Year: 2012

Just A Shot That I Like…#13 – Puffed-Up Chukar In Golden Light

During spring and early summer Chukars habitually call from large rock perches but in winter they’re secretive, elusive and very difficult to approach.  On the rare occasions I can get close to the species this time of year they’re buried in the vegetation and I can’t get a clear shot.    1/800, f/8, ISO 800, 500 f/4, 1.4 tc But I found this bird on a nice boulder perch last month on one of the first very cold mornings of the winter.  The sun had just come up over the Wasatch Mountains and this Chukar was determined to absorb some heat from the warming rays so it hardly moved a feather for the several minutes I was able to keep it in frame.  At times like this they fluff up their insulating feathers and always remind me of the Pillsbury Dough Boy.  Or perhaps the bird simply swallowed a softball, ya think?  Full disclosure – I cloned out a couple of bird droppings on the rock which is something I seldom do but in this case they were quite conspicuous and distracting. Ron  

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American Kestrel Preening on a Rabbitbrush Perch

American Kestrels are pugnacious and skittish little falcons that are usually difficult to approach.  But last week I found a cooperative male warming himself in the early morning sun while perched on rabbitbrush.   Though feisty by nature this kestrel looked almost cuddly while all puffed up against the cold and nestled into the bush.     1/2000, f/8, ISO 500, 500 f/4, 1.4 tc I first approached him head-on which gave me some images where bird and perch combined to produce a pyramid shape that I liked.        1/3200, f/6.3, ISO 400, 500 f/4, 1.4 tc But then I maneuvered to get a different angle so that at least part of the tail would be visible.  In these early shots my camera settings were meant to give me enough shutter speed for the take-off that I fully expected.        1/2000, f/7.1, ISO 250, 500 f/4  But when he began to groom contentedly I started fiddling with my settings to get shutter speeds and depth of field more appropriate for the situation.  Here he is passing one of his tail feathers through his bill in typical preening behavior.       1/1600, f/8, ISO 250, 500 f/4   He gave me a variety of preening poses that I liked.      1/1250, f/8, ISO 250, 500 f/4   Some of the neck feathers are difficult to reach so they go through some strange contortions in an effort to get to them.      1/1600, f/8, ISO 320, 500 f/4   Here the eye was half closed but I was still able to get a catch light. …

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Just A Shot That I Like… #12, American Avocet Ballet

Occasionally an image still appeals to me despite significant imperfections.  In this shot the cluttered background is not ideal nor are the specular highlights on the leg of the male’s reflection but I quite like the positions of both birds, their reflections and the good separation between the avocets and the reflections.       1/1250, f/10, ISO 400, 500 f/4, 1.4 tc Fighting avocets are very difficult to photograph because typically several male combatants are separated from each other by some distance and you never know which bird is going to go after another one next and when the action begins it is blindingly fast.  There’s also the problem of getting enough shutter speed and depth of field for multiple birds in action.  Shooting these birds fighting is nearly always a “poke and hope” situation. Setting the scene:  I had been photographing four males fighting over a single female (sexes easily identifiable because the female has a shorter and more strongly recurved bill than does the male) when this male lifted off and attacked two other males just out of frame to the right.   I just happened to catch the male in a good position over the female with reflections I liked.  One of the things that made this shot work is that I had enough light to use f/10 for sufficient depth of field and still get a fast enough (just barely) shutter speed to get both birds relatively sharp.  Ron 

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Peregrine Falcon Feeding Behavior (graphic)

The Peregrine Falcon has always been a nemesis bird for me.  I’ve occasionally seen them far off, either in flight or perched, but have never been able to get close to one.  All that changed last week when I spent an incredible half hour very close to a young bird while it was feeding on a female Northern Shoveler.  That’s the good news.  The bad news is that there was no LIGHT!  DAMMITALL!  It was heavily overcast with only a bright spot in the clouds to mark the position of the sun.   As usual, this kind of situation requires lots of compromises between shutter speed, ISO, depth of field, motion blur, catch lights, ad infinitum…  So compromise I did but I still got many feeding behavior images I find interesting.  And since one of the primary focuses of this blog is bird behaviors, you guessed it – a blog post…  First – a warning.  Some of these photos are graphic.  Proceed with caution if your sensitivities are fragile.     1/250, f/5.6, ISO 640, 500 f/4, 1.4 tc As I first approached this falcon it was depluming the duck.  At times feathers were flying everywhere but at these shutter speeds and apertures many of those shots ended up in the delete bin.  At this point I was still using the 1.4 teleconverter but the bird soon let me approach close enough that I was able to ditch the tc and get slightly more shutter speed. Take visual note of the size of the crop in this image when the falcon has just begun…

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Award Winning Image

Maybe it’s a little tacky of me to toot my own horn but I figured that some of my readers might be interested in this and wouldn’t find out any other way. Yesterday Nature Photographers Network announced the 2011 winners of their annual Editor’s Pick Awards and one of my images won first place in the Avian category.   I’ll provide several links below for those who may be interested in seeing my winning photograph and those of the other winners.  For those who are unfamiliar with Nature Photographers Network (NPN) it is primarily a nature photography critique site which will explain the critiques below the photos.  My image.  Be sure to click the “view larger photo” option to see the photo in much better detail.  The front page of the NPN Online Magazine, which includes a slide show presentation of the First Place winning images in each of the 9 different categories.  Be sure to check them out (hold your cursor over the image to temporarily stop the slide show) as there are some wonderful nature photographs in the presentation. The first, second and third place winning images in each of the nine categories, including the critiques given on each photograph. Ron

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