face and the head.
#22: Wearing sun protective clothing is better than wearing sun block…
#23: Remove the foot and lens plate from the 100-400 II when handholding to lighten the load a bit.
#24: I stabilized my rig by plating my left elbow firmly on the ground.
#25: If you are not learning and having fun while you are at it you are missing a lot.
Please Remember to use our Affiliate Links 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack!
Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
Please Remember to use our Affiliate Links 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack!
Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
After my ultra sound this morning I learned that I am good to go for green light laser surgery next Thursday, March 24. I spent the rest of the morning and all afternoon photographing displaying Brandt’s Cormorants, 777 images in all. What fun.
The Streak
Today’s blog post marks 134 days in a row with a new educational blog post. As always–and folks have been doing a great job recently–please remember to use our B&H links for your major gear purchases. For best results use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. Please remember that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) that we would appreciate your business 🙂
Price Reduced $2500
Japan In Winter IPT. February 9-24, 2017: $11,499 (was $13,999)/double occupancy.
Price Reduced $2,500 on 3-8-16!
Please e-mail for couple and IPT repeat customer discount information.
As I really, really want to make it back to Japan in winter one more time, I decided to lower the price of the world’s best Japan in Winter trip by $2,500. Yes my trip has three great leaders including the best bird photography instructor on the planet. That’s the guy who knows where to be when and why. And yes, it is now a bit more expensive than most. And yes, we stay at a fine hotel in Tokyo. And yes, we stay in a marvelous traditional hotel for our three nights at the Snow Monkey Park. And yes, we are perfectly located on Hokkaido, minutes from the premier Red-crowned Crane sanctuary and an easy drive to most of the other wondrous avian attractions. And yes, we enjoy home cooked breakfasts and dinners prepared by Shinobu, the wife of our local Japanese guide. She is an incredible chef. After three visits her meals are now traditional Japanese fine-tuned for the American palate. And yes, my tour is longer than the others, giving us many days with the cranes. I saw one trip with only two days of crane photography; what a bummer. End each day with a traditional onsen (hot springs mineral bath) to complete your immersion in Japanese culture.
Life is short. I hope that you can join me. Scroll down for details.
What is it? Hokkaido, Japan
What Is It?
What is the subject of the photograph? Was I in a plane? Was I in a spacecraft? (Remember, I did visit the Kennedy Space Center recently…) What focal length did I use?
Answers to Questions
In the Bliss… And Snow Monkey Business Image Questions blog post here, I asked the two questions below.
Easy Question and Answer
Why did I move the Shadow slider to +5? (Hint: take a look at the animated GIF below…)
The Shadow Slider was moved to +5 to open up the darker tones of the young Snow Monkey and to lighten the dark smudges upper right.
Hard Question and Answer
Why did I move the Highlight slider to +3?
The Highlight slider was moved to +3 to lighten the dark smudges upper right.
IPT Updates
Learn to improve you bird and nature photography with the best instructor on the planet; join an Instructional Photo-Tour. Learn more and see the schedule here.
Consider joining me in Japan in February, 2017, for the world’s best Japan in Winter workshop. Click on the card to enjoy the spectacular larger version.
Japan In Winter IPT. February 9-24, 2017: $11,499 (was $13,999)/double occupancy.Limit 8/Openings: 5
Price Reduced $2,500 on 3-8-16!
All lodging including the Tokyo hotel on 9 FEB, all breakfasts & dinners, ground transport and transfers including bus to the monkey park hotel, and all entrance fees and in-country flights are included. Not included: international flights, all lunches–most are on the run, and alcoholic beverages.
Please e-mail for couple and IPT repeat customer discount information.
This trip is one day longer than the great 2014 trip to allow for more flexibility, more time with the cranes, and most importantly, more time for landscape photography. Hokkaido is gorgeous. You will enjoy tons of pre-trip planning and gear advice, in-the-field instruction and guidance, at-the-lodge Photoshop and image review sessions in addition to short introductory slide programs for each of the amazing locations. Skilled photographer Paul McKenzie handles the logistics and we enjoy the services of Japan’s best wildlife photography guide whom I affectionately call “Hokkaido Bear.” His network of local contacts and his knowledge of the weather, the area, and the birds is unparalleled and enables him to have us in the best location every day.
Arrive Tokyo: 9 FEB 2017 the latest. 8 FEB is safer and gives you a day to get acclimated to the time change. Your hotel room for the night of the 9th is covered.
Bus Travel to Monkey Park Hotel: 10 FEB: A 1/2 DAY of monkey photography is likely depending on our travel time… This traditional hotel is first class all the way. Our stay includes three ten course Japanese dinners; these sumptuous meals will astound you and delight your taste buds. There are many traditional hot springs mineral baths (onsens) on site in this 150 year old hotel.
