LUMINOSITY UNDER WATER

Pacific Sea Nettle, Oregon Coast Aquarium, Newport, OR

It’s tempting to just follow the actual time line and post only the photos that reflect what’s going on at the moment of publishing. I would follow the ”journalistic path” of the blog but many photos I create, especially those on the more artistic side, would fall under the table and never ever being shared with you.

Today’s image of a Pacific Sea Nettle is one of my favorites from our recent trip. It’s not wildlife and it was all about dealing with the circumstances of shooting through the thick glass in the Oregon Coast Aquarium in Newport, Oregon.

I pressed the lens tightly against the glass of the aquarium and the rest was done by the lighting source of the tank above the water level. A few years ago I would never ever had dreamed about using a sensitivity of ISO 16000 for a photo. Now, with the great handling of high ISO settings in mirrorless cameras and much better noise reduction features in our software, this is just a matter of employing all these tools. Don’t take me wrong, I still believe shooting with the lowest ISO settings as possible is the best way to go for a high quality image. This time ISO 16000 allowed to expose at 1/640s at extremely low light conditions and to get this pulsating jelly fish still sharp in the frame.

A public aquarium tries to tell the story about the life under water for a certain habitat, that most of us aren’t able to see in their life time. When I take a shot like this I try to keep any men-made items out of the frame and hope to continue their story telling.

Here in Dubuque, Iowa we have the Mississippi River & Aquarium, one of the best in the country, and practicing many times before at their beautiful fish tanks made it easier to nail down the photo I can present for you today. I hope you enjoy it!

ICE STORM (THE UPSIDE)

We are still dealing with the outcome of a big ice storm with freezing rain that hit us last night and today. I probably could host a bob sled race here in our drive way…😉  With all the negative impacts it brings for the people it also comes with a certain beauty. Nobody likes icy roads, electrical power lines down, or falling trees, but the glass-like look of tree branches bares some photo opportunities. A small adjustable LED light, set to 5000 Kelvin, was used to bring out some colors in the yew bushes that grow in front of the house.

The second photo was made on the balcony already last night when the ice cover was still growing. The power of two LED lights, that we use to illuminate the deck if necessary, comes from behind the camera. All the boards overhead that support a climbing vine plant  had this gallery of icicles. I shot this with ISO 10000, something I have never done before. The Nikon Z6II does a very good job for noise reduction in general, but of course at ISO 10000 there was noticeable noise in the picture. Since a few months I use Topaz DeNoise AI in my post-processing workflow whenever necessary for an image. The noise in this photo was most visible on the illuminated boards in the background. I’m amazed about the results, even at such a high ISO level, with no noise left and the icicles remained sharp and unaffected.

NATURE CLICKS #511 - CEDAR WAXWING

Cedar Waxwing, Nikon Z6II, Sigma 150-600mm / f5-6.3 DG OS HSM S, FTZ adapter,  @ 600mm, 1/800s, f/6.3, ISO800, DX crop

I shot this photo yesterday morning, just before I went on my hopefully last business trip for this year. There is only one big reason why a few Cedar Waxwings show up at our heated bird baths during this time of the year. We must have a good crop of juniper berries on the red cedar trees here on top of the bluffs above the Little Maquoketa River Valley. Most of the time the waxwings are in company with a number of American Robins. Both bird species love to eat the berries and between feeding frenzies they drink a lot of water. Last winter we haven’t seen a single Cedar Waxwing here, because there was obviously not enough juniper berries available. It is so good to see this beautiful bird back again!

