Posts in Category: backyard photo-blind
Maine! Downy Woodpecker
Downy Woodpecker: backyard, Kennebunk, Maine, USA, May 2023 — So we will stay close to home for the holiday today. This is one of our backyard Downy Woodpeckers, taken from my photo-blind out by the big pine on our property line. Looking just a bit disheveled. OM Systems OM-1 with 100-400mm zoom @ 800mm equivalent. Program mode with my evolving bird modifications. Processed in Pixelmator Pro. ISO 4000 @ f6.3 @ 1/640th.
Maine! Goldfinch, nothing so yellow
American Goldfinch: Kennebunk, Maine, USA, May 2023 — there is nothing so yellow as a fresh spring male Goldfinch. We suddenly have a small host of them in the yard. This one posed outside my pop-up backyard bird blind as I was learning the new OM-1 system. Olympus OM-1 with the 100-400mm zoom at 800mm equivalent. Program mode with my evolving bird modifications. Processed in Pixelmator Pro. ISO 320 @ f6.3 @ 1/640th. Minus .7EV
Maine! Tufted Titmouse
Tufted Titmouse: Kennebunk, Maine, USA, May 2023 — I am trying to find the best combination of focus settings on the OM-1 to allow me to pick the warblers out of the dense foliage at Magee Marsh in Ohio next week when I am there to give two Point and Shoot for Warbler workshops, so I am spending time in my backyard photo blind whenever the weather permits, practicing on the titmice, chickadees, chipping sparrows, and goldfinches. As you can see, this was a tricky shot, with foreground foliage and vines and a confusing background. I had the camera set to bird recognition and to the “small” focus target to give it a chance to find the bird in the brush and it worked quite well. Often with a larger focus target, which works fine in less obscured situations, the camera could not get close enough to focus to actually recognize the bird. But with the small target if I could get the target on any piece of the bird, the camera would focus, recognize the bird and move focus to the eye. Pretty slick! Still a lot to learn! Olympus OM-1 with the OM System 100-400mm zoom at 800mm equivalent. Program mode with my evolving birds modifications. Processed in Pixelmator Pro. ISO 320 @ f6.3 @ 1/640th. Minus .7EV. (to protect the highlights).
Maine! Grey Squirrel (I see you!)
Grey Squirrel: Kennebunk Maine, USA, May 2023 — When you live in Maine you practice Animal Auto Focus on any wildlife available…mostly squirrels. 🙂 This squirrel did its “laying out flat on a branch” thing for me, and watched me inside my hide. He very definitely knew exactly where I was and was keeping track of what I was doing. We have two different framings here: 800mm equivalent and, using the digital tele-converter in the OM-1, 1600mm equivalent. In both cases the camera automatically kept focus on the eye. Program mode with my evolving wildlife modifications. (That is what the practice is all about.) Processed in Pixelmator Pro and Apple Photos. ISO 800 @ f6.3 @ 1/500th. Minus .7EV.
Maine! Chipping Sparrow
Chipping Sparrow: Kennebunk, Maine, USA, April 2023 — Still in the experimental stage of setting up my OM-1 for birds and wildlife. Here I was using the cooperative Chipping Sparrow on the feeder to test the built in 2x digital converter. Lots of cameras have them. Some work surprisingly well for those times when you need the extra reach. This shot was taken with the 100-400mm zoom at the equivalent of 1600mm and I think it is just fine! I could have gotten the same image scale by cropping an 800mm shot, but the digital converter maintains, or simulates at least, the full 20mm files. I have the converter programed into a handy button on the camera so I can just click it on and off as needed. Olympus OM-1 with the 100-400mm zoom. Program mode with my evolving birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Pixelmator Pro and Apple Photos. ISO 800 @ f 6.3 @ 1/500th.
Grey Catbird
Grey Catbird: Kennebunk, Maine, USA, May 2022 — The catbirds have come. We had at least 2, maybe 3, in the yard, yesterday. They love the suet, though they are poorly adapted to take advantage of it. They can’t “cling on” the way woodpeckers do, and they can’t get through the out cage the way the chickadees, nuthatches, and pine warblers do, so they kind of hover under the suet cage and grab a bite. I have a video which I posted (with a Native American Flute accompaniment) on Facebook and Youtube yesterday. 🙂 I will link it here. Such a handsome bird. Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Pixelmator Photo and Apple Photos. ISO 500 @ f4 @ 1/500th.
Maine spring edition: White-throated Sparrow
White-throated Sparrow: Kennebunk, Maine, USA, May 2022 — Another common bird this time of year (and only for a few weeks here), but another irresistible pose from my backyard photo-blind in the late afternoon sun. The White-throated Sparrows come through in flocks and settle out on their way north and up to higher elevations to stock up under our feeders. Sony Rx10iv at 591mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Pixelmator Photo and Apple Photos. ISO 125 @ f4 @ 1/500th.
Maine spring edition: Purple Finch acrobatics
Purple Finch: Kennebunk, Maine, USA, May 2022 — Purple Finches are messy eaters…wasting as much seed as they eat as they sort through the seeds for just the right one…but they are also among my favorite feeder birds. The males, at least early in the season, before mating, are such posers…always putting on a show. Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Pixelmator Photo and Apple Photos. ISO 125 @ f4 @ 1/500th.
Maine spring edition: Chipping Sparrow
Chipping Sparrow: Kennebunk, Maine, USA, May 2022 — Chipping Sparrows are a dime a dozen in our yard from April until early October, and I have thousands of photos of them (well hundreds at least) but occasionally one poses just so, in such good light, that another image is irresistible. This is from my back-yard photo blind in the lovely light of late afternoon. Sony Rx10iv at 575mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Pixelmator Photo and Apple Photos. ISO 100 @ f4 @ 1/500th.
Maine spring edition: What color is a bluebird?
Eastern Bluebird: Kennebunk, Maine, USA, May 2022 — As I sit in my backyard photo blind I can see this male Eastern Bluebird busy feeding chicks in the next box two yards over, going back and forth between our yard and theirs. They have nested in the little box on that fence since we first began seeing them in the neighborhood 4 or 5 years ago. We now have them coming for meal-worms at our feeders year around. This one posed under the pines in the late day horizontal sun for a great look at the actual color of a male at his brightest. Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Pixelmator Photo and Apple Photos. ISO 100 @ f4 @ 1/500th.