Posts in Category: Florida
4/20/2011: Full Alert, wings on wednesday
Great Blue Herons are one of my favorite birds to photograph. They have great plumage. They get into interesting shapes. And they are easy! They pose. This bird, caught looking at Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge in Titusville Florida, held this unlikely pose (unlikely unless you have spent much time with Great Blues) for long enough so that I had no trouble catching it, even in the limited field of view of my digiscoping rig. There is a lot of tension in the shot, highlighted by the light in the bird’s eye, which is rotated forward to look along the bill. Something certainly had this bird’s attention.
Very careful observers will see that I was shooting through reeds, and there are two in the far foreground, so out of focus as to be little more than a shadowy wash of color, which cross right at the bill.
Canon SD4000IS behind the eyepiece of the ZEISS DiaScope 65FL for the equivalent field of view of a 1200mm lens on a full frame DSLR, 1/1250th @ ISO 125, f4 (camera limited).
Processed for intensity and sharpness in Lightroom. Cropped for composition.
3/18/2011: Surprise Among the Reeds of Light
I posted most of the best of my digiscoped images from this year’s trip to Space Coast Florida, but while watching a slide show of the images last night, this one really popped out at me. I love the light on the reeds, the backlight on the bird, and the contrast between the texture of the reed bed and the feathers of the bird. The color pallet also catches me. This is an image that makes me smile…and my Feathers on Friday offering.
Not digiscoped. Grabbed out the window of the car at Viera Wetlands, with Canon SX20IS at 560mm equivalent field of view, f5.7 @ 1/400th @ ISO 200. Landscape mode.
Processed in Lightroom for intensity and clarity (see the Processing link).
3/1/2011: Ibis
Just a really quick post at the airport on my way to San Diego. A very dirty White Ibis from Merritt Island NWR in FL.
Digiscoped with the Canon SD4000IS and the ZEISS DiaScope.
2/25/2011: Mixed Waders!
One of experiences I enjoy most at Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge can’t be digiscoped. You need a wider lens to capture the sometimes large groups of birds, like this group of mixed waders under the Eagle Nest Platform on the back side of Blackpoint Drive. There are four species here: Great Egret center: Snowy Egret left, right, and back; Little Blue Heron (white phase), to the left of the Great Egret; and White Ibis on the Great Egret’s right.
An even wider view. This kind of thing is common in Florida, and you see even bigger groups, but for a boy down from Maine twice a year, it is always a treat!
Canon SX20IS at 1) 190mm equivalent field of view, f5 @ 1/400th @ ISO 80 and 2) 43mm equivalent field of veiw, f4 @ 1/640th @ ISO 80. Programmed auto.
Processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom.
2/21/2011: pampas?
Not really, of course, since this is north Florida. A few miles east of Titusville on route 50 there is a major conservation area, practically unmarked, between the road and the river: Canaveral Marshes Conservation Area. I’d never heard of it, but I saw the sign on my way back from an abortive trip to Orlando Wetlands (still closed for hunting, apparently, even in January) and turned around to go back for a look. It was late afternoon, with storms coming on, but I took a nice, if lonely walk back in from the road for a mile or so. There was nothing much doing…just acres of open grassland with tree cover and small patches of swampy forest along what was apparently and old road.
This small stand of mixed grasses along the way struck me as somehow exotic, like something from a savanna or the pampas, hence the title. Of course I have never visited either, so it is no more than a feeling based on who knows what set of impressions from film, tv, magazines and books. Until I went for the title, I didn’t even know I knew what a pampas was. 🙂 And I had to google it to be sure. Argentina? Okay.
Of course what really caught my eye was the mixture of textures, curves, and subtle colors, built up around those darker feathery heads. I used a medium long telephoto setting on the SX20IS zoom to frame an interesting pattern, and then cropped in Lightroom to eliminate some distraction at the top.
Canon SX20IS at 380mm equivalent field of view, f5 @ 1/400th @ ISO 200. Landscape program.
Processed in Lighroom for intensity and clarity.
And a happy Presidents’ Day to you!
2/20/2011: Rosy Spoons, dessert
Happy Sunday!
We have completed our meal of Roseate Spoonbills for this winter (I will back in Spoonbill country in April 😉 and we finish with this delicious dessert confection. It was taken a few moments after yesterday’s helping, but turned 180 degrees so that the low afternoon sun was full on the birds, raising the pinks to a whole new level of intensity and giving dimension to the eye.
The bird is on that same mussel covered mangrove snag (see 2/18) and may well be the same bird. But what a difference the light makes!
Canon SD4000IS behind the 15-56x Vario on the ZEISS DiaScope 65FL for equivalent fields of view of 1) 5000mm @ 1/500th @ ISO 125, f13 effective, and 2) 2000mm @ 1/1250 @ ISO 125, f5.6 effective.
Processed in Lightroom for clarity and sharpness.