I’m very impressed how good the new Nikon Z6II deals with luminance noise from shooting with higher ISO settings. With my older cameras I would not stretch the ISO settings up to 800 in my bird photography. I always found the necessary noise reduction in post process would remove way too much detail in the bird’s feathers. With the Z6II it becomes a totally different game. It allows shooting in low light, as we had yesterday morning, and a sharp image with all details still intact becomes more likely under these conditions. Another reason I wanted the Z6II. 😊

A GANG OF FOUR

Young Raccoons, Green Island Wetlands, Iowa -------- 

When it’s time to leave the Green Island wetlands I usually drive slowly down the gravel road on the left hand side and scan the water canals, ponds, trees, and bushes for any sign of wildlife with my eyes. The camera rests in my lap, turned on, and ready to shoot. Don’t worry about me driving on the wrong side, the road is straight and wide and there is not much traffic at all. If another car shows up on the horizon or in the rear view mirror, I stop and wait until the car has passed and the dust from the road has settled again.

Yesterday evening on my way out I saw some movement in one of the trees ahead. First I thought it was a mink but as I came closer it became clear that a gang of four young raccoons had a feast on the berries of a mulberry tree.

I hate to crank the ISO at the camera beyond 400, but I had no choice and went up to ISO 640, still shooting as slow as 1/80 s at 600 mm. Noise reduction in post means loss of detail and with the fine hair of a raccoon it has its limits, at least for my own photography.

Most of my previous photos of raccoons were taken around the house, on the roof or balcony, or catching them while they robbed our bird feeders. With other words, I’m very happy to have finally some images that have no men-made elements in the frame.

The four little guys were obviously listen pretty good to their mama. I never saw her, she stayed somewhere below in the bushes, but after five minutes of watching the gang they all climbed down at the same time and disappeared in the underwoods.

The “cuteness factor” of young critters is always high and I hope you don’t mind seeing a couple more photos sometime in the near future.

RETRO AND CLOUDS (AND SOME FINISHING THOUGHTS)

Orlando, Florida

Looks like vacation again, doesn’t it? No, I just returned from GraphExpo, the annual trade show of the printing industry in North America. This year it was for the first time in Orlando, Florida. Attending the show as an exhibitor does not leave much time to enjoy the city or visit any of the big entertainment places, like Disneyland or SeaWorld.

Busy places like Orlando are anyway not my cup of tea and I’m definitely not a fan of the heat and humidity down in Florida. But there is one weather related feature I really like. Clouds and giant thunderheads showed up every day and this can always lead to some interesting pictures. The photo was made through the glass of my hotel room window in the Cabana Bay Beach Resort - Universal Orlando, which features a retro theme that takes you back to the 1950’s and 60’s. 

These were not the most impressive clouds we saw, but I like how the twilight goes together with light and colors of the hotel. The RAW file was developed in Adobe Lightroom and afterwards the photo was finished as a smart object in Adobe Photoshop, with some filters of Google’s NIK collection for tonal and overall contrast applied. Usually I do noise reduction in Lightroom if necessary, and that works pretty well for me. Shooting with ISO 500 and through the thick glass of a window created more noise in the picture than I like. As a remedy I used NIK’s Define 2 noise reduction filter and that took care of the problem.

MISSISSIPPI RIVER STORIES 2016 #8 - NEVER THE SAME

A busy travel schedule kept me away from home and from pursuing my passion lately. But any time I come back from a trip, I can’t wait to get down to the Mississippi River and maybe find some interesting light or a good subject to photograph. The river is always good for a surprise and it is never the same twice. Look at this image and compare it with the photo in my last blog post from exactly a week ago. It is the same spot on the dyke at Mud Lake Park and both days a thunderstorm moved in. It is even shot with the same lens, the gorgeous Nikkor 16-35 mm/ f4 VR.

Today I climbed down the rocky slope of the levee to get closer to the water and make the round leaves of the water lilies my foreground. The tripod was left home but there wasn’t much time anyway to set up, because shortly after it started to rain heavily. The click was made with 22 mm, 1/20s, f/8, and ISO 640 dialed in, and thanks to vibration reduction in the lens I was able to handhold the camera. I usually don’t like such high ISO settings for landscape photography (noise reduction = loss of detail) but today it was the only way to get this shot halfway sharp.