ON THE OLD RAILROAD PATH

July 13, 2019

Heritage Trail, old railroad path near Durango, Iowa

Another picture from yesterday’s walk on the Heritage Trail in the Little Maquoketa River Valley. The photo from my last blog post was made way in the back behind the couple on bicycles, on the bridge that crosses the river. In the old days when the railroads were built they tried to keep the tracks as straight as possible and blasted away some of the rocks and bluffs that were shaped by the river a long time ago. These hollows make some nice and shady spots on the trail that have a micro climate and can be interesting for finding plants, birds, and critters.

As mentioned in my last blog post, I tried out a new GND filter and even in a situation like this it helps to manage the high dynamic range of the scene.

Nikon D750, Nikkor 16-35mm / f4, Breakthrough 2-stop X4 GND filter

DOWN IN THE VALLEY

July 12, 2019

A shot fresh out of camera from this evening. I went down into our Little Maquoketa River Valley to Durango, Iowa, a little village with maybe a dozen homes and the old railroad depot, which is now a bar. The picture was taken from the railroad bridge towards the fork where the Middle Fork Maquoketa River and the Little Maquoketa River meet, only a few miles before their water enters the Mississippi River. The railroad tracks have been removed a long time ago and their path is now a very popular recreation trail, called the Heritage Trail.

I was testing a new 2-stop soft edge graduated neutral density filter and I’m sure after I have more experience with it I will write a little review here in the blog. After the flooding during the last months the river banks don’t look necessarily pretty. A lot of dead wood and debris edges the banks and removing some of the sticks in post process is part of my way to make this landscape picture work. You can see how the GND filter keeps the interesting clouds and the moon on the right hand side intact and leaves good detail and tones in the fore- and middle-ground. Sure, I could lift the dark shadows in post process to reveal more detail in the trees, but this would not benefit the storytelling of this image. This is not a picture with a clear subject but the eye follows the lines of the river, goes to the clouds, maybe the moon, and comes back to the subtle reflections on the water in the foreground. No reason to get lost between dead branches and the mud of the river bank, which are nicely covered in the shadows.

ALL YEAR LONG

July 12, 2019

Goldfinches breed later than most birds in North America, mostly not before mid-summer. They are vegetarians with almost no exceptions and they rely on plants that provide seeds, like thistle, milkweed, and others. The American Goldfinches are the only finch that molts twice a year. The males get their pretty yellow feathers in late winter and it makes it very easy to identify them even over a long distance. We have them around here in eastern Iowa all year long, but it might not be the same birds that we see during the winter because they migrate.

A good way to attract them to the backyard is by providing a bird bath that is always filled and of course heated during winter time. We don’t see them actually bathing very often but they sure like to drink. Setting up a little perch helps to make a picture without the bird bath in the frame. The gesture of the finch, just ready to jump down to the water source, made me choose this photo for today’s blogpost. Nothing spectacular, but still pretty…

BUSY BLUEBIRD PARENTS

July 10, 2019

A couple days a go I received a call from my photography friend Kevin, inviting me for a backyard shooting at his house in the evening. A pair of Eastern Bluebirds were feeding their offspring, three little chicks in a bird box. Kevin builds nest boxes, not just for his land, also for public places like Swiss Valley. He had set up a nice perch near the nest and all what we had to do was waiting for the parents with some food in their bills. Almost every time they came with insects, larva, or spiders the bluebirds used the perch to observe the surrounding before they safely approached the entrance to the box.

We sat comfortably in lawn chairs behind our tripods, had good conversation, and clicked away when the action took place. The low sun provided relativ soft light and it was not necessary to use any flash for color boost or to fill in the shadows.

Eastern Bluebirds are some of the prettiest birds we have here and they are very photogenic. The blue of the female’s wing feathers is a lot paler than the male’s but both parents put the same efforts in to find enough food for the chicks.

This was the shot Kevin and I were hoping for, both adult bluebirds with food in their bills on the perch at the same time. It happened only once this evening but we used this opportunity. I usually shoot with the long lens wide open at f/6.3 but here I had it set to f/8. This provided of course still not enough depth of field for having both birds in sharp focus. The focus was on the male at the top but the photo summarizes the story of this evening.

It is always fun to shoot together with Kevin and I’m thankful again for sharing a great photo opportunity.

MISSISSIPPI RIVER STORIES 2019 #05 - AN EYE FOR THE LITTLE THINGS

July 8, 2019

Four-spotted Skimmer, Mississippi River, Mud Lake, Iowa

Here is another photo from our little paddle tour yesterday evening. Of course, if you see a picture of a dragonfly you may think immediately, oh we talk about macro photography today. Well, with 600 mm focal length attached to the camera this is not what it really is. Dragonflies are permanent companions during a paddle trip in the summer on the Mississippi. They are beautiful and I try to include them in my story telling if the setting is right, even if it is not a macro shot. Due to all the rain we had in spring and early summer the vegetation everywhere here in eastern Iowa is lush and green and yellow colors have a strong impact on many photos. The Four-spotted Skimmer can be found here along the river and it wasn’t the first time that I had this dragonfly in front of the lens. Handholding the D750 with the Sigma 150-600 attached is always a challenge, especially in a kayak. The low sitting sun led to a shutter speed of only 1/160s. Not really intended, but having the dragonfly sharp and the water soft and silky made this photo a keeper that I really like.

