Oct 30, 2018 | Wildlife Photography
It’s such a little thing (those them ears are huge!), the direction of the ears on ungulates. Moose, deer, elk and all hooved animals use their ears to tell them lots of things, the main being which way is trouble coming from. They are constantly pivoting them to take inventory of everything around them. Bull Moose use them along with this to listen for the moans of cows. Those big racks are like a disk and they turn their ears to listen to all the sounds that come in. It really is a remarkable adaptation they use with great accuracy. Since the Moose don’t smile or frown or have any real facial movement, it’s their ears that do all the talking. So what do you want your ungulate to say?
Here are two quick clicks to illustrate my point. Shooting with the D5 / 180-400VR a split second apart, you can see how with the ears forward (the desired position of ears) the Moose is engaging the viewer. With the ears back, the Moose looks pensive, afraid or even aggressive. Now there are other body gestures that make the ears back better or worse. But it all starts with the ears so watch them as you deal with buck fever. Always ask yourself, “what do the ears day?”
Oct 25, 2018 | Wildlife Photography
Oh ya, nothin good is coming with that look in a Moose’s eye! Bull Moose has quite a ritual they go through each late fall in the pursuit of mating. Battling and chasing other bulls, young and old is a big part of it. It takes a lot out of them so typically after their afternoon nap, the fun begins. In this case, these two who were really just “goofin” give you a great look at the battling process. You can see in the eye of the one on the left the invitation to shove. The cocked head and eye tell the opponent that it’s on! I was shooting with the brilliant D5 / 180-400VR which provides the speed and flexibility to capture the action. So, after hours of boredom looking at sleeping bulls, you have a thirty-minute burst of sheer spectacular wildlife biology action. What a great day just knowing a whoopin is comin!
Oct 22, 2018 | Wildlife Photography
I got up Saturday, grabbed the Z7, FTZ with the 60f2.8micro and headed outside with Sadie to photograph the leaves frozen in the bird bathes and well, nothing. I moved leaves around the meadow, chased the light and Sadie, nothing. No worry, I’ll head to some of the trees and went for backlighting, nothing! That afternoon, the next morning, that next evening, nothing. It simply wasn’t speaking to me, I just wasn’t feeling it, the photo. The closest I came was this shot of Mt Tom Sunday evening and while there is fall color in the foreground, you wouldn’t know it as I went B&W. But that’s OK, the challenge really was just to get out, anything that came from that was icing on the cake. So my weekend challenge, well so much for color.
Oct 19, 2018 | Landscape Photography
Fall in the Eastern Sierra is fading quickly. The Aspens in our meadow are meer silver trunks testament to a great year. While the hillside might not be carpeted in yellows and oranges, there are still patches of color calling us and our cameras to immortalize them. It’s a challenge I take up every fall, shooting fall color when there really isn’t any fall color. I love the walks I have to take to find that last vestige of fall.
This year I’m going real light in search of fall color. I’m just carrying with me this weekend the Z7 / Z24-70 along with the 60f2.8micro attached to the FTZ. I tend to walk toward the sun in search of the photograph because I prefer backlit fall color. The light is a large part of the photograph. Once I find a grove with a hint of color, I’ll take my original photos and then make a circle looking for those hidden treasures. That’s how I came across the frost-crusted leaf on the edge of falling. It’s those little treasures that make the whole adventure worthwhile. And if I come back with no photographs, that’s OK too. Walking in a forest in fall is simply good for the soul!
Oct 18, 2018 | B&W Photography, Landscape Photography
B&W is such a romantic, complicated and magical way to tell our visual story no matter the subject. The colors of black, white and all the shades of gray in between intice our imagination to explore and ponder. The drama light can bring to our photography is heightened, intensified and brought to life by all of this. That’s if-if we have all of those colors in our B&W photo. So along with everything else we have to do as photographers, B&W complicates it all by requiring that clean black, that clean white and everything in between. Going back through the blog here, you’ll find a minimum of nine methods of turning our color images to B&W in post. I’ve constantly been in search of the fastest, cleanest and best method to bring B&W to my digital world. At the same time, have fun doing it!
With every new camera body, one of the first things I do is shot the Monochrome or B&W Picture Control. I then take the color file into post, do my current B&W conversion and print. And so it was with the Z7 and that’s when it all changed. I set the Monochrome Picture Control settings (as seen below) and shot. The B&W photo appeared as B&W in PhotoMechanic as usual. I hit Cmd E and the Nef launches in ACR in B&W! Not only that, my settings are there from the camera. But the best part, the image appears as I shot it, no conversion required. And other than perhaps a tweak, the image is done, as in, no more B&W conversion in post, done! I can only speak for myself and my own photography, but the Z7 has made my B&W not only easy, fast and simple, but fun!
Oct 17, 2018 | Wildlife Photography
I refer to all deer as “Bambi” for one reason, nearly everyone has seen the movie, Bambi. That powerful imagery can affect how viewers of our deer images look at our photographs. Preconceived visions are the “rose-colored” glasses we look through at the world, our own built-in filter. When it comes to critters, this is important to consider if you want that cute and cuddly appeal of critters to come through in your photographs. So with deer, here is the biggest element to never forget!
You gotta have those ears pointed forward! Why? That’s a darn good question! It starts with the movie Bambi and the preconceived idea of deer being innocent, playful, and full of life. Those ears of the Mule Deer are HUGE! They can pivot independently taking in the sounds surrounding the deer. The direction of their ears can communicate visually all sorts of emotions and if you wanna grab heartstrings then you have only one option, ears pointed at the camera. Standing there in Roosevelt Nat’l Park hand-holding the D5 / 180-400VR after the sun had set, I watched their ears and once all were pointed at me did I think about firing off some frames.
An additional benefit of having those giant ears pointed at you is being able to have other body parts hidden. With the “Bambi” syndrome conquered then the mind tends to fill in the rest of the story. For me, it permits setting the stage where the critter lives because, without that habitat, they disappear, sometimes for good! You can see that in one photo nearly everything is missing except one eye, but I have both ears. So the challenge and ease in which we can visually tell the story of deer we can thank Disney and Bambi.
