Monthly Archives: July 2010
7/21/2010
On a Lazy River’s Evening Light
The Mousam, in Kennebunk Maine, at high tide, about 7:30PM on a summer evening after a hot damp day. View this larger on the Wide Eyed In Wonder site by clicking the image above. It has much more impact at larger sizes.
Canon SX20IS at 300mm equivalent field of view, f5 @ 1/160th @ ISO 200. Landscape program.
Cropped for composition in Lightroom. Blackpoint right. Added Clarity and some Vibrance. Sharpen narrow edges preset.
From Around Home 2010.
7/20/2010
Eastern Wood Pewee
I wish I were 100% sure of this id, but near as I can tell this is an immature Eastern Wood Pewee. It hunts, most days, off a series of old fence posts set out in flooded marsh about 30 feet from the raised bed of the Kennebunk Bridle path on the ocean side of Rt. 9. Here it is very intent on the dragon and damsel flies hovering over the water below. Every 90 seconds or so it swoops. Occasionally it scores.
Canon SD4000IS behind the eyepiece of the new ZEISS DiaScope 65FL for the equivalent field of view of a 4200mm lens on a full frame DSLR. Effective f11 @ 1/320th @ ISO 400. Programmed auto. Only rarely do you have the light and a cooperative bird for such a frame filling shot, even with a digiscoping rig. Viewed at full screen resolution on my laptop, this bird is well over life-sized.
Some Recovery in Lightroom. A touch of Fill Light. Blackpoint a fair distance right…which threw the color balance well into the yellow, so Auto White Balance to start, and then further adjustment by eye. Added Clarity and just a smidge of Vibrance (otherwise too yellow again). Sharpen narrow edges preset.
From New DiaScope 65FL.
And for a more moderate view…the same bird at maybe 2000mm equivalent.
7/19/2010
Rockport Daylily Light
These, for a change, are not in my yard. A late afternoon visit to Rockport, up the coast two hours from us, for a Bay Chamber concert (my daughter played: Young Stars of Maine), and a few hours to wander the village between dropping her off and the concert proper. Rockport is full of little pocket parks. It seems that wherever there is open ground it is turned into a beauty spot: with plantings, paths, and benches. For which, as a casual visitor, I am truly thankful. The Daylilies in this hillside park were at their best in the late light, which gave them an inner fire.
Canon SX20IS. 1) 28mm equivalent @ f5.6 @ 1/320th @ ISO 125, Aperture preferred. 2) 560mm equivalent @ f5.7 @ 1/640th @ ISO 160. Aperture preferred.
In Lightroom, Recovery for the highlights, a touch of Fill Light for the shadows, Blackpoint just right, added Clarity and just a smidge of Vibrance. Sharpen narrow edges preset.
From Rockport 2010.
7/18/2010
Painted Lady! (and the nature of grace)
Happy Sunday.
When this is posted, I will be somewhere in the air between Portland Maine and Philadelphia, on the first leg of a day-long (14 hour) trip to California. At least I don’t have to go by wagon train.
And, of course, the Painted Lady is a long distance traveler too. This butterfly, if I understand it correctly, came up from Mexico this spring. They used to come through Rehoboth, New Mexico (where I lived for many years, many years ago) in waves. You could stand in a field and watch them pass, 150 or more in a line across the field and lines hitting every few moments for most of a day. And that was just our soccer field.
I was out digiscoping, still learning my new camera, when this Lady lit on the blossoms. I still had the the camera at –2EV exposure compensation from attempting to photograph a Snowy Egret and it metered correctly for the sunlit butterfly and blooms, but threw the shadowed background completely black. I could not have achieved this effect if I were trying. It looks like a studio shot. Sometimes you just get blessed beyond your deserts…which is why photography always keeps me aware of grace.
And, what more could you ask for on a Sunday?
Canon SD4000IS Digital Elph behind the eyepiece of a ZEISS DiaScope 65FL. F5 @ 1/1000th @ ISO 250. Programmed auto. –2EV.
Some Recovery in Lightroom. Blackpoint just right. Added Clarity and Vibrance. Sharpen narrow edges preset. Cropped for composition.
From DiaScope 65FL. View it as large as you like on Wide Eyed In Wonder by clicking the image.
7/17/2010
Deep Purple (and too Yellow!)
Yes, still with the Daylillies. They never stop. 
Of course they will. We have to enjoy them while they are here. This is purple cultivar we bought a few anniversaries ago. It is not as vigorous or as prolific as the native plants and some of our other cultivars, but it has its own beauty. It is not easy to photograph. That yellow is simply too intense, and tends to burn out before there is enough light on the purple petals. Open shade held it all together here.
Canon SX20IS at 560mm equivalent field of view and macro. F5.7 @ 1/20th @ ISO 100. Aperture preferred, ISO set at 100. (Which meant I was pretty much dependent on the Image Stabilization for a 1/20th second hold!)
In Lightroom, some Recovery for the Yellow, Fill Light for the purple, added Clarity and and very little Vibrance indeed (the yellow blocks up with much saturation adjustment). Blackpoint just slightly right. Sharpen narrow edges preset.
From The Yard: Kennebunk ME.
