Spirits of Winter
G’day Everyone,
While I consider myself a druid of sorts I’m not prone to numinous tendencies. Then again, I have my moments.
I was photographing snow geese at the Dead Creek Wildlife Preserve in Addison, VT on a bitterly cold morning a few autumns ago when I happened to glance away from my camera. My eyes were tearing in the biting wind and I had to wipe them every few moments. As I turned to swipe the sleeve of my fleece jacket across my face, I was confronted by the transfixing stare of a snowy owl.
Solstice, 2011
G’day Everyone,
For the time being, a book deadline, home improvements, my part-time gig at the local college, and my HO trains provide ample reason for getting out of bed every day during the winter. Going outside, apart from snowshoeing with the boys and bringing in more firewood, least of all to take photos, is not part of my daily routine between December and March. I was never cold-hardy and am becoming even less so as, well, my father pointed out to me during my last visit with him, my hair takes on a more distinguished look. Though, there are those occasional photo opportunities when I simply have to bundle up and brave the frostbite, say, when there’s a brilliant display of northern lights or the rare ice fog creates the enigmatic Truhin’s Pillars or there’s an eruption of great gray owls or pine grosbeaks. About every other week, Jeff Parson’s and I trudge out on our snowshoes to check our game cameras. An article on how to use game cameras for wildlife photography which highlights our adventures over the last several winters as we attempted and finally succeeded in capturing a magazine-quality image of a bobcat appears in the current (Winter, 2011) issue of Northern Woodlands magazine. You can see an online version of the article on the Northern Woodlands website here:
http://northernwoodlands.org/articles/article/camera-trapping-how-to-get-the-shot/
Getting High in Glacier National Park
G’day Mates,
Several years ago, a client purchased all the spaces in our Kenya tour for the privilege of having an exclusive experience, to have me all to himself as it were, and learn all the field technique and digital processing he could absorb during the two-week safari. It was a sublime adventure for both of us; Peter, the client, felt he got his money’s worth (He could be driving a nice sports car for what he paid for that exclusive experience.) while I regarded the tour as a magnificent, once-in-a-lifetime event. Let’s be honest, being in the company of kindred spirits in some of the world’s most remarkable natural locations doing what we love to do is always a precious gift. I never take it for granted.
Read MoreSingle-strobe Hummingbird Photography
G’day Everyone,
Conventional wisdom recommends using several strobes for photographing hummingbirds. Typically, hummingbird setups employ two strobes at about 45 degrees either side of the bird and level with it, a top and bottom light, and one or two additional strobes to light the background. My brief note here is not intended to refute the merits of this standart technique, not at all. Indeed, most circumstances will require a number of strobes to properly illuminate the scene and freeze the wing motion, especially in the field when one is not entirely in control of all the variables, i.e., flash to subject distance, the distance between the main subject and the backgroud, ambient light, etc.
However, under certain conditions, it is possible to capture outstanding images of hummingbirds with a single strobe…and a little help from the sun.
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Camera Hunting with Remote Setups – Epilogue
G’day Everyone,
In this final briefing of our experiences using high-quality game cameras to produce publishable images of otherwise elusive wildlife, I’ll cover the important considerations for placing the cameras in the field, that is, for locating field sites with a reasonably high potential for yielding usable images of the intended subjects, and I will also provide you with some pointers on properly positioning the cameras. Though I will use our experience with bobcats to illustrate our techniques and provide examples, the concepts I outline here are generally applicable to virtually all wildlife.
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