Last of the Autumn colours

June 12, 2013 by 1 Comment

Winter has set in here in Victoria, Australia, and we’re experiencing cold days and nights, and rain, with a bit of sunshine here and there. Our first week of June had the equivalent of the average month of June’s rain. So will be interesting to see what pans out for the rest of the month.  Here, we’re planning to put in new rainwater tanks to help capture what our current tanks can’t hold, so we have plenty of water for the garden in the summer months.

These leaves are on the last Liquidamber to be losing its leaves here on our property. It’s always the last to change its colour and the last to lose its leaves. All the other deciduous trees are now totally bare. Our garden is covered in leaves and looking a bit drab but there are bulbs popping up here and there and I expect we’ll have some new colour from them soon.

Autumn leaves

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Filed Under: Seasons Tagged With: , , , ,

An Introduction to Bird Photography

June 11, 2013 by Leave a Comment

Since taking up photography much more seriously over the past 4 years, I’ve found that bird photography is the most challenging… and the most satisfying.  Getting close enough for that one-of-a-kind shot or hoping you’ll see that bird again to do better next time.  I find my bush walks so much more interesting these days and they pass so quickly, simply because I’m focused on the next bird, rather than where I’m walking or how long I’ve been walking.

This post was published a couple of nights ago by the Digital Photography School and I just had to share it with you.  If you’re keen to improve your skills in bird photography it’s worth learning from other photographers. I enjoyed a 2 day workshop last year with Steve Parish, Mark Galer and Darren Leal, and learnt much from the three of them, including processing my shots in a better way. I also now only shoot in RAW and no longer in jpg.  Any shots I want to keep can easily be exported to jpg.

An Introduction to Bird Photography

A Guest Post by Lithuanian Photographer Tadas Naujokaitis.

Birds are very interesting creatures, but it’s not so easy to photograph them. Wild birds usually don’t pose where you want and, moreover, it’s often difficult to get close enough to take quality pictures. But if you know some basics of bird photography, it becomes much easier to capture amazing moments of the birds’ life.

Equipment

It’s not necessary to have an expensive camera of lens, however the proper equipment lets to take bird photos easier.

Lens
Most birds are quite shy, so you need at least 200mm (300mm is better) to take pictures of them. Longer focal length not only lets to photograph birds from larger distance, it also gives more blurred background. However more millimeters (or larger aperture) means more expensive, larger and heavier lens. Knowing all that, I think that 400mm f/5.6 lens is the best, if you want to have as much millimeters as possible, not too small aperture and still want to be mobile. Of course, you can make magnificent bird images with 100mm or less, just you should find more courageous birds or compose them to landscape.
Read more…

For the record I currently use a 70-300mm 1:4-5.6 lens but do plan to get a longer one when finances permit.

And here are a couple of shots of my own that I’m happy with.

333-360 Crested Pigeon

Australian laughing kookaburra

Filed Under: Birds, Sites for Photographers Tagged With: , ,

Do you receive my posts by email?

June 10, 2013 by Leave a Comment

I’ve been updating the site, as you might be aware, and changing some of my systems. I’ve been going through a real learning curve with the new theme (courtesy of StudioPress Themes) and using the mail service at MailChimp so that I have all my blog and newsletter services in the one place, rather than multiple places. I recognise some might prefer to read the posts via RSS or even at my Facebook page.  I chose this new theme because it is mobile responsive and you should be able to view it easily on your smart phone, ipad or tablet. Except, perhaps the banner on the home page and the changing images as they are both wider than the screens will be. But the rest should view fine.

I’d love to hear from you as to what works best for you in the delivery of blog posts or even your thoughts on the new look layout of my site. This site began as a photo blog and then morphed into a website so has gone through a few changes over the years.  With over 1260 posts to this blog, the first dated 1st January 2009, I’ve certainly had a few photos to share.  And I’ve grown and developed during that time too.

My post popular post was this one: http://dandenong-ranges-photography.com.au/a-photography-walk-goes-wrong/ It got the most views and comments.  If you haven’t read that post, I encourage you to. It outlines a walk I took that ended with me going into hospital for just over a week, and right before Christmas 2011. Not what I had planned at all!

Most viewed images at Flickr is this one:
Eastern Grey Male Kangaroo

although the one most commented on at Flickr was this one:
166-365 T'was a foggy morning

One thing I have found to be a mystery are those people who haven’t claimed prizes when they’ve gone into a draw for one. Either here at my blog or at my Facebook Page. I wonder why that is?  Are they not reading the posts which announced them as the winner or was it something else?  I would love to gift the people who have won prizes.

I look forward to hearing from you, my readers, here at this blog with your thoughts and commentaries relating to the posts I publish here.  Thank you.

 

Filed Under: Blog, Sites for Photographers Tagged With: , ,

Kangaroos at Lysterfield Lake Park

June 9, 2013 by Leave a Comment

I went for a walk on Saturday with my husband around the lake at the park. It’s a total of 5.5km and was a lovely surprise as I wasn’t sure if he’d be up to it. It was a cold but sunny and clear winter’s day – just great for walking in the sunlight.

Saw a few things I’d not seen before, and in particular, a couple of kangaroos mating.  In all the times I’ve walked around the park, I’ve never witnessed this event, although it’s evident it happens due to the number of young roos we see at the park.  It was funny, perhaps timely, that we should see this, as we’d been watching a program on the Taronga Zoo (Sydney) only the previous night, about the challenges the staff go through in introducing different animals to their mates and getting them to reproduce. I do have a couple of video clips too but they’re very shaky – I rarely carry a tripod with me and didn’t have anything to lean on where I was standing to witness this event.

Eastern Grey Male Kangaroo

Just finished inching his way up her back and ready to mount.

 

Kangaroos in the act of mating

Filed Under: Kangaroos, Lysterfield Lake Park Tagged With: , ,

New look to the site

June 8, 2013 by Leave a Comment

Site Facelift

I’m currently updating the look of this site with a new theme – one that is proving to be a bit challenging at the moment, but I’ve got it more than halfway there, so determined to persevere.  I hope you like the new look, once it’s finished.

 

Filed Under: Sites for Photographers
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