Full Day snow monkeys: FEB 11.
Full Day snow monkeys: FEB 12.
13 FEB: Full travel day to Hokkaido/arrive at our lodge in the late afternoon. The lodge is wonderful. All the rooms at the lodge have beds. Bring your warm pajamas. A local onsen (hot springs bath and tubs) is available for $5 each day before dinner–when you are cold, it is the best thing since sliced bread. The home-cooked Japanese styles meals at the lodge are to die for. What’s the best news? Only a small stand of woods separates us from the very best crane sanctuary. During one big snowstorm we were the only photo group to be able to get to Tsurui Ito; we had the whole place to ourselves in perfect conditions for crane photography!
FEB 14-23: Red-crowned Crane, raptors in flight, Whooper Swans, and scenic photography. Ural Owl possible. An overnight trip to Rausu for Steller’s Sea Eagle and White-tailed Eagle photography on the tourists boats is 100% dependent on the weather, road, and sea ice conditions. Only our trip offers complete flexibility in this area. It has saved us on more than once occasion. The cost of 2 eagle-boat trips is included. If the group would like to do more than two boat trips and we all agree, there will be an additional charge for the extra trip or trips. No matter the sea ice conditions, we will do two eagle boat trips (as long as we can make the drive to Rausu; it snows a lot up there). We have never been shut out.In 2016 there was no sea ice but our guide arranged for two amazingly productive boat trips.
Lodging notes: bring your long johns for sleeping in the lodge. At the Snow Monkey Park, and in Rausu, the hotel the rooms are Japanese-style. You sleep on comfortable mats on the floor. Wi-fi is available every day of the trip.
FEB 24. Fly back to Tokyo for transfer to your airport if you are flying home that night, or, to your hotel if you are overnighting. If you need to overnight, the cost of that room is on you.
Life is short. Hop on the merry-go-round.
To Sign Up
To save your spot, please send your $5,000 non-refundable deposit check made out to “Birds as Art” to Arthur Morris/BIRDS AS ART, PO Box 7245, Indian Lake Estates, FL 33855. I do hope that you can join me for this trip of a lifetime. Do e-mail with any questions or give me a buzz at 863-692-0906.
Purchasing travel insurance within 2 weeks of our cashing your deposit check is strongly recommended. On two fairly recent Galapagos cruises a total of 5 folks were forced to cancel less than one week prior to the trip. My family and I use Travel Insurance Services and strongly recommend that you do the same.
Please Remember to use our Affiliate Links 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack!
Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
I had a private client on Thursday morning and we were blessed with wonderful light and pelicans, a displaying Brandt’s Cormorant, and my first Elegant Tern on digital. Boy, was I stoked. I had my pre-op chest x-ray done after lunch. Tomorrow is my ultra-sound.
The Streak
Today’s blog post marks 133 days in a row with a new educational blog post. As always–and folks have been doing a great job recently–please remember to use our B&H links for your major gear purchases. For best results use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. Please remember that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) that we would appreciate your business 🙂
Topaz Simply BuzSim breeding plumage Brown Pelican head portrait
Topaz Simply BuzSim
I have been intrigued by Topaz Simplify BuzSim images for years. When I created the original pelican image below, I knew that it was perfect for BuzSim so I bit the bullet and got ahold of the licenses for a slew of Topaz products. Once I installed the program I opened the original image in Photoshop, hit Filter > Topaz Labs > Topaz Simplify 4. Under COLLECTIONS I clicked on BuzSim and then clicked on the first item in the list of PRESETS, appropriately named BuzSim. I was thrilled with the artistic, painterly rendition so I simply hit OK. As I wanted to open up the middle and dark tones only, I applied a Curves adjustment after the image opened in Photoshop. See immediately below for a Curves lesson.
Curves adjustment to bring up the dark tones
Curves Adjustment to Bring Up the Dark Tones
With the WHITEs beautifully bright but the dark tones a bit too dark to fit with the painterly look, I pulled up the curve at the dark end after pinning the WHITEs with four dots right on the line from the middle to the upper right. This prevented the adjustment from affecting the WHITEs and the middle tones. Pinning the curve is a commonly used technique when making a Curves adjustment
Center AF point (by necessity)/AI Servo Expand/Shutter Button AF as originally framed was active at the moment of exposure (as is always best when hand holding). The selected AF point was just below the bird’s eye. This was a small crop from below and behind the bird. Click on the image to see a larger version.
Breeding plumage Brown Pelican head portrait
100-400 II/1.4X III TC/5DS R Combo
The hand held 100-400 II/1.4X III TC/5DS R combo is deadly on the pelicans at La Jolla. It is easy to get around the cliffs, AF is fast and sure, and the resulting images are sharp with amazing fine feather detail.
