Terns

I am a little behind, so a belated Merry Xmas. Santa was good to me this year, but more on that later.
I am now up to Moreton Island, where I was invited to join a photography club on their week-end outing.
It has been an awful long time since my one and only visit to Moreton, and I fell in love with the island all over a gain. Accommodation was camping at a permanent camp site, catered, though the cold showers took some getting used to! Moreton island is a sand island, so everything is sand! It can get heavy walking at times.
Anyway, first morning, up early for a sunrise shoot at the dunes. I am not so good on landscapes, so though I enjoyed the view, the light wasn't so great, and I couldn't get a composition going. Back at the bus, I noticed a tern flying overhead, so swapped lenses, and lo and behold, quite a few of them landed right where our bus is! How nice of them. So us keen birders had a great time photographing the terns, but we had to go eventually, as we were already late for breakfast.

Following morning we went to the other side of the island, and what should there be, but a colony of terns, so again, us keen birders spent a happy while with them. I could have stayed all day, but when you are part of a group, your movements are a bit restricted. However, if it wasn't for the group, I wouldn't have been there, so I am not complaining. I will definitely go back, just need to tee it up with my friends who own a 4wd.

All images taken with the mk4, and the 400mm prime.

cormorants

Well, after returning home from Broome, 24 hours later I was back at the airport, for a flight to sydney, to photograph the cavalier specialty show. After Broome, Sydney was decidedly chilly! Back home, and madly processing dog photos, before disappearing down to Port Macquarie for the annual photography convention. So my next series of photos are from this trip.
To start the ball rolling, we stopped at a little town called Iluka, and decided to stay the night. In the morning, we were lucky with lovely light, and trawlers coming in with their catches, and the following of birds in their wake, the majority being gulls and terns. So we spent a pleasant time honing our skills on birds in flight. Can't say I got too much I was really happy with in the end, and I tend to want to process nature shots without the hand of man first. I will need to go back and relook at my images, but for now, from that morning, here are a few cormorants. Taken with the mk3 and 400mm prime.

crabs

This will be my last post about Broome. Time has marched on, and I have other memories to share.
As I mentioned in an earlier post, the crabs were fun to shoot, especially as the bird life was a bit quiet. These were all taken with my 180mm marcro lens (except one, with my g12), lying in the sand (or kneeling in the mud),with my camera resting on an upside down skimmer dish. Even though the light was bright, I still needed to use high iso's to keep my shutter speed up, as they do move surprisingly quick once peeking out of their shell and deciding the coast is clear.

                                     
                                       

Not sure what was happening here, maybe one crab was after the other crab's shell (not up on the mating rituals of hermit crabs).  I got sidetracked, and when I checked again, they had gone their separate ways.

          Taken with the G12 (auto mode on macro)

I call this my hallelujah crab. These guys are very tiny, and I didn't see  them until I was quietly perched in the mud, waiting for the larger crabs to come out of their holes. They were fun to watch. They would sit there,  then suddenly leap their claws up in the air, reminding me of people raising their arms when saying hallelujah.

Red Fiddler Crab...seemed to come out when the sun was well and truly high, so shooting conditions were rather harsh.Shooting the crabs was fun. Luckily the mangroves here don't smell like I am used to at home, nor were there lots of little flying bities, so apart from getting older, and finding that kneeling with head down and bum up a bit tiring after a while, it was totally fascinating to see all the little creatures come back out of hiding and go about their daily lives in front of me.

Broome shorebirds

On my last morning I found some shorebirds nearby. I set myself up, and waited. Eventually they came closer, but I really struggle with only a 400mm lens. I had my 1.4 convertor on, but it was still so very short. Oh for a 500mm! Anyway, things were looking a bit promising when a Brahiminy Kite flew over, and that was the end of my fun. These images are severe crops, but I am still pleased to have them.

                                          Grey-Tailed Tattler

                                       Red-Necked Stint

                                Red-capped Plover

Broome continued

Well, it has certainly been a very busy couple of months for me, but now things will slow down a bit.  I have finally looked at my images and I will have more time to process and post.

On my third morning, when everything was quiet, even the crabs, I spotted the kites circling in the distance, and decided to see if I would be lucky and they would stay in the area, which they did. Quite a few of them flew over on and off for about an hour, and I was a happy chappy.

Brahiminy Kite

Whistling Kite

Broome

Well, I have returned from Broome, with a mixed bag. My main focus in Broome was to photograph the shorebirds. I was lucky to help with the tagging of some shore birds on my arrival, which had been netted about an hour earlier, and so nice to see them close up. But let's just say the rest isn't so good. A 400mm lens is just rather short for these shy creatures, even with the 1.4. There wasn't a lot of shorebirds around, I was a bit early, and didn't get the lie of the land properly in my first few days, so the only shorebirds I got was on the last morning.
However, I will continue on Broome soon. I am off again in a few hours, to photograph a Cavalier King Charles Spaniel Specialty show in Sydney, so I only have time for one quick photo. Here is one of a peewee who posed in a nice spot.

Broome and Sea Lions

I am off to Broome tomorrow, staying at the bird observatory. I hope to get myself the shore birds. I have bought a new gimbal head, and a skimmer dish, for low angle photography, so here's hoping!

Back to New Zealand.......
After the oyster catchers departed, I set out again and found these guys. One was leaving, and another came in, and walked around a bit. I did not like to get too close, though a local did get up quite close. I would have preferred a lower angle, but the background made it a bit difficult. Next time I hopefully will get better images, the sort that were in my mind, but didn't quite eventuate.

                                                                            Heading out

 Just came in

Having a mild tussel over territory

Yuck!

back on shore

Still in New Zealand, and here are a few of my favourites from dry land.

I have added the exif data below each image in this post, all shot with a 1DMK3, 100-400L plus 1.4 extender.

I was actually on my way to photograph the sealions at the far end of the beach, when I just had to stop and shoot the pair of oystercatchers on the way. I crept slowly towards them, and was rewarded with this photo just before they took off when a runner came along and scared them away.

f8, 1/400s, iso640, 560mm 

                                                                   f8, 560mm, 1/1600, iso500

                                                                  f8, 560mm, 1/1600s, iso 640

yellow eyed penguins

I was privileged to photograph these beautiful birds, though the shooting conditions were not very good (shade, windy, no tripod). I had to do some very heavy noise removal, as I had to shoot at high iso's.  All taken with the 100-400L plus 1.4ex.

                                                                       1/500s, f8, iso 1250

                                                                      1/320s, f8, iso2000

                                                                       1/250s, f8, iso 2500


This one was taken on a different day, on a tour.

                                                                    1/320s, f8, iso1600

more from my chumming trip

Apart from the albatross, there were a variety of other sea birds. I did get a list of all the birds we saw that day.

My first blog.

I have struggled to keep up with technology, going only as far as having a couple of websites. I am still deciding on facebook, and am totally lost on all the other 'things' out there.
However, I have enjoyed reading blogs from my fellow photographers, and thought it was time to 'get with it'.
While most of my posts will be nature, there will be the odd sports or dog photo thrown in.
So I will start off by going back a few months, to my trip to New Zealand.  Most people go there for the landscapes, I went for the wildlife. Top of my list was the albatross. We went out on a chumming trip in a small boat, in rather choppy weather, so was a real challenge to shoot as the boat went up, down and side to side, and the birds went up, down,and side to side. The image in my header was my favourite, and I had a canvas print done, and it looks great.
The series here are of the albatross bathing, which was great to watch.