Persistence pays off

Just every once in a while, we find examples of the persistence and dedication of nature having successful outcomes.

I have been lucky enough to see the fortunes of a pair of Great Crested Grebes at my place of work.

Back at the beginning of the year, we needed to undertake a project to shore up the banking around the lake as it was subsiding. As a nature lover, I was aware, as was the Project Engineer of the breeding pair of Grebes that nest in the affected area.

To that end, he bought a floating island, pre-planted with reeds for it to nest. It was placed about 15 metres away from the previous nest site that was actually within touching distance of a public footpath. This was put in position well before the breeding season and the reeds in the effected area were removed.

However, this didn't deter the Grebes and they promptly built there nest on the open water right next to the footpath.

She sat on eggs for many weeks but it was clearly a failure.

They tried again with the same result!!

By this time, the reeds on the floating island had grown and it was now occupied by a Coot that has fledged a couple of chicks. But they tried for a third time, and happily a couple of weeks ago two little chicks hatched, looking just like little black and white mint humbugs sweets.

So I headed off to the Lake in my lunchtime today and got some images to share with you.

Mum, Dad and the two chicks

Hitchin' a ride a two week old chick just about
outgrowing mum and hanging off the back

Man made floating island with a tiny Coot chick

So with perseverance and dedication, nature has made it. It has been great to see that they were finally successful, despite them ignoring the helping hand that we tried to give them.

As a result of them nesting where they did, our project works were much delayed and are only just commencing at the furthest point away from them.

Martin

Lets Talk

Well today the forums are full of the news that Canon has announced a new 'hybrid' image stabilisation system, Canon are always at the front of breaking edge technology which was the main reason i went with them many years ago-they don't always get it right mind you, I.S is a major leap forward for the photographer in getting 'critically' sharp images, I am a fan of anything that makes my life easier, Canon haven't said what lenses will be the first to come out with this new system ,My guess would be the 100-400 as i think its the weak link in the 'L' lens range, But who knows maybe they will bring out a new lens range-200-400 anybody-that would please many Canon users-more details can be found here
As always i am stuck behind the PC after a trip away-processing is the burden of the modern photographer but the images are far superior than the old days of Slide/Film that i am willing to put up with it, I still put food out in the garden and over the last few days we have had new families of cardinals,tufted titmouse and chickadees so the birds seem to be doing well, We have a new member of the white tailed deer family and whilst striking up the BBQ last night mum came out to eat some corn that i had put out 5 Min's before, followed by a small spotty Bambi so tonight i will set up a remote camera with a wide angle lens and hope they return, We have also had a red shouldered hawk visiting the garden most mornings and it has been landing on a log next to a plastic container that holds water for the birds and animals and has been bathing and drinking from it-its a beauty and this morning it bought a juvenile with it and they sat there for more than 20 Min's until the gardener came and they flew-not before i managed a quick snap shot of the young one-so a hide will go up later today and tomorrow morning i know where i will be-always nice to have something unusual coming into your garden.
A quick note for those using extenders-try not to shoot wide open if you want the best-read sharpest results, Nikon have 3 in their range-1.4x,1.7x and 2x and Canon have the 1.4x and 2x, Now i have used the Canon extenders extensively and they work well if used correctly, The 1.4x has little effect on focusing speed and image quality but i would shoot at least 1 stop over so for a F4 lens that would be F5.6 or F8 for the best results whereas the 2x will slow the AF by 75% and will need to only be used in very good light with a highish ISO for a decent shutter speed,don't forget on the 500 you will have 1000mm of lens so any movement will show so its best used on a beanbag or very low stiff tripod and set the aperture to F8 on a F2.8 lens and F11 on a F4 lens, i would only use the 2X on fast prime lenses and if its possible use a remote release, You can see by this that the 2x is a specialist piece of kit and not for everyday use but its another piece of kit in the armoury that has its uses-if used properly(see kingfisher image below), I have the 1.4x and 1.7x Nikon extenders, I shy ed away from the 2x as i had heard some not so good reports on it, All i can say that if used as described about then the results are great

News (Sad) - The Swifts are leaving

It only seems like five minutes ago that I wrote this blog posting about the arrival of the Swifts over my house. How time passes quickly.