Nikon D750, Sigma 150-600mm / f5-6.3 DG OS HSM S @600 mm, 1/160 s, f/8, ISO200

MISSISSIPPI RIVER STORIES 2019 #04 - BACK ON THE WATER

July 7, 2019

Painted Turtle, Mississippi River, Mud Lake, Iowa

It is always an enjoyable way to finish the weekend with a paddle tour in the kayak on the Mississippi River. Joan and I took kayak-dog Cooper and the boats down to Mud Lake, the closest access to the big river from our home. Very little wind made the paddling easy and I thought it would help with bird photography, but we didn’t see any within the range of the 600 mm focal length of the Sigma 150-600. Other critters stepped in and let us get close for a photo. Painted Turtles are usually very skittish and slide into the water as soon you come within a 10-20 yards range, but this one didn’t mind our presence at all. I accidentally hit the log it was siting on with the bow of the kayak but this turtle was more than patient and stayed on the piece of driftwood.

Nikon D750, Sigma 150-600mm / f5-6.3 DG OS HSM S @600 mm, 1/500 s, f/8, ISO200

BEE BALM, HUMMERS LOVE THEM!

July 3, 2019

Male Ruby-throated Hummingbird at a Bee Balm

Maybe I have a few days to make a photo like this, maybe not. With flowers you never can predict one hundred percent how long they last. A heavy thunderstorm can bring a quick end to their beauty. The Bee Balm is blooming right now in our front yard and it seems we have more flowers than ever before. Bee Balm is a favorite of the hummingbirds and making a good click while they hover around the flower or drink nectar from its blossom is always a great challenge but also a lot of fun. It takes some patience to be successful. This evening I had periods of time when no bird showed up for 10-15 minutes, instead they preferred one of the hummingbird feeders hanging from the roof of the porch. This is understandable because the resources of each flower are obviously limited. I tried a little trick I learned from other wildlife photographers and sprayed some hummingbird food into the blossom, but I don’t think that has increased the frequency of their visits to a particular blossom. It is the same mixture (4 parts water + 1 part sugar) that we use for our feeders.

This evening I experimented a lot with different settings for exposure and flash compensation and even with some higher ISO settings than I usually apply. Yes, it is a little easier to freeze the action of a hummingbird with a higher ISO setting (today up to 1250) and therefor much faster shutter speed, but I still like the rendering of details much better if the ISO value stays low (100-400).

Nikon D750, Sigma 150-600mm / f5-6.3 DG OS HSM S, Induro GIT 404XL tripod, Induro GHB2 gimbal head, Nikon SB 800 speed light, MAGMOD MagBeam flash extender, @ 600 mm, 1/400 s, f/6.3, ISO 1250,

FOLLOWING THE CURVE (PART 2)

July 2, 2019

If this looks familiar you must have visited my blog a few days ago. Today I tried the same image as a black and white version. I had this in mind when I took the shot but later at home, in front of the computer screen, the play with the color contrast appealed to me as well. Now, with both versions on hand, I think the monochrome version supports the graphic impact of this photo better. The Z-shaped curve of the clouds and the edge of the field are better pronounced.

As much as I like the relativ new B&W presets in Adobe Lightroom Classic, for the finishing of this image I used the well trusted NIK Silver Efex Pro 2. In Lightroom I started with the same Camera RAW settings as for the color version, opened the photo as a Smart Object in Photoshop, and finally applied NIK Silver Efex Pro 2 as a filter. I still love the way how global and local adjustments interact with each other in any program of the NIK Suite. The final touch was made with a subtle dodging and burning layer in PS, mainly in the lower half of the photo.

FOLLOWING THE CURVE

June 27, 2019

Farm on a hill with clouds, near Sherrill, Iowa

A couple days ago I mentioned I would share another photo from the “cloud chasing” tour that evening. Quite some time ago I made a mental note about this old farm on a ridge not very far from our home here in eastern Iowa. I have driven by several times over the years and always thought this would make a nice foreground or middle ground for a photo with a dramatic looking sky. Well, this week I had my chance. The lush vegetation makes for a nice color contrast to the clouds in the sky. The curved edge of the field leads the eye to the farm structures and from there the curve continues in the sky. Now I’m thinking about a black and white version of the image…

NATURE CLICKS #431 - NORTHERN WATER SNAKE

June 26, 2019

Here is another image from last weekend. I know, snakes are not everybody’s favorite animal but I was very happy to see this Northern Water Snake crossing our way in the Green Island Wetlands. They are nonvenomous and eat fish, frogs, and salamanders. This was not the biggest one I have ever seen and its color was relativ light and so I assume this was a young adult. Unfortunately the snake population here in eastern Iowa has declined, maybe due to snake fungal disease (SFD). I have written about it here in the blog before.