Topaz Simplify
I was thrilled with the results of my first try with Topaz Simplify. I will be sharing some more BuzSim examples with you here in the not too distant future. You can help support my efforts here on the BAA Blog by clicking on the logo link above if you would like to join in the fun. After you click, be sure to watch the great instructional video.
Topaz Simplify:Turn your photos into works of art. Create paintings, sketches, watercolors, cartoons, and more. Make your art uniquely personal instead of using cookie-cutter filters. Get better results faster with specialized digital art technology
Subject and focal lengths clockwise from upper left around to center.
Palouse Falls: 11mm; homemade kiddie race car: 105mm; barn siding pan blur: 798mm; Rolling fields diorama: 110mm; Crayola drums: 343 mm; Hay barn interior: 19mm; vintage gas station: 40mm; Dilapidated farm building: 13mm; Denise’s tree Infrared: 20mm.
Images and card design by Arthur Morris/BIRDS AS ART.
The Palouse ~ A Creative Adventure/BIRDS AS ART Instructional Photo-Tour (IPT)/Eastern Washington State. June 3-7, 2016/5 Full Days: $1699/Limit 12/Openings: 6
The Palouse ~ A Creative Adventure/BIRDS AS ART Instructional Photo-Tour (IPT)/Eastern Washington State. June 10-14, 2016/5 Full Days: $1699/Limit 12/Openings: 2
Double Header!
Maximize both your travel dollars and your learning experience by signing up for both IPTs.
Images and card design by Denise Ippolito/A Creative Adventure.
The Palouse IPTs
Rolling farmlands provide a magical patchwork of textures and colors, especially when viewed from the top of Steptoe Butte where we will likely enjoy spectacular sunrises and possibly a nice sunset. We will photograph grand landscapes and mini-scenics of the rolling hills and farm fields. We will take you to some really neat old abandoned barns and farmhouses in idyllic settings. There is no better way to improve your compositional and image design skills and to develop your creativity than to join us for this trip. Two great leaders: Denise Ippolito and Arthur Morris. Photoshop and image sharing sessions when we have the time and energy…. We get up early and stay out late and the days are long.
After 6 days of back-breaking scouting work in early June 2014 we found all of the iconic locations and, in addition, lots of spectacular new old barns and breath-taking landforms and views. On three additional scouting days in 2015 we discovered several more truly amazing locations. We will teach you what makes one situation prime and another seemingly similar one a waste of your time.
What’s included: In-the-field instruction, guidance, lessons, and inspiration, our newfound but very extensive knowledge of the area, all lunches, motel lobby grab and go breakfasts, and Photoshop and image sharing sessions when possible. There will be a meet and greet at 7:30pm on the evening before each workshop begins.
You will learn and hone both basic and advanced compositional and image design skills. You will learn to get the right exposure every time. You will learn to develop your creative eye. You will learn the basics of HDR (high dynamic range) photography. You will learn a variety of in-camera creative techniques. Most importantly you will learn to see the situation and to create a variety of top-notch images. Do see both of our blogs for lots more on that in the coming weeks. You will learn how the quality and direction of light combine to determine the success of your images. And–please don’t gasp–we will be working quite a bit with sidelight when creating landscapes. Lastly, we will be doing some infrared photography.
To Sign Up
A non-refundable $699 deposit is due now. The balance will be due on February 15, 2016. If we do not receive your check for the balance on or before the due date we will try to fill your spot from the waiting list. Whether or not your spot is filled, you will lose your deposit. If not, you can secure your spot by paying your balance.
With the spectacular success that we enjoyed in 2015 it seems quite likely that this one will fill up very quickly. Please let me know via e-mail that you will be joining us. Then you can either call Jim or Jennifer at 863-692-0906 during business hours or send us a check to leave a deposit; the latter is preferred. If by check, please make out to “Arthur Morris” and mail it to: Arthur Morris/BIRDS AS ART, PO Box 7245, Indian Lake Estates, FL, 33855. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us via e-mail: artie or denise.
Travel Insurance Services offers a variety of plans and options. Included with the Elite Option or available as an upgrade to the Basic & Plus Options. You can also purchase Cancel for Any Reason Coverage that expands the list of reasons for your canceling to include things such as sudden work or family obligation and even a simple change of mind. You can learn more here: Travel Insurance Services. Do note that many plans require that you purchase your travel insurance within 14 days of our cashing your deposit check. Whenever purchasing travel insurance be sure to read the fine print carefully even when dealing with reputable firms like TSI.