Today while I was sitting at my PC at work writing up various reports, I glanced out of the window to see many Swifts, quite low over the buildings, in the terrible weather all heading south or southwest. Now I don't usually see Swifts over the office very much so it was an unusual sight. This carried on throughout the day. So it looks like they are heading back south on their exceptionally long migration back to southern Africa.

This lead me to thinking about some of mine and Dave's philosophies about wildlife photography. We have set out to make this an entertaining, educational and generally useful blog for a wide range of readers from a photographic perspective. However, it is also important , if we are genuinely passionate about the natural world to ensure that we understand our subjects, learn about them and increase our knowledge, particularly where circumstances make their lives difficult.

I also recently posted about the RSPB Swift survey that I hope that you responded too - please be quick if you haven't before they have all gone south.

So one of my favourite birds will not be back for another nine months. It seems rather ironic that such a fabulous bird only stays for such a short time.

Martin

Focus Assist Points

Cameras these days are getting more advanced AF systems and along with that more and more AF points to allow you to compose your image without moving the camera-brilliant, But why use just the 1 AF point when you can use more, I don't mean having them all alight so that the camera grabs what it thinks you want, I mean use the AF assist points, My Nikon D3 and D300 have AF 51 points and i can choose to have 9,21 or 51 assist points to help the main AF point incase the main subject drifts off of the point of focus, I currently have my bird in flight set up using 21 assist points,What does this mean-well the centre focus point tends to be the most accurate and fastest so this grabs the subject first and tracks the subject,if you track a bird and the bird moves off of the centre AF point then the assist points jump in to help keep it in focus, On the Nikon this works very well even with a busy background, I didnt have the same confidence in the Canon 1D3 which grabbed the background at every available oppotunity, I think the last couple of firmware updates have helped with this, Whilst talking of the Canon 1D3/S bodies i feel Canon took a big step backwards when moving from the 45 points of the 1D2 to the 1D3 where they disabled the photographers ability to use all 45, Although there are 45 points some can only be used as assist points-come on Canon give the photographer the right to choose and not be told,I am sure it could be fixed with a firmware upgrade, Anyway back to Nikon-The D300 and D3 bodies have a 51 point 3D tracking where as the centre point works first and then ALL the points automatically track the subject where the AF points dances around the screen whilst keeping the subject in focus-very clever and great for birds in flight against a plain background but i am not sure about a buy one, Have a play with the assist points and find what one works for you, All i can say id that they have saved my bacon on many occasion and allow you to move the subject off of centre giving a better composition, The images below are all taken using the assist points where the main point is the centre one-all are full frame-not the best images in the world but show how without using assist points i would have ended up with an out of focus main subject







Dave

Hardware & software - Virtual Screen Res on Netbooks

Well I promised that I would share how you can get 1024 x 768 res on a netbook screen that has a native res of 1024 x 600 when I posted our first guest photographer blog on John Bulpitt on Friday just gone.

I found this after a bit of googling and found that some people were saying this was possible.

Now why would you want more res. than the screen can support. John made the point in his post that certain bits of software need a minimum screen res to run, including some of the Photoshop series, the Canon software and of interest to me is my colour calibration Eye One 2 software.

So here is how you do it.

On the desktop, right click and select properties. On the Settings tab, select Advanced button. Then on the monitor tab untick the box that says 'Hide modes that this monitor cannot display.

Click Apply and OK. Then back to the Display properties window and use the slider to select 1024 x 768 res.

And again Apply and OK.

Now when you see the screen you will either be missing the top or the bottom. Just use the scroll part of the built in mousepad to scroll the screen up and down.

I moved my desktop icons down to ensure I could see them all when using the taskbar and quick launch bar.

Now you may not get on with this but I find it is pretty easy really.

Would be good to get your feedback on how easy you find this.