The water snake was moving very fast and only stopped because we stepped in front of it. With hindsight I think I should have gotten still a little lower on the ground for this photo but overall I’m glad we saw this snake, which seems to become a rare occasion…

MISSISSIPPI RIVER STORIES 2019 #03 - CLOUD CHASING

June 25, 2019

The disadvantage of living in the woods is that we are the last ones that know when some interesting clouds are around. Yesterday evening some nearby thunder and a few rain drops made me grab the dog, jump in the car, and drive to a ridge in the countryside. Some quick photos were made of an old farm (I may show them another day) but the way the clouds were moving I expected that down at the Mississippi River some drama would develop in the sky. I just hit it right. The last rays of the setting sun over the banks of the river painted the landscape with some killer light.

A minute later I was attacked by a bear, whose shadow you see at the bottom of the picture. Alright, I’m just kidding. The big shadow beside mine belongs to our little dog Cooper, who patiently followed me again, although he hates thunderstorms…

The time stamp in the metadata of both photos reveal that the second picture was made just two minutes later. The sun was gone, the thunderstorm moved along the river, and on the Wisconsin side of the Mississippi parts of a rainbow developed.

These are the moments when I employ the Schneider Graduated Neutral Density filter 0.9, which darkens the upper part of the photo by 3 stops of light. Both Photos were made with the Nikon AF-S Nikkor 16-35 f/4 at 16 mm focal length. The ring of the Schneider ND filter creates a little bit of corner vignetting with the lens zoomed out to 16 mm, but this is easy to fix in Lightroom or Photoshop.

NATURE CLICKS #430 - AMERICAN MINK

June 24, 2019

American Mink with kit, Mississippi River, Green island Wetlands, Iowa

Today’s photo is not more than a documentary shot, the photo lacks some sharpness, but it was such a nice encounter that I like to show it anyway. Yesterday Joan and I went for a drive to some of the nature locations I visit frequently. One of them was the Green Island Wetlands, which is still flooded and only partly accessible. As we stopped briefly while on one of the dykes I saw suddenly an American Mink with two little kits disappearing in the tall grass and bushes that grow along the dyke. It happened at some distance in front of the car and so quickly that there wasn’t even time to get out of the car. We waited for a minute, hoping to see the minks again. Suddenly the mother came out of the dense vegetation without the two kits and ran back from where she came from the first time. After a little while she came back and with her was another little kit. I took some pictures but failed to get a sharp image. Well, I had another chance. She went back again and a little later a fourth young mink was guided to the place where obviously its siblings were waiting. I supported the lens on top of the car door but heat shimmer over the gravel road and the fast movement of the minks made it very difficult to obtain focus. The picture is heavily cropped, I’m not very proud of it, but the fun we had watching the mink with a litter of four was priceless…

NATURE CLICKS #429 - BOBOLINK

June 23, 2019

A year ago I wrote about my first sighting of a Bobolink at a patch of grassland at the outskirts of Dubuque, Iowa. They are in decline due to the loss of their habitat, large fields with a mixture of grasses and broad-leaved plants. Yesterday I saw at least two males and a female at the same location like last year and it looked like they were feeding their brood in a nest somewhere on the ground between tall grass and wildflowers. Bobolinks have a long journey behind them after they arrive here. They travel about 20000 km (12500 miles) from South America.

Female Bobolink. Non-breeding males look almost the same.

We had a light overcast yesterday. Beside the fact that it takes a little bit of light away, I really liked it because it allowed me to point the lens to the southwest in the afternoon. If you have tried to take a picture of a black bird you know already it can be a challenge to balance the black feathers and a light environment. While shooting again from the car I was able to get really close this time. Wind was probably the biggest problem. The grass and plants swayed the whole time and the birds don’t sit still either. With other words, lack of sharpness was the main reason for throwing out some of my photos at the end of the day.

SLOW SHUTTER SPEED, STILL GOOD FOR THE STORY

June 19, 2019

There are many ways to make a picture of a hummingbird. Some people may like to present every single feather to the viewer and ‘nuke’ the birds with tons of flash light in order to freeze the action or obtain depth of focus. This is perfectly fine if counting every feather is important for the story, like maybe in a bird guide book. With still photography it remains a challenge to tell the story of an extremely fast moving bird and even lots of video footage I have seen doesn’t always meet the expectations. For me it is natural to have at least the wings blurred in order to tell the story of the extremely high frequencies of their wing beats. When the hummingbirds hover for parts of a second in front of a flower or a feeder their body seems to stand still and this is the moment I use for my photos. The metadata of yesterday’s shooting in our front yard show that the exposure was between 1/50 s and 1/320 s. The photo above was shot with a shutter speed of 1/125 s. Sure, the rate of keepers versus misses is not the same as shooting your coin or stamp collection, but hey, the fun is at least ten times bigger… 😉