There is something about crocodiles and their relatives that fascinates many people. Perhaps it’s the 85 million year history of this family of creatures. Or maybe when we look into their eyes, it is the realization that they may be looking back at us as a potential meal that gets our attention. If you are in the Myrtle Beach (South Carolina) area a trip to Alligator Adventure may be a great way to spend part of a day. The facility has…
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A Ribitting Morning
The Royal Botanical Gardens in Burlington Ontario (Canada) recently hosted a display of frogs from around the world. Frogs: A Chorus of Colours was an interesting, educational exhibit as well as an opportunity to capture some images.
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Is There Really Anything ‘Wrong’ with Digital Camera Sales Volumes?
There have been some interesting debates lately about what’s ‘wrong’ with the digital camera market as people try to understand the rather dramatic decline in unit sales that has been happening over the past 4 or 5 years, with volumes down by half from their peak. I let my old, porous brain muse on this for a while and have some perspectives to share. One way to look at this situation is to simply accept that there is nothing fundamentally…
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Brookgreen Gardens: A Photo Essay
My wife and I have been to the Myrtle Beach (South Carolina) area many times over the past 20 years but it wasn’t until 2015 that we finally visited Brookgreen Gardens. To say that we were shocked with what we discovered there would be an understatement. We simply had no idea how extensive the grounds are and how much there is to see. From a photography standpoint Brookgreen Gardens is a treasure chest of creative possibilities. From the Lowcountry Trail,…
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Using Fog to Create Surreal River Images
Landscape photographers often use fog to help them create wonderful, moody images. You’ve likely seen one of those arresting photographs of a single tree shrouded by fog standing silently in a field.
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Photographing Brown Pelicans with Tamron 150-600mm VC
During a recent trip to the Myrtle Beach area of South Carolina I took the opportunity to try something new, and captured a number of images of brown pelicans. Although I’ve seen these birds a number of times in the past I never tried photographing them before, and as with any bird species there was a learning curve involved.
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Arizona and Utah: Big Memories with a Tiny Sensor
Sometimes we can get so caught up in the technical aspects of our gear that we forget that the most important things are the images we capture regardless of the gear we are using. Those images help to enshrine memories. They could be of family and friends, pets, events, or places that we have visited.
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Nikon 1 V3 Review
Ever since Nikon announced the introduction of the Nikon 1 V3 back in March of 2014 the camera has been met with mixed reactions. Some of the design choices made with this camera left many photographers scratching their heads wondering what the engineers at Nikon were thinking when they put the concept for the Nikon 1 V3 together. Specifically many people questioned the use of a microSD memory card, making the EVF and grip detachable, introducing yet another new battery,…
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Using DxO Smart Lighting
After writing my recent article Birds-in-Flight Images with Nikon 1 V3, it occurred to me how helpful using DxO OpticsPro 10 was in processing the RAW files for the article, and specifically the DxO Smart Lighting function. The DxO Smart Lighting function is designed to adjust the dynamic range in an image. This brief article shows a quick example of the impact of using DxO Smart Lighting. Let’s start with an out-of-camera jpeg of an image that I did not…
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Birds in Flight with Nikon 1 V3
I’ve been continuing my field work for my hands-on review of the Nikon 1 V3 and spent some time capturing images of birds-in-flight at Grimsby Harbour. This has been a particularly severe winter and some of the Great Lakes have frozen over completely. This is only the fourth time in the past 40 years that this has happened. As you can see from the image below, Grimsby Harbour is frozen solid out past the lighthouse. This made for some interesting…
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Nikon 1 V3 Initial Impressions and Sample Images
This short article has a selection of sample images taken hand-held with the Nikon 1 V3 and Nikon 1 CX 70-300 lens at Bird Kingdom in Niagara Falls Canada. While I was intending on doing a full review of the Nikon 1 V3 a number of time sensitive client video projects have recently emerged. Unfortunately that means I will not be able to proceed with my planned full review any time soon. Instead I’ll provide a few initial impressions of…
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Shooting Hand-Held with the Sigma 150-600mm Sport
In advance of the Photography Life’s full review on the Sigma Sport 150-600mm f/5-6.3 DG OS HSM/S superzoom, I thought readers may like to see a few sample images along with some initial thoughts about shooting with this lens hand-held. Before getting into this brief article I’d like to extend a big ‘thank you’ to Photography Life reader Michael Wroblewski, who very generously let me borrow his copy of the Sigma 150-600mm Sport lens so I could do some shooting…
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Shooting with Lady Luck
Without question there is a skill component in photography. Understanding our gear, lighting, composition and post processing are all important ingredients when creating images. Photography captures specific moments in time and on occasion it can be extremely helpful when Lady Luck is on our side. Most of us can remember particular instances when we just happened to be at the right place at the right time to capture an image. Maybe it was the expression on a child’s face. A…
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Shooting Hand-Held Video with Nikon 1 CX 70-300mm
During my recent trip to Cuba I had the opportunity to try out my Nikon 1 CX 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6 lens shooting some hand-held video of various birds that were in the small wetland area that was adjacent to the hotel.
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Tips for Photographing Small Lizards
If you live in a warm sub-tropical or tropical climate, or holiday in one, you’ve likely seen many small lizards scurrying about and you may have tried to photograph them. Often times this is not as easy as it first appears as these small critters tend to be quite skittish and can disappear in a blink of an eye. In addition, they tend to be quite small so unless you can get close enough to them these lizards can end…
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Photographing Heron in Cuba
I recently returned from a vacation in Cuba during which I had the opportunity to photograph a few different species of heron using my Nikon 1 V2 and Nikon 1 CX 70-300 f/4.5-5.6 telephoto zoom lens. I ended up photographing birds hand-held for about 7-8 hours every day and my Nikon 1 gear proved to be an ideal combination to take with me as it was very light and easy to handle, and I avoided the fatigue that can set…
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Photographing Birds on the Niagara River with Nikon 1 70-300mm Lens
As a brief follow up to my Photographing Tundra Swans with Tamron 150-600 article, this piece features a small selection of bird-in-flight images taken along the Niagara River with a Nikon 1 V2 with the Nikon 1 CX 70-300 f/4.5-5.6 lens.
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Photographing Tundra Swans with Tamron 150-600mm
It always amazes me how I can live in an area for so long and be completely unaware of some fascinating image subjects. Thanks to Ray Miller, a local Photography Life reader, I had the chance to photograph a small group of Tundra Swans in their winter migration home on the Niagara River in Ontario.
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Professional Development: A Different “Rule of Thirds”
As photographers who regularly visit photography web sites and blogs, we all seem to be driven by very personal commitments to learn new things and to improve. Over the years I’ve been using my own ‘rule of thirds’ – not as a composition technique – but as an approach to help me direct my own development efforts when it comes to photography. As is often said, “So much to learn, and so little time!” Basically my “rule of thirds” focuses…
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DxO ClearView Anti-Haze Adjustment First Impressions
The purpose of this article is to share my initial impressions of the DxO ClearView anti-haze function which is contained in the Elite Version of DxO OpticsPro 10 software. As many Photography Life readers know, I’ve been using DxO OpticsPro as my main RAW processor for some time. I started out using DxO OpticsPro 8, then upgraded to 9 in order to get the PRIME noise reduction function, then upgraded again to OpticsPro 10 in order to get speed improvements…
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