Simple Set Ups

The past three mornings I went out into the yard and created some simple set ups. On the first day I duct taped a branch to the side of a small platform feeder  about ten feet out from one of our bedrooms. Within minutes of setting it up the birds were using it.  I got some nice images from it. The second morning I grabbed an old knothole feeder I had lying around and I used some wood screws to attach it to the same post. The birds loved it and so did I. This morning I added a fall colored background behind the feeder. For some reason the birds weren't as cooperative. I had a long, long wait before the birds started using the feeder. Eventually they came in and  I was able to create some images. I hope that you are all enjoying your week. God's love and blessings to all, chris

Sap Sucker

Living in the forest we find the weirdest bugs at times. I captured this one on the window screen in our bathroom. After photographing it on an old fish fossil I did a Google image search of it before setting it free into the forest. I found out that it is a Western Conifer Seed Bug (WCSB). They feed on the sap of young conifer cones as the cone is developing. Talk about a specialized bug. What a strict diet! This one was photographed with my Canon EOS 7D MkII camera and a Tamron 180mm lens in natural light from a window. God's blessings upon your week, chris #TeamCanon, #WithMyTamron

City Boy

In my college years I spent some time living in the city of Sacramento. Luckily I lived in an apartment right next to the levee of the American River. I spent a lot of time kayaking, fishing and swimming in the river. It was my saving grace as it helped my sanity by having nature just over the top of the levee. Over the weekend I visited relatives in the Sacramento area. I made it a point to visit where I used to live. I found that the apartments had been converted to high end senior condos for 55 and up. Just down the street in Campus Commons I found some Wild Turkeys strutting in front of an office complex. Judging by how fat this on was they weren't lacking for food! This image was created with a Canon 7D mkII camera and a Tamron 150-600mm G2 lens. Fill flash was provided by a Canon 550 EX flash, #TeamCanon, #WithMyTamron

Little Lake Sunrise

Many days I plan what I'm going to photograph. Other days God just surprises me with some incredible examples of his creation. This morning was a total surprise and I almost missed it. I was walking out to fill the bird feeders when I noticed that the clouds had these great leading lines pointing towards the horizon. I ran back inside and grabbed a wide angle lens and threw it on my camera. Then I sprinted upstairs and poked my head out the back window. The view was gorgeous and I was lucky I hurried because the lower part of the clouds closest to the mountains was just starting to be overexposed by the rising sun from behind the mountains. Thank you Lord for this wonderful gift. chris Equipment Used: Canon 50D and a Canon 10-22 lens at 19mm Camera Settings: AV mode, ISO 400, F5.6, 1/250th of a sec.

Misty Mountain Morning

There was just a kiss of fog caressing the ridgetop this morning. I happened upon it when I was getting ready to head down the driveway to the big city of Ukiah to run some errands. I love it when the fog lazily drifts through the trees creating angel's breath patterns of light, shadow and fog. The scientific name for it is crepuscular rays but that just sounds too clinical and boring for something so beautiful. Thank you Lord for a beautiful day.

God bless,
chris

No Photography Day

Yesterday I didn't create any images in camera but I did create some on the computer. It was a computer catch up day in processing some images that needed some work. If you are like me that often times means spending quite a few hours at it as I mostly shoot in RAW + JPEG. The only time I shoot in just JPEG is when I'm going to shoot in volume and give most of the shots away. A good example of this is when I shoot images for Vacation Bible school at church. I will shoot several hundred images that I'm going to give away. I think the processing time would kill me in that case.

Yesterday I rescued one image of a Stellar's Jay that I really like. When I was creating the image I chopped the poor little guys tail tip off . (He screeched a little bit and then settled down) but I really liked the rest of the image. So I extended the canvas on one edge and duplicated a tiny section of tai,l flipped it and then added it onto the Jay. Then I did some cloning around it to blend it in. Now that I have told you what I did I'm sure the very alert observer will be able to pick it out. Otherwise I don't feel that it would be noticeable. Take a look and see if you agree with that or not.

OK. OK so it was a photography day. Just not using the camera.

Sincerely and God bless everyone,

chris