The sun is shining here in Northwest Ohio, but it is still cold.  Hoping that golf season would start, but again we wait.  Here is an image I call Flight 25.  I know, its a boring title.  But I could spend hours coming up with new and descriptive titles for the posts of Eagles in flight from my recent trip to Alaska, but there are better things to do around the office and posting images of Bald Eagles is one of them.  In addition, I have already started posting images to a hard bound book I am working on for future publication. I have many flight shots from my trip and this is one of my favorites.  So much so that I chose this for the cover of the book.  It didn’t hurt that I had a lot of blue sky to the right where type would go giving a Title to my book.  For many of these flight shots I was using a short telephoto zoom lens.  We were working from a boat for most of the flight shots and I was able to capture many images.  The trick is to try and catch them in the air as they approached the boat and then follow them with my focus button until the time to trip the shutter.  Since my camera gave me 8 frames per second, I was able to get a large number of flight shots illustrating many different facets of Bald Eagles in flight.  So ignore the boring title and enjoy the beautiful image capture of a Bald Eagle in Flight.  More to come!  Enjoy!

Here is another image from my experience photographing Snowy Owls in Quebec, Canada.  This is an image capture of a female Owl as she takes flight.  Watching these owls for a while you can get a sense as to when they might be lifting off and taking flight.  Timing is everything and I think I captured a really nice angle here with this one image.  The female Owls have the brown feathers or “burrowing” that you see here in this frame.  The males are all white and are often times difficult to locate.  We did find a male a few hours away and were able to track him down.  We spent several hours trying to get the best images.  He was very skittish and hesitant to come near us.  Although there wre only 6 or 7 of us in a group, he stayed quite a ways away from us on a fence or in a tree waiting and watching for food to present itself to him.  Below left is an image of the Male Snowy Owl.

We were provided many opportunities to photograph the female owls, but this male was very illusive.  One interesting fact about Snowy Owls is that they are monogamous.   They will only mate with one female.  In the winter when the Owls leave their Arctic territory and fly elsewhere, the male and female may not winter in the same location.  Upon returning to their Arctic home they will reconnect for mating season.  They spend months away from each other but reunite during the summer months having travelled many miles from their winter hideouts to their mating territory up north.

Photographing Birds in any weather is fun and exciting.  I am currently preparing to fly off to Alaska to photograph American Eagles along the coast.  Returning at the end of March I will have many images to share with you.  We just survived winter storm Rocky and are looking forward to an early spring.  Enjoy!

February is a great time to go looking for Snowy Owls.  These Owls can be found in Ontario and Quebec north into Canada.  This particular bird was found in a farmers field around Quebec City, Quebec.  Snowy Owls are pretty territorial.  When winter comes they fly down from the Arctic region where they spend the summer, and usually return to an area that they visited before.  Our guides were able to track these birds through the use of GPS.  Once they established a way point where a Snowy was known to frequent, they generally found them there each and everyday while they stayed in the area.  While photographing these birds we also saw them get a little aggressive with other Snowy Owls that came into their area.  Each bird flew higher and higher among the trees and structures showing off how high they could fly.  Once one of them established a dominant position, the other bird quickly flew away.

It was fun photographing these Owls.  I was using my 200 to 400 mm zoom lens with a 1.7 tele converter on it.  This was usually enough reach to get good close up images of the Snowys.  Our guides had brought a few mice with them incase there wasn’t any food in the area.  The snow this particular season was not very deep and food was quite plentiful.  Patience was the key here as these birds only ate when they were hungry.  If they had just found a mouse or Vol to eat, they would fly back to their perch and stay away until they were hungry again.  Sometimes this was a 20-30 minute break in our shooting.  Standing around in 10 degree weather waiting for an owl to have her lunch is a bit crazy.  We were pacing back and forth to make sure we were keeping blood to our feet so our toes would’nt freeze.  We were dressed for the weather but sitting around wasn’t helping us keep warm.  I have been told that there have been sightings of Snowy Owls here in Northwest Ohio near the lake.  I have yet to see one, but will continue my search while the weather remains cold and the snow continues to fly.  Enjoy!

Its another cold day in February here in Northwest Ohio and yet, the sun is shining.  We had a very beautiful sunrise and sunset over the last few days.  A little color to brighten the dreary days of mid winter.  Here is an image I captured of a juvenile mountain lion.  He was quite playful and loved to climb up onto the rocks and logs found in the compound where he was living.  Even though he was living on a game farm, we had to remember that he was still a wild animal.  Just look at the talons on this cat.  One quick swipe at a photographer and there would be some serious damage.  He looks like a cute little kitty who could take out your heart in a minute and have some lunch.  Yeesh!  At least we were working with guides who were trained to work with these animals and help us to capture the images that we wanted to add to our portfolio.

Images like these can be found in your own community if you have a nice Zoo.  Here in Toledo we have one of the best in the country and many families can be found photographing the animals, even on a day like today.  Most Zoos have been converting from their traditional cage views into more natural habitats.  This really helps the families take better pictures because the surrounding areas are better than shooting through the bars of a cage or around a chain link fence.  Even so, caution is best to help preserve the safety of yourself and your family, as well as the well being of the animal.  Too many times we read about incidents where people are injured while interacting with animals in a local zoo.  Wild animals are dangerous in any environment.  I encourage you to take your camera to your local Zoo and see what interesting images you can bring home with you.  But always remember to practice good safety techniques and do your best not to aggravate the animals.  Enjoy!

