John Cowie Photography: May 2010

Oh Snap! Happy Birthday!

We typically celebrate birthdays on a yearly basis - those of you that track that sorta thing, I should say (notice I left myself out here....). But as soon as we're old enough to date, we like to celebrate our first week together, then our first month, and all sorts of fun silly variations of an annual celebration...

But couldn't we also celebrate 1 day? Wouldn't it make sense, say, to celebrate the life of a 1-day old kitten? How about if she was found abandoned (by her mom? We don't know)?!?!

This little Kitty came in to the local shelter where I volunteer while I was there working with the dogs. Luckily I had my camera with me, just wish I'd had a different lens (I brought my 16-35 for some doggie smile closeups) with me.

But here's what we captured - luckily little Kitty isn't aware enough to notice she's practically resting inside the lens hood:

My lens was literally resting on the table top, I couldn't get any lower!

Her lips and nose really are that color!

The precious little thing was starving. She followed the bottle, lifting herself up to stay connected when Rita started to pull it away. She would have kept eating, but her little belly was extended, and she needed time to digest before getting more.

I'm going to follow this little girl's development (yes, she's a girl Rita tells me - She's so small I didn't think I could tell the difference without my reading glasses), so stay tuned - this is going to be a great project!

Enjoy...

Stuck in a Rut

Shooting birds again? Doesn't this guy have anything else to do???

Believe me, I didn't set out to, it just happened. After missing the chance with the foxes I don't leave the house without a camera any more. And what do you know - it paid off this morning! Of course, I have some laundry to do now...

(click images for larger view)

I ran into this guy just a few minutes into our morning walk. Sky was mixed haze and clouds, lighting was soft most of the time. My dogs and I had just crossed the street on the north end of the lake, and were turning west when I glanced down as saw him - just like you see him here.

I froze, whispered to the dogs to sit still (they didn't get it) and prayed the bird wouldn't fly away while I was getting the camera ready (note to self: 1st rule, bring your camera, 2nd rule: GET IT SET UP BEFORE YOU LEAVE).

First things first, get a shot "in the can" before it flies away. Quite the challenge cause one dog is pulling to go sniff the grass and the other is using my calf as a rubbing post to scratch his muzzle. Nice shot though, huh?!

I was afraid to move directly toward the bird just to get it's feet in the shot, and I knew there was a better angle anyway, so we moved ever so slowly down the grassy slope, angling away, and got lucky. He didn't move an inch.

I sat down in the grass to minimize my presence, but mostly to give myself a stable platform by propping my elbows on my knees. I got several shots of him just sitting the looking left, then right, then back left and back.... .... (sad, what I'll do for humor's sake, huh?!).Nice shots, but the one on the grassy knoll looked just as good, so I chose it for this post.

I'd shoot a few, scootch down a tad closer and shoot more of the same. I finally got close enough to bother him (her?), cause he turned and sauntered off. We followed (my dogs were doing great once they got the hang of it!) to see what would happen next.

I'm watching him through the viewfinder when movement to my left catches my eye. Another Heron (the tall skinny kind) swoops in and lands right next to this guy and starts fishing. Caught a great one of him, but things happened so fast I couldn't change camera settings to get both birds in focus. So I shot what I could, and as I'm trying to changes settings he takes off...

During the short time Big Bird was there, Little Bird is snubbing him. He didn't move, looking off to his right till Big Bird walked off around the corner and out of view.

Little Bird turns back toward the water and spends some time preening his feathers (or scratching an itch - who knows, I don't know birds):

I guess we moved in too close or too much. While I was resetting my position Little Bird flew away. I thought we were done, and we climbed up the hill and resumed our walk. Crossed a small bridge and what do you know, there he was on the other side. This is the closest I've been to him, and despite the fact he's partially hidden behind some tall grass I caught this shot:

I could have cropped this into a head shot, but I actually like the sense of hiding inside a pocket of foliage, so I kept it as I shot it.

Ok, so you've seen all these nice images, all nicely focused (except the 2-bird shot) yes? I shot these with my 100-400 Image Stabilizing (IS) lens so you'd expect them to be sharply focused. However, throughout the time working these birds I thought I must have the zitters cause I couldn't seem to hold the camera steady. I worried that none of these shots were going to turn out.

Half way through the remainder of the walk it hit me, so I checked. Sure enough, IS was turned off!! Geez, how could I have missed that?! (Rule 2B: be sure to check ALL your settings!!!).

I've mentioned to some that I'm struggling with this lens/body combination - seems to give me soft focus no matter what I do. Imagine my surprise to see that over 80% of these pictures were focused better than any images I've shot with IS on...

Hmmmm....... Well, I'll ponder that while I'm washing the grass stains outa my clothes...

Hope you enjoy.

