More garden babies

OK so not specifically hatched in my garden, but this newly emerged juvenile Southern Hawker came into the garden a couple of weeks back and took up refuge on one of the hedgerow plants sunning itself while it was getting its full flight strength.

With female Southern Hawkers egg laying last year and this year, and with the nymphs taking two to three years to hatch, I am hoping that we see our own emerge from next year or the year after.  I am already expecting Broad Bodied Chasers to emerge next year as I have seen them scurrying around in the pond.

Both images with the 7D and Canon 180 f2.5L macro lens, handheld.

Martin

Photoshop CS5 - ACR update

Adobe have just launched ACR 6.2 to take into account  16 new camera bodies and 120 lens profiles.  If you have CS5 you will an auto update notification.

Will give it a check out in the near future with the revised lens profiles

Martin

Nikon 105VR Macro

A couple of weeks ago i mentioned that i had been loaned a Nikon 105VR Macro by a friend who had been offered it by somebody who was selling it, Unfortunately i only had it a few days and those few days were wet and miserable and the only shots that took with it were of Alfie my mini Schnauzer late one evening as well as a couple of ornaments that were close by, My initial reactions to the images on the screen were 'wow thats sharp', It really is one sharp lens, The VR makes it easily hand holdable in low light, The images here were shot with the D3s at ISO 6400 as it was just a test and i wanted a decent shutter speed, Anybody looking for a Macro lens for their Nikon kit wont go wrong in looking at the 105VR, It would also make a great portrait lens

Heres Alfie

And a crop of the above

A Rhino ornament that was close by

And a crop

You can see how sharp the images are with very little sharpening and also how impressive the D3s is at ISO 6400-No noise reduction has been used on any of the images

Dave

Look out for - new flocks and roosts

With most of this years young birds all fledged now, it is time to watch out for lots of new flocks of birds together.  As young birds and their parents leave their nesting sites and territories, you will see lots of them coming together for their collective protection and feeding.

I have been seeing  a regular large flock of mixed Tits come through the garden most days.  Comprising of a mix of between 50 to 100 adult and juvenile birds of Blue, Great, Coal and Long Tailed, this is not something I have noticed in previous summers in my garden.

Out in the countryside watch out for the same but with large communities of Rooks, Jackdaws and Starlings, and in particular during the evenings for Pied Wagtails.  This was the time of year at my old place of work when up to 100 of these delightful little birds would get together and can often be found in supermarket car parks.  At Morrisons in Stratford, they are regular roosters.

Martin

Deer oh Deer

Since returning from California i have been trying to get some White Tailed Deer images, Mainly because a couple of the does have fawns that still have their white spots-very cute and cute always sells, The does with the 2 fawns is very shy and i have seen her most visits but either distant or she starts to come into range and senses me even though i am in a hide and moves out of the area, The other problem over the last couple of weeks has been the weather, Its either been very wet or overcast, I have decided not to shoot in either case although some images in heavy rain would be different, I have some images of deer in lovely light and its pointless going out just for images when i already have better, So in that case i have made better use of my time by processing images that are backing up, The last couple of evening have seen a change in the does behaviour, I dont know if its that the fawns are now of a certain age but she has become much more relaxed and has approached the feeding area-i put corn down-much quicker and is more relaxed, although if you take a series of images she still backs off, so its single shot using the D3s's silent mode and only shooting when i am happy that they are relaxed and that the poses are good, A couple of nights ago she fed in front of me with the fawns facing the sun and then went around the back of my hide and wanted to feed in the area where the sun would be back lighting her, I put corn out infront and behind the hide as i never know what direction they will arrive, But she was again very vary of the area for some reason and stayed just out of view, I could see one of the fawns just behind a bush so i knew where she was, The problem was she stayed there over and hour and it was now dark-i was being held prisoner and dare not leave until she was gone as if she saw me coming out of the hide that would have been it and i am sure she would not have come into the area with the fawns again, Anyways the D3s has come up tops again, The silent mode proving its worth and makes it easier to justify the purchase, Over the years camera shutters have bcome more robust-the D3/D3s now being rated at 300 000 clicks but that also means that they have become much noisier which for a wildlife photographer is a real problem, My first Canon camera was an EOS 5 and its was very quiet-i wish they would make a quiet mode camera that could work in continuous shooting mode rather than one shot-so here are a few images from the last couple of visits

Notice the 'Light' on these images, Some were taken as the sun was setting and some where the sun was already gone from the area-its all about the light and the quality of the light

Dave

750 up

So today it is congratulations to us - this is our 750th post since we started in January 2009.

We set out trying to write something every day, and we haven't let you down.  It has come close once or twice, but we have stayed with it.

So nothing more today but a little bit of reflection back over the last twenty months with more than 41,000 visits by more than 10,000 visitors from 96 countries around the world.  After UK and USA, Japan, Switzerland and France are the next most visited from locations - thanks Pierre (Pete) and Jackie  :-)

Although I note Vermont is STILL the only US state where we haven't been visited from.  Does Vermont have the Internet?

So as we go into a holiday weekend here in the UK, I hope you all stay with us over the next goodness knows how many posts in the future.  Keep your comments and feedback coming.  If we know some of you read and like what we post, and your words back to us it makes all worthwhile.

Cheers

Martin

New Canon Gear

Canon have been busy-They have announced a list of new gear and gear soon to be announced, Camera wise the 60D with the same 18mp sensor as the 7D/550D, Images of this camera started to appear on forums a couple of days ago
Lens wise there are a few biggies- EF 8-15mm f/4L Fisheye, EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6L IS, EF 300mm f/2.8L IS II, EF 400mm f/2.8L IS II, Extender EF 1.4x III and Extender EF 2x III and they have said that they are working on new versions of the 500 and 600F4 big boys-Time to start saving Canon boys, I can guarantee that these wont be cheap
I just found out the prices-be sitting down for this-The 300F2.8 will be $7000 and the 400 F2.8 will be $11000 yes thats right and the extenders are listed as $500 a pop!!!! must say i am glad i am with Nikon at the moment looking at these prices-Gulp, The positives are that these super telephotos will be much lighter than the previous models,The weight has gone into the prices


Dave

New External Hard Drive and Backup

I mentioned in my last blog that i had ordered a new hard drive and external casing from Newegg, This arrived a couple of days ago and within a few minutes the internal hard drive as installed into the casing and ready to go,The casing is excellent-very well made and rugged, It has an on/off switch for the drive and the fan so that is cool, First thing to do once attached to your PC is to partition the drive and give it a letter in my case the new drive is called 'M', All the instructions on how to do this are with the case, The partitioning/formatting took a couple of hours then it was ready, I have always done my back ups in the old way of copying to one disk and then the others, Its easy to forget what you have done if you keep one off site as you should do just in case of fire or theft so i downloaded and purchased a software called Acronis which is a data back up software and seems to be the most popular with people on forums, This way when i attach another hard drive it will read what the new files are and then just copy them over, My first mistake with this is that i copied the K disc to the new M disc, It took 20 hours and although all the files were on there i couldnt see them in breezebrowser so i am now in the process of reformatting the disc and will then 'clone' the K to the M drive so it will be identical-another learning curve but should make my life much easier in the long run

Dave