So finally apologies that none of this is any good for our Mac readers, but you could always upgrade to a PC so you can get the benefits of Breezebrowser :-)

Martin

Trip Report-South Carolina 2

Hot and Extremely Humid that about sums up the last few days, I have just arrived home and its nice to be back to less humid conditions, The South Carolina coastline is very pretty but a very busy place,Wildlife only getting a look in in designated areas, The area i was first in was better for photography and its a shame i didn't get more time there but its noted and i will make it back at some time, I managed a couple of sessions there and it was very successful and you had chances of shots every couple of minutes so you could get the standard shots and have plenty of opportunities for arty farty shots as well, As i said before i chose the D300 over the D3+1.4x as the AF is faster without the extender and D3 combo and IQ is great under ISO400, I am old school and still try to keep the ISO as low as possible although last week i processed a couple of images taken at high ISO with the D3 and its very impressive and i will come to this in a later blog,The skies were clear so only the first hour or more after sunrise would be worth shooting in as the light after this was harsh although i did some back lit flight shots that worked OK in Bright light, I set the D300 to ISO 400 which is the max that i use it for and this gave a shutter speed of 1/500 or more which was adequate for what i wanted and the wimberley Gimbal head worked perfectly with the 600 F4 making my life very easy for tracking birds, The birds were feeding in the mud next to the river and with the sun behind me i could focus on the trees next to the river so as soon as the birds flew over the on the way back to the nests i was already focused and could track them from distance and shoot when i felt they were a good size in the frame, Even if the birds were closer than the trees by the time i saw them the AF snapped on to them, I would rather focus at distance and then lock onto something closer than focus close and then try to grab a distant subject if that makes sense,
So that's another state pinned on the map and a big thank you to my buddies for allowing me to stay with them and show me around

Dave

Guest Photographer - John Bulpitt FRPS

Today is the first of what will hopefully be a new features for Wildlife Photography across the Water with our first guest photographer slot on the blog.

John Bulpitt read this article I posted back in February and contacted me ahead of a trip he made to Africa earlier this year and we got into dialogue about digital storage. But before John's story her a few details and background on John.

John's Bio

I have been a keen sports photographer for more than 20 years and gained my RPS Fellowship in 2003 with a panel of athletics/track and field prints. More recently I have diversified into nature and street photography. Most action pics are taken with a Canon 1D mkII with either a 70-200f2.8L (often with a 1.4 converter) or a 300f4 IS. A Canon 40D is used for more static subjects.

I enter many National and International exhibitions and am an enthusiastic member of Cambridge Camera Club, click on the Gallery for some of my sports pics. If you can take sharp images of Greyhounds, birds in flight are straightforward!

John now takes up the story below with his article that was published in summer 2009 edition of "The Iris", the magazine of the Nature Group of the RPS.

Storing Digital Images on the move

On a recent trip to Tanzania with Mark Hamblin of Wildshots, I took about 8000 images. Some may find this excessive, but as a photographer whose main interest is action photography in all it's manifestations, I tend to hit the motordrive and only stop when the Bar opens. In any event, it does raise the question of how you back up and store digital images on a "big" trip. Over the past five years I have tried four different solutions. If I knew then what I know now my kids would (eventually) be far better off.

One could take a pocket full of CF cards. I tend to use Sandisk Extreme 11, 4GB cards and shooting in RAW on a Canon 1DmkII would need about 20 of these for the trip described above.

At the time of writing (April 1st appropriately) these would cost about £280 from Amazon. You could argue that fewer are needed because of the facility to edit in camera but I would counsel against this. You can't really see what you are doing and it can corrupt the card. However, the main drawback with total reliance on CF cards is that you can not take full advantage of the benefit of digital the facility to review a day's shoot and learn any lessons that need to be learnt in preparation for the next day. There are cheap CF cards but I wouldn't go there personally. You could also buy bigger capacity cards but I would be nervous about having too many eggs in one basket as it were.

The second possibility is a photo viewer. I think that today this is the most expensive solution. The Epson P4000 costs about £390 and holds 80GB. Other than cost I also believe that this can be the worse solution out of the four options outlined in this article. You can not back up and hard drives do fail. you cannot edit other than delete and downloading takes about 15 minutes for a 4GB card. Moreover the battery has a relatively small capacity. It will download two 4GB cards, but not three which can be a problem in places with an intermittent power supply.