I’m back!!  Having just returned from a little R&R in the Caribbean, I’m back to posting my usual three times a week.  In my last post I showed you a close up image of “Skywalker” a hot air balloon I photographed during my trip to Monument Valley last year.   Here is another image that I like as well.  As the Balloonist moved away from us up and over the monuments, I captured this close cropped pic as he ascended into the beautiful morning sky.  Cropping in and outside of your camera is a true artistic aspect of photography.  Often times how you crop an image can add to the dynamic of the photograph that you want your viewers to see.  Is there a right way or a wrong way to crop an image?  You bet!

Often times our cropping is done in camera with no thought as to what we are doing.  Clipped edges of trees, cutting the image too close on the sides, or just cropping for the sake of cropping can cause the image to look like you just didn’t have in mind what you wanted to do.  They often times look like you made a mistake and clipped off the edges.  This gives the viewer a misguided or misdirected thought about what you were seeing when you tripped the shutter.  If you feel the need to crop in or outside of the camera, do so dramatically with an artistic approach.  Don’t just clip off a tree branch here or there, crop it with flair so that the viewer can tell that you intended to frame your subject one way or another.  Creative cropping is a compositional tool that can bring a ho hum image into a real and powerful piece of art.  So take a few minutes while framing your subject and make the dramatic crop that is needed to make your image jump out at the viewer.  Remember to “Like” this image on Facebook, give it a +1 on Google+, or “Pinit” on Pinterest.  Enjoy!

I am off to the beach for some well deserved R & R!  See you in ten days or so!

My wednesday post on thursday.  What can I say, busy day.  This is an image that I like to look for when I am walking through the park in the fall.  It is a super wide angle shot up through the trees.  The super wide lens is a Nikkor 16mm f/2.8.  Its a fish eye lens, that is why you see the trees curving in towards the center of the image.  I like the color, the look, and the sense of scale that the 16mm gives to this image.  Different lenses provide a different angle of view and more.  This lens has a tendency to show the curve of the earth when using it in its normal landscape view.  This is one situation where you need to place the horizon smack in the middle of the photograph or you will see rounded edges to the horizon.  The edges curl down if you aim too high in the frame up if you aim too low.  You can certainly do some creative cropping after the fact to provide a more pleasing photograph.

This image capture was a bit challenging as you are shooting right up into the sky.  Time of day could have an impact depending on where the sun is.  This was taken in the fall while traveling through the Black Hills of South Dakota. Since I was in fall, the light was a bit diffused as the sun was on a lower angle than it would have been in mid summer.  The clouds helped a bit as they moved over the area and added a little bit more dynamic to the frame.  Remember to “Like” this post on Facebook, give it a plus 1 on Google+, or Pinit on pinterest.  Thanks for stopping by, enjoy!

As we ring in in the new year I wanted to personally thank all of you that follow this blog.  Your comments throughout the year have been well received and I look forward to sharing more with you in the coming year.  On behalf of my wife Elizabeth and all of us here at New Dawn Photography, we wish you and yours a very happy and prosperous new year!

Along the Blue Ridge Parkway in Virginia, I found a really nice waterfall.  Parking was nearby and there was a short walk to the falls.  Along the short walk was the Logging Railway which I have shown in previous posts.  Climb a few steps, walk along the rail, find a path to the falls and there you are.  Upon departing from photographing the falls I wandered around a little looking for other interesting compositions.  I found one close to the road as the water run off from the falls came under the railway and out under the roadway.  I really liked the way it looked and the color rendition of this image is quite nice.  For this post I wanted to show it in Black and White.  The dynamics in this image is the various textures found in this photograph.  I really like the way the water flows through the rocks and gives a sense of quiet rushing water located in a woodsy area.  Quite surreal.

Many times we see an image and get caught up in the beauty and dynamics of a shot.  We spend a lot of time looking at it and capturing the essence of the scene over a period of time.  In some cases, we get so wrapped up in a certain location we miss some truly great images nearby. Wandering around with just my camera in hand often times helps me find new and exciting ways to express my wonder of the things we find in our environment.  This image demonstrates how a man-made item, the logging rail, can be used as the Background for a great landscape photograph.  As landscape photographers we are often times put off by the “hand of man” and their impact on the environment.  In this case, the rail tells us a story about the way things were along the Blue Ridge mountains at a more simpler time in our history.  Although it impacts the overall landscape, it also allows for a quick look at those who came before us and provide us with a photo opportunity that goes beyond a typical landscape view of life.  Enjoy!

The house is over run by Santa Claus Images.  Statues, candles, Stuffed Santas, Red Santas, Gold Santas, Crystal Santas, and even a Santa Moose.  During this special time of year, my wife Elizabeth and I would like to wish each and everyone of you a Merry Christmas.  Here is hoping that you and your families will have a joyous holiday season and look forward to a very prosperous New Year.  From our family to yours, Have a great Holiday. Be safe and pray for a brighter future for all of us.  Enjoy!