That was a lot of Spoonbills, a 5 course meal. Do you suppose if I lived in Titusville and visited Blackpoint Wildlife Drive at Merritt Island NWR daily, or even weekly, I would get tired of looking at Spoonbills? Do you suppose they might become so ordinary that I would stop looking. I’d like to think not. I’d like to think I could continue to celebrate the amazing beauty of this bird in all its seasons and in every weather and light. I know that is the way it ought to be…that I should be capable of that. I know that it is a matter of paying attention, of seeing through the film of ordinary to the extraordinary at the heart of every moment. I know that every moment is newly created…that every moment the world, the universe, myself, is newly created, had I only the eyes to see and the mind to grasp. If I were only willing to abandon the narrative of my existence which commands so much of my attention…if I were willing, as Jesus said, to die to myself I might live in the moment in all its infinite creative potential. I suspect that is the way we are made to live…that such a life, being the life of our creator, is supposed to be ours as well. If I ever get tired of looking at Spoonbills, it should come as a wake-up call, as a blaring alarm to bring me back from the sleep and dream of self to the waking life I could be living with my creator. After-all, I fully believe my creator made, and makes, the ultimate sacrifice so that I can turn from self and see…and in seeing, celebrate. Though it is generally beyond our culinary art, a good dessert, the right dessert, should leave you hungry, ready, pallet cleansed, for your next meal!
So, will you be ready for more Roseate Spoonbills by April? 🙂
2/19/2011: Rosy Spoons, helping 4
It is all about the spoons today, in this forth helping of Roseate Spoonbills from Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge…that bill! This is one of those cases where only a picture will do it justice…words fail. These shots from late afternoon with the light behind the birds show some of the subtitle texture on the leather-like upper bill, and the elongated nostrils, both of which I had missed until now (the plumage is so spectacular that it is easy to over look finer details…or at least it is for me).
Different angles, but still all about the spoons.
Canon SD4000IS behind the 15-56x Vario eyepiece on the ZEISS DiaScope 65FL for equivalent fields of view of 1) 4000mm @ 1/500th @ ISO 125, f11 effective, and 2-3) 2000mm @ 1/640 @ ISO 125, f5.5 effective. Programmed auto. Though this is a case where Exposure Compensation for backlight might have been effective, I am learning that the Canon SD4000IS’s digital sensor has more dynamic range that I am used to, and generally, especially when the bird fills a significant amount of the frame, does better on straight Auto exposure than I can do by fiddling with EV. This is good. One less thing to worry about.
Processed in Lighroom for clarity and sharpness.
2/18/2011: thirds on Rosy Spoons
Are you satiated with spoonbills yet? I hope not since I have several more helpings, from my visits to Black Point Drive at Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge last month.
This time I will throw in some mussels for variety, clinging to the roots of a dead mangrove…and reflections in the water. Make a meal of it, so to speak.
Canon SD4000IS behind the 15-56x Vario eyepiece on the ZEISS DiaScope 65FL spotting scope for the equivalent field of view of a 3000mm lens @ 1/1000th @ ISO 200, f7.6 effective (scope limited).
Processed for clarity and sharpness in Lightroom.
2/17/2011: Rosy spoons 2
I promised you an unrelenting diet of Roseate Spoonbills for a few days here and this gentleman, resting in a mangrove, is the second helping. Roseates must lose a lot of heat through that bill, since when resting they always tuck it well into the back feathers. The only trick to a shot like this is catching the eye open.
Here is the same bird, from the same spot with less zoom.
Canon SD4000IS behind the 15-56x Vario eyepiece on the ZEISS DiaScope 65FL for the equivalent field of view of 3000mm and 1000mm, 3000mm @ 1/500th @ ISO 160, f8.5 effective (scope limited), and 1000mm @ 1/640 @ ISO 250, f4.5 effective (camera limited).
Processed for clarity and sharpness in Lightroom.
2/16/2011: Rosy spoons
I am, as you see, still working through the images, mostly digiscoped, from my visit to Florida’s Space Coast Birding and Nature Festival. On of the highlights of a trip to Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge in January is the Roseate Spoonbills coming into breeding plumage. Then again, the Spoonbills at MINWR always seem particularly bright…according to my sources, the color comes from the algae the crustaceans eat when the Spoonbill in turn eats them. There must be lots of that algae and those crustaceans at MINWR.
This is a classic breeding male with the green head, the black ring, and the bright red eye.
And here from a slightly different angle. The black ring at the back of the head is often hidden when the bird roosts. I am sure I have seen it before but never captured it as clearly as in these images.
Canon SD4000IS behind the eyepiece of the ZEISS DiaScope 65FL spotting scope for the equivalent field of view of about a 2000mm lens. The bird was feeding actively and moved away some by the second shot. 1/640th @ ISO 125 and 1/800th @ ISO 125. Programmed auto. Approximately f5.5 effective aperture.
Processed for clarity and sharpness in Lightroom.
Over the next few days I will be featuring more Roseate Spoonbills from MINWR.