Clovis' Nikon Nuggets

Clovishound

Clovishound

Senior Member
The Pup and I went back to Magnolia today. Not my best day of shooting. There were a few OK images.

These turtles were either very brave, or very stupid. I didn't count on the way back to see if they all survived.

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This was a solid photo, IMO, although nothing to alert the press about.


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Lots of these little warblers around, although they were very small, so I had to try and get as close as possible. Still had to crop a good bit, and it was in deep shade, so I had a high ISO. Topaz to the rescue.

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Spent a lot of time looking through the viewfinder, and waiting for this hawk to make his move from his perch in a tree. As soon as I got distracted by an egret nearby, he swooped down and grabbed a crawdad. This was the only one I managed to get that was in focus and showed his face. Oh well, maybe next time.


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The Pup wanted a picture of these very small flowers, but didn't want to swap lenses. I had my 105 macro mounted, so I took a few. Looked better after transferring to the computer than I thought it would.

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Clovishound

Clovishound

Senior Member
Mating season for them will be starting here soon. I usually only take gator pictures when there isn't much else to take pictures of. It's kind of like shooting fish in a barrel at some of these spots.
 
Clovishound

Clovishound

Senior Member
The Pup and I made it back down to downtown Charleston today. I've got a few more to edit. I find myself emulating the Pup's style a lot when shooting there. Here are a few.

I tried a lot in B&W, most were a toss up between them and the color. This one was hands down B&W.

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I took a bunch of different iterations of this window and reflection. Several worked for me, but this one seemed like the best. I like the ghost image of the bottles behind the glass.

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I rarely use square aspect ratios, but this one really cried out for it. There was a deadbolt to the right that was distracting.

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I want to say I have shot this roofline before. An interesting sky helps make the image. I think it's a nice mix of geometric shapes and colors. The cupola helps to anchor the image IMO.

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Clovishound

Clovishound

Senior Member
Close. It was a shot of the gutter in front of my house after a rainstorm. The pollen coated the top of the water, and caught my eye when I went out to check the mail. I swear you could put this up with a group of aerial photos of estuaries and you wouldn't think twice about it being taken from an airplane.
 
Clovishound

Clovishound

Senior Member
Magnolia again. I've got a lot more to edit, but thought I'd post the few I choose as the ones to edit first.

This little blue heron put on a show for us. I've got several more shots of him on my edit list, so there may be more to come. Hopefully there will be some gems in them. Right now I'm tired from traipsing around the woods with 30 lbs of gear, and a little burned out on editing.

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This is nice and sharp, has lots of color, but lacks the artistic quality I'm looking for these days. I guess you can't win them all. Still, it's not a bad image. I would have been very happy with it back in my film days, and the Pup liked this one.

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Clovishound

Clovishound

Senior Member
Missed it by "that much"! I was at the Audubon Swamp Garden this morning and there was a nice moon still visible. I had my camera set up and was experimenting with some different AF modes for BIF. All of a sudden I hear a flock of geese approaching. I line up the camera with the moon and briefly waited for the geese to arrive. They came in frame and I fired off at the blazing 4 1/2 FPS on my Z5. The camera grabbed onto the moon for focus and the geese were, well, fuzzy. If I had reverted to my normal BIF AF settings I likely would have gotten a lock on the geese.

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I did get one shot of them in focus after they passed the moon, but had some very out of focus branches in front of them. I tried my hand at taking the moon from one shot and pasting it into the other and cleaning up the branches. This is not something I will put forward as anything but an experiment. And, yes, the fourth goose from the left looks a little weird. It was behind a fairly large branch and I was unable to clean it up to look natural. I tried removing it, but it looked odd with an obvious hole in the formation, and I had a bit of ghost remnants left from the branch I just couldn't get rid of at my skill level. I'm not into cutting and pasting from one image to another and replacing skies, but just wanted to see what the image might have looked a little like if it had gone according to plan.

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Marilynne

Marilynne

Administrator
Staff member
Super Mod
I got a plane crossing the moon this morning. Haven't processed it yet.

Also tried getting a wood stork with the moon in the background but the stork was too close to me.
 
Clovishound

Clovishound

Senior Member
OK, I thought about this some this morning and figured out a better way to get what I more or less should have gotten.

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Clovishound

Clovishound

Senior Member
Got out to the Beidler Forest today. Not thrilled with any of them, but a few keepers.

The Prothonotary Warblers have arrived. They aren't nesting yet. They are rather small, and it is rather dark under the canopy, making things difficult.


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This night heron was rather cooperative. Let me get pretty close. The railing wasn't the best backdrop, and there was a hard shadow falling across his body. I was able to minimize the shadow, but nothing much to be done about the backdrop.


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I took this one for irony's sake.


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