Then there is the laptop. This may not involve additional expenditure because many of you may already own one. You can back up onto an external hard drive, DVD's or a number of 16Gb pen drives. it will also take imaging software, But of course Hard drives can fail..... The main drawback is that it takes a big chunk of your carry on baggage allowance and opportunist thieves can spot them from a thousand paces.

The final option and the one I have now decided on is the Netbook. Essentially this is a very small laptop. I have bought the Samsung NC10 (£380 from John Lewis with a 2 year warranty). It has a 160GB hard drive and comes with a 1GB RAM, but I have upgraded to a 2GB (about £20 from Amazon) I back up onto a Seagate external portable hard drive. £75 from PC World a few months ago but you can buy similar products today a much lower price. It all fits very easily into the outside pocket of my camera rucksack.

Of course the hard drive can fail... you know the story now! And it will not load Canon software because the screen resolution is 1024 x 600 and not 1024 x 768***. But it will take Breezebrowser pro (free 15 day trial download available). This enables me to review my images quickly but a full edit would be a bit of a fiddle and cuts down on drinking time. if you are still with me you may have concluded that there is no perfect solution and this is where i have got to, But in my view, the best solution at present is the Netbook plus a lot of CF cards.

I am most grateful to RPS Nature group member Martin Dyer for his help with my Netbook purchase and configuration. Martin co authors what, in my view, is the best wildlife photography website around.

Thanks for that John....... and of course we are most grateful for the kind words about our blog.

*** Note: I (Martin) have found a way round this now and will report in a couple of days time on how to get 1024 x 768 res. and unlock other programs.

And now for a few of John's favourite images. So for all lovers of African wildlife, here are some great images.

Taken in Ndutu where the migration reaches full swing on Jan/Feb. Shutter speed of 1/30th. Pan and blur is not easy from a Landcruiser!

Lake Manyara NP where unlike Ndutu you cannot drive off road. I think that backlighting often works well with small mammals but doesn't suit every subject.

Ngorogoro crater. Good numbers of these birds scavenge around the picnic area. The tatty tail feathers tell you that this bird spends a lot of time on the ground

Ndutu - my favourite place in Africa. We came across a mother and four cubs on four consecutive days and were able to photograph many different behaviours.

Lake Manyara. We saw the bird go into it's nest hole and hoped it would emerge quickly as we were blocking the road

Well many thanks for that great article John and the fabulous images. It looked like you had a great trip.

So finally a note to other wildlife photographers. If you would like to feature as a guest photographer, please tell us about yourself, send us some images and we will get you on the blog. Use the comments box if you want to contact us (remember we don't need to publish your contact note as the comments are moderated - so we won't be telling the world).

Thanks again John

Martin

Trip Report-South Carolina

Finally-Internet access, I have just spent a couple of days in Southern South Carolina, My friends had the chance to use a house free of charge and were kind enough to ask me along, So a social/photographic trip in one,Very much a splash and dash, No real time to search for places to go but i did notice a sign to a wildlife preserve close to the house so spent a couple of mornings there,First thing as the light rises quickly and gets harsh, The preserve had a couple of lakes/ponds with egrets/herons, Ospreys etc, The egrets and herons were very densely populated so lots of squabbles and fighting, Birds constantly flying in and out so bird in flight shots were the order of the day, I did try to get some original type shots not just a bird against a blue sky but tried various things both front and back lit, I used the Nikon D300 as i feel this still to be the best camera body available for this type of work, I shot in manual mode all the time metering off of the tress or sky and used the 600F4 VR, Image quality from this combo is very sharp and the AF is quick to grab the subject and stays with it,I have now moved to Northern South Carolina and will be here for 2 days so time to get out and explore ready for the morning session, One thing i will say is that South Carolina is a beautiful place but so far extremely humid, The first morning i made the mistake of having the AC on in the car and the camera/lens took an hour to de mist as soon as i got out of the car it was a wall of heat-probably 85% plus humidity, I haven't been anywhere like that since being in the jungles of Sumatra, Today i didn't make the same mistake and could shoot almost straight away

Dave