IPT Updates
Learn to improve you bird and nature photography with the best instructor on the planet; join an Instructional Photo-Tour. Learn more and see the schedule here.
Please Remember to use our Affiliate Links 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack!
Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
Patrick Sparkman took a few hours off from work this morning to join Bryan Holliday and me at the cliffs in La Jolla. After a slow start we smoked em. I have a private client tomorrow morning; we will be targeting the pelicans–many still in spectacular breeding plumage–Brandt’s Cormorant, and Western and California Gulls.
The Streak
Today’s blog post marks 132 days in a row with a new educational blog post. As always–and folks have been doing a great job recently–please remember to use our B&H links for your major gear purchases. For best results use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. Please remember that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) that we would appreciate your business 🙂
“That’s what my wife looks like when she wakes up in the morning”
The Gallery Walk
As noted here previously, on Sunday past, Patrick and Robin Sparkman, Bryan Holliday, David Salem and his friend Glenn Conlan, and Brian Jones and his friend Norm Brown joined me at The Nat (The San Diego Natural History Museum) for a gallery walk. My exhibit, BIRDS AS ART, the Avian Photography of Arthur Morris hangs until mid-April. Even those who had been to the show before were amazed by the beauty of the venue, the Abe Ordover Gallery. Everyone liked the images too, and marveled at the incredible printing job by Fine Print Imaging of Fort Collins, CO.
David Salem is no slouch as a photographer; he is the first two time winner of BirdPhotographer.Net’s Image of the Year (IOTY) and the first to be so honored in consecutive years. You can see Dave’s spectacular 2015 winning image and the other category winners here. And you can see the 2014 winners here. I will be featuring the 2015 winners in a blog post here soon. You can learn more about BPN or join here. In any case, David’s effusive and insightful comments on my work were greatly appreciated. And they meant a ton coming from such a talented, skilled, and hard-working photographer.
Locals, and those who will be visiting San Diego in the next few weeks, can learn more about the SDNHM gallery exhibition here. It runs until April 25th.
The gentleman pictured in today’s lead image kindly stopped to chat with the group when he learned that I was the photographer. Pointing to the Great Egret begging image pictured in Bryan Holliday’s fine cell phone image above, he cracked everyone up by saying, “That’s what my wife looks like when she wakes up in the morning.” And to think that his wife was standing right there!
birds as art: The Avian Photography of Arthur Morris/The Top 100
The companion e-book to the solo exhibit at TheNat, San Diego, California
The new e-book on CD is available for $23 here. And it is also available via convenient download for $20 by clicking here.
birds as art: The Avian Photography of Arthur Morris/The Top 100
If you missed the announcement of the new e-book click here for complete info that includes details on getting a signed copy.
Wood Stork images collage
Which are your favorites? See mine below.
Are Wood Storks Too Ugly to Photograph?
At a recent blog post Dave Adler commented:
All of your stuff is so consistently amazing that I thought I’d just ask whether you have ever published (or even taken) an image of a Wood Stork. The reason I’m asking is we were in Wakodahatchee (DelRay, Florida) and disappointed to find that practically the whole place has been taken over by these, well, less than impressive birds. Just curious if you have any comments, and thanks.
Good friend and multiple IPT veteran Bill Lloyd (who is headed to Namibia with us in a bit) responded:
Hmmm… Wood Storks and spoonbills are on my bucket list. The storks have amazing faces!
And then I wrote, I have published many Wood Stork images both in print and here on the blog. Those include many beautiful ones and many close-ups of their yes, amazing faces. Try doing a search for “Wood Stork” in the little white search box on the upper right of each blog post page. You should find a few good ones. LMK what you think. 🙂 a
To which I add here: To me, Wood Storks are quite impressive. And yes, they are ugly, but they are quite beautiful at the same time. If you can find one in a nice setting or get really close making some wonderful images of them is a snap. The textures and patterns on their faces are incredible. They breed every year at Gatorland in Kissimmee, FL. My very favorite image in the collage above in the tight adult head portrait from Anhinga Trail, the left-most one in the bottom row, the one with the golden tones. But there are several that I really like a lot especially some of the chicks and the head portrait of a young Wood Stork, bottom row, third from the end.
So what’s the lesson?
IPT Updates
Learn to improve you bird and nature photography with the best instructor on the planet; join an Instructional Photo-Tour. Learn more and see the schedule here.
Please Remember to use our Affiliate Links 🙂
To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod heads, Gitzo tripods, Wimberley heads and plates, LensCoats and accessories, and the like. We sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And we are always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail. I just learned that my account was suspended during my absence; it should be up and running by Monday at the latest.
I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and visiting the BAA Online store as well.
Facebook
Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack!
Typos
In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right 🙂