7/16/2010
Waz Up? (Barn Swallow Fledgling)
So, I took a lot of pics of this group of Barn Swallow fledglings, testing my new Canon SD4000IS camera behind the eyepiece of the new ZEISS DiaScope 65FL. Swallows are not easy to photograph. Those super-fine feathers that help them with speed and maneuverability are, well, super fine…and do not reproduce well in an image. In this case the birds were sitting on rocks about 15 to 20 feet below me, in good light, and the digiscoping rig caught a good amount of detail. This image is cropped from the full 10mp frame for composition (and humor). Here is a full frame shot for comparison. You can view it at larger sizes on my Wide Eyed In Wonder site by clicking the image.
I am pretty pleased with the Canon SD4000IS and will be doing a full review as time allows on my Point and Shoot Landscape site.
1) 2000mm equivalent field of view, f5.3 @ 1/200th @ ISO 125. Programmed auto. (Scope limited f-ratio, f5.7)
2) about 1600mm equivalent field of view, f5 @ 1/500th @ ISO 125. Programmed auto. (Camera limited f-stop is accurate).
In Lightroom, Recovery (mostly for the rock), some Fill Light and Blackpoint barely right. Added Clarity and just a bit of Vibrance. Auto White Balance. Sharpen narrow edges preset.
From New DiaScope 65FL.
7/15/2010
Storm Over Parson’s
Parson’s Beach, that is. This is actually the mouth of Back Creek where it flows into the Mousam. The storm passed just south of us, scattering a few drops on the far end of the beach, but soaking Wells. A shot like this is, of course, all about the drama in the clouds. Here the curve of the creek adds to the composition.
Canon SX20IS at 28mm equivalent. F4.0 @ 1/1000th @ ISO 80. Landscape program.
I tipped the camera up to meter off the clouds, then tipped it back down for composition. I tried Recovery for the clouds in Lightroom, but ended up using a Graduated Filter effect pulled down from the top to the horizon to reduce exposure and add a bit of brightness and contrast. Fill Light for the foreground. Blackpoint just a little right. Added Clarity and a touch of Vibrance. Sharpen narrow edges preset.
From Around Home 2010.
7/14/2010
Song Sparrow
Great light. Evening sun, after a day of rain and fog. Parson’s Beach. I walked out behind the dunes along the river, with my digiscoping rig over my shoulder, to see what I could see. And this Song Sparrow popped up on a little dead branch in the grass to reach the higher seeds just I as passed. Tripod down, scope up, camera to side, focus, camera in, camera on, zoom, and let the shutter run. Sometimes it all just comes together. (And, of course, the harder you work at it, the more time you spend in the field, the more often it all comes together. 
)
This Sparrow fed along the length of the branch, fairly oblivious to me, for several moments before disappearing down deeper into the grasses. I got several keepers.
Canon SD4000IS behind the eyepiece of the ZEISS DiaScope 65FL for an equivalent focal length of about 1700mm @ f5 @ 1/200th @ ISO 400. Programmed auto. Second one at something more like 2000mm @ f5 @ 1/160th @ ISO 125.
A touch of Fill Light and Blackpoint right a good amount, added Clarity and Vibrance. Sharpen narrow edges preset. Auto White Balance.
I continued on around the point looking for gulls. When I returned, with the sun even lower now, I caught another sparrow just after his or her bath, while still preening wet feathers. I got a few stills, but the sparrow was in among a tangle of dead branches and never still… hard to focus on. I decided to try from some video just as the sparrow finally hopped out on the tip of a branch in the open.
Sometimes it all comes together.
7/13/2010
Double Daylilies
These are one of the mysteries of our yard this year. My wife insists she transplanted them from one of our normal clumps of Daylilies…and that they were normal when she transplanted them. This year all the lilies on the far side of our driveway are double…with a second lily blossom sprouting inside the first. Most of the second blooms are weirdly distorted, as you see it here, but then the whole thing is just weird anyway.
Both shots were taken in deep shade, and the camera wanted to boost the ISO, since I had it on Aperture preferred at f5.6. I set the ISO manually to 100 and relied on the Image Stabilization for handholding slow shutter speeds.
Canon SX20IS at about 500mm equivalent and macro. F5.6 @ 1/25th and 1/15th @ ISO 100. Aperture preferred.
In Lightroom, a touch of Fill Light and Blackpoint right. Added Clarity and just a tiny amount of Vibrance. Sharpen narrow edges preset.
From The Yard, Kennebunk ME.
And here, from my Canon SD4000IS, in better light, is the most prefect of the double blooms we could find. But wait…is that yet another bloom unfolding at the center. Weird!
7/12/2010
Evening Light/Tidal Pool
Summer’s late light, going on 8PM with the sun still well above the horizon and seemingly hanging there forever. The slant picks out abundant detail in the sea grass surrounding this tidal pool, here full and reflective with the tide. A bit of mist left from a hot muggy day still floats up-river, thinning toward the coast. Peace. It will repay a larger look on Wide Eyed In Wonder (click the image).
Canon SX20IS at 28mm equivalent. F4.0 @ 1/320th @ ISO 80. Landscape program.
In Lightroom, Recovery for the sky, Blackpoint just right, added Clarity and just a tiny amount of Vibrance. Sharpen narrow edges preset. Finally I pulled a Graduated Filter effect down diagonally from the upper left corner to bring up some blue where the mist catching the light had overexposed the area.
From Around Home 2010.