Oh Snap! Birds adrift

First, a little kick in the pants... Yesterday I left the camera behind while we went for our morning walk around Windsor Lake. Reason? How many ways can you shoot the same birds relaxing in the water? Or taking off, or sitting in a tree? I figured I'd shot everything there was to shoot there.

So of course we no sooner start our walk when we came across a pack (family?) of 5 red foxes hanging out at the old Eaton House. They spied us as we stopped, but of course since I didn't have my camera they pretty much ignored us. They played together, climbed on things and each other and pretty much just stayed there unperturbed by our presence.

(sigh, whimper, whine)... ...

So this morning, despite the fact our planned route had nothing of photographic interest, I took my camera. And am I glad I did!

There's this tiny lake just off the path. I've never see anything of interest along it. This morning it had a large group of Pelican's, and one Heron. When we first passed them, the pelican's were on the far side of the lake. As we passed again on the return leg, there was a small group on our side.

Here's what I caught:

First, a note - with respect to the pelicans, I wish I'd shot video instead of stills. There was one pelican facing straight at me, slowly drifting sideways. For whatever reason he drifted slower than the pelicans that passed behind him. It was so cool to watch!

I had no clue how to show this with stills. This series is the best I could come up with.

Pretty cool, huh?

I had my eye glued to the viewfinder and didn't see this fellow stop by. He wasn't there when I sat down to shoot the pelicans, and I'm glad I spotted him before I stood up. If I hadn't, my bet is he would have flown away. I've never been able to get this close before.

Typical pose for these guys,

looks much cooler on this pole!

A little stretch...

Then on to other fishing spots.

This guy actually hung around a bit before taking off. Didn't do much more than what you see here. Looked left, then right, then stood on one leg awhile. Stretched, then took off. Not necessarily in that order....

Hope you enjoy.

Golf-n-Stuff

Monday last week, I had an opportunity to join a friend that was shooting a charity golf event. The chance to visit my old friend was a great treat, and the photography wasn't bad either!

Most of the shots I captured are good enough for those that attended, but 2 stood out for me:

This guy let me get right behind him with my wide angle lens for this shot. I timed it so I caught him just as he hit the ball.. hmmm... maybe I shoulda waited half a second more.... (insert V8 moment here)

I have to wonder if this club is legal? At the least, he's going to overshoot the ball if he doesn't back up! Can't wait to see the divot this monster creates! Actually, it's another wide angle shot. I like how it distorts the club as it passes by my head. If you've used a wide angle lens before, you have a good idea how close I had to get shooting at 16mm...

This green is on top of the ridge on the west side. Yeah, I know - nobody's there. That's cause nobody was there!!! The wind was blowing like crazy, and though we waited around for quite awhile, no one showed up to play it. The wind was strong enough, my friend had to stand in as a VALP (Voice Activated Leaning Post). You might think at first that the picture is tilted, but it's not the picture, it's the trees and flagpole!

South of the golf club is this new skyscaper - well, half a skyscraper I should say. You're seeing pretty much all but the bottom 2-3 floors in this shot. But framed like this it gives a feeling that it's larger. At least it does to me...

Hope you enjoy...

Just love them Eagles...

This morning's walk took us back out to Windsor lake, and we had an interesting sky. Everything to the west was clear without a single cloud, while looking east was filled with light-to-dark cloud cover. I wasn't expecting much of anything but brought my camera along, just in case - and guess what?!

The eagles were back - the adult and the youngster. And this time they hung around instead of flying off before I could get close enough. The dogs and I hung out by their tree for a good 20 minutes and they never moved.

They pretty much ignored us while we hung around and made little clicking noises with the camera (what other word would you use for the noise the shutter makes? Clunk??).

Is it just me, or is the youngster on top bigger than the adult? I'm told it's a youngster cause it hasn't gotten it's white feathers yet... I'm not a bird expert, just love to shoot them (no Virginia, I only use a camera).

Ever see an eagle yawn? This guy (gal?) rolled his head like we roll our eyes while it yawned. Was cool to watch, and I love this shot cause it seems like he's actually talking.

The first set of images I captured was a bit dull due to the clouds behind me. But as they moved eastward, the sun popped out and the sky behind the birds suddenly turned a deep blue and the yellow leaves started to really pop! I was watching through my viewfinder when it happened - way cool thing to watch!

Back to the birds: the entire time we were there, these guys did just what you see - nothing (sigh). Well, the adult left while my back was turned the first time we started to leave. The youngster stayed there, and stayed there and so on and more staying. I finally gave up on him leaving so we finished our walk around the lake. As I loaded the dogs into the truck I took one last look and he was still just hanging out on that same branch.

OH there is one set of shots I chose not to share: at one point I thought the youngster was about to fly away so I started shooting. Unfortunately, he was just taking a dump.Didn't think you'd want to see that... ... but I'll happily post the best of the lot if enough people want to see it! Anybody? Anybody? Bueller???

As we left, I glanced to the south and found the symmetry of this last shot quite interesting...