Another in the backyard series with my 500mm f/4.0 lens. An American Goldfinch taking a momentary rest on a weed I hadn’t gotten around to pulling.
Cropped to 50% Nik Dfine and a small amount of Nik Sharpener is all.
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Tags: Avian, Backyard, Birds, Canon 500mm f/4.0L, Canon 5DMII, Goldfinch, Nik Filters
Taken with that amazing Canon 500mm f/4.0L lens on the 5DMII. ISO was set to 1250. The only editing done was to use Nik Dfine to clear up the noise. I’m amazed at the bokeh along with the sharpness. Now if I could only hire a sherpa to carry the beastie for me I’d be even happier.
Tags: Avian, Birds, Canon 500mm f/4.0L, Canon 5DMII, Juvenile Tree Sparrow, Lincoln, RI
Another image from my first try with the 500mm f/4.0L lens. A nuthatch eying the bird feeder:
Nuthatch
I’m still amazed how amazingly sharp this lens is. Processed just gently in photoshop cs5 with Nik plugins – Viveza 2 to give an overall brightness to the image since it was shot under trees, and White Neutralizer from Color Efex Pro 3.0 to adjust the white balance. Sharpened gently with Sharpener Pro.
Tags: Avian, Backyard, Bird, Canon 500mm f/4.0L, Canon 5DMII, Lincoln, Nik Software, Nuthatch, Photoshop CS5, RI
A 500mm f/4.0L lens. It arrived today, a day early, and it is a BEAST. It weighs 9.5 lbs and comes in a hard case (which is apparently a good thing because the box from Canon that was inside the intact box from B&H was all crumpled on one end with the Styrofoam crunched up good inside). The Wimberly head for the tripod comes tomorrow so I hand held it, well, not really hand held it, I’m not up to that – yet – I sat in a chair in the backyard and balanced my elbow on my knee or on the arm of the chair. The birds and squirrels were very cooperative after an initial fly off. This is one of my favorites, just for the color and sharpness, it’s a bit busy for me with that branch in the foreground but he didn’t stay still very long. 50% crop, Dfine and Pro Contrast Nik filters.
Male Cardinal on Branch
Tags: Avian, Backyard, Birds, Canon 500mm f/4.0L, Canon 5DMII, Handheld, Lincoln, Northern Cardinal, RI
The Lotuses are blooming down in Wickford and although it was a bit windy and the sun was too high in the sky I was able to get some nice images of the new buds.
I thought I’d try something different so I dug out my old Canon 300L f/4.0 and my 1.4X tele. It gives me a bit more reach than my 100-400 and I think it’s a bit sharper.
Tags: "Canon 1.4X teleconverter", "Canon 300L f/4", "Egyptian Lotus Flowers", Canon 5DMII, RI, Wickford
Taken during the workshop Roamin’ with Roman given by Roman Kurywczak and Denise Ippolito at Nickerson Beach on LI, NY. Cropped in CS5 and applied a “glamour glow” from Nik Color Efex Pro 3.0.
Tags: Canon 100-400L f/4.5-5.6, Canon 5DMII, Denise Ippolito, LI, Long Island, Nickerson Beach, Nik Plugins, NY, Photoshop CS5, Roamin' with Roman, Roman Kurywczak, Workshop
On the beach at Captiva Island. When Mikes Dad and step-Mom came to visit while we were in Fort Myers we took them there, Pat loves to collect shells and this is a paradise of shells. People were actually using what looked like mesh panniers to scoop them out at shoreline looking for that special one.
Tags: Canon 100-400L f/4.5-5.6, Canon 50D, Captiva Island, Florida, Seashells, Vacation
We saw a few of these gorgeous birds when we were at Corkscrew Swamp in Naples, they were very shy and didn’t stay still very much. We got lucky that they happened to like the feeders right outside the Visitor Center and the light was in our favor to sit at the rail outside the cafeteria and be patient waiting for them to show up. The Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary and Blair Audubon Center was established to protect the largest remaining stand of Bald Cypress in North America during the 1950′s when almost all the cypress forests of Florida were being cut down for timber. The National Audubon had been protecting wading birds in this area since 1912 (during the “plumage craze” years , and in 1954 accepted responsibility to manage the area which had grown to over 6,000 acres. In 1955 the first boardwalk began construction. Today the total boardwalk length is 2.25 miles with a shorter walk of 1.07 miles and covers a variety of habitats including Bald Cypress, wet prairie, Pond Cypress, a Sawgrass pond and Pine Flatwood.
Tags: Audubon, Avian, Bird, Canon 100-400L f/4.5-5.6, Canon 5DMII, Corkscrew Swamp, Florida, Male Painted Bunting, Naples, Vacation
The Great Blue Heron just enjoying the last rays of the sun in Ding Darling NWR
Tags: Canon 100-400L f/4.5-5.6, Canon 50D, Ding Darling NWR, Florida, Great Blue Heron, Sunset