Backdoor Hippie's 365-ish Days of Looking Out The Window

I debated strongly about doing a 365, but life can get such that there are days when a camera is the last thing on your mind. So, I decided last year that if nothing else I would do something that both carried a specific theme and allowed me to take a break during the day while I'm working at home without the stress of having to "go out and take some pictures" when work got crazy.

Therefore, I give you what will amount to a photo-a-day from my office window, which just happens to be 2 doors down from my bedroom at home. I'm hoping to keep this interesting for both me and you guys. Best part is that with my wife home all day I have a spotter for any excitement in the area.

So for day one January 2, 2013, I give you a buck or two. I'm going to try and get the window open for most of these, but these were through glass.





(and the EXIF data reminds me it's time to change the copyright info on my cameras!!)

I know folks that do this, my hat off to them,,

My mind does not work quite that way, I think more of a photo session, first with place, time slot, and then what type of equipment do I want to tailor for the occassion.

A photo session may be 15 minutes, or half a day, but still a dedicated time slot for the sake of photography, and of course the post time on the computer is 1:1 to the shoot time.

The nice thing about the post time processing is that it can occur anytime, often while watching TV.

The risk of ot taking daily pictures of course is that gear will only collect dust...

No risk of my gear gathering dust, I can assure you of that. While I would love to be able to plan my work days, the nature of my job means that I can go from wide-open day to "OMG, I need to come up for air" in a matter of minutes. My office window is a glimpse into where I'd rather be, but it's active enough that between sunrises, birds and critters I can probably find something interesting. For me, I'm a grab and go photographer who almost never leaves home without one, so I'm looking to this as a way of disciplining myself to find something new in what I look at every day. Figuring I probably work 220-240 days a year that's a lot of stuff to find in one year, but I'm looking forward to the challenge.

great,, enjoy the shooting.

Nice idea Jake!

Getting today out of the way early...

"Sharp Shinned Hawk by Dawn's Early Light" - waking up and looking for breakfast.



A little fuzzy, but for 500mm at 1/40 I will take it. On a monopod.

A busy day outside the window. It's Friday, so if I'm lucky I won't be in there until Monday, so you get some extras to get you through the weekend...

Just after breakfast the neighbor's cat, who loves the critter friendly environment, finds hers



Tufted Titmouse does some acrobatic feeding...



And a Pileated Woodpecker paid a visit just after lunch...

Love the piliated woodpecker shots!!

That poor guys messed up in the head! Really, that's a messed up looking head. Admittedly not as funny looking as that spoonbill bird I've seen on here, or some of those strange headless birds I've also seen on here.

We have a lot of downy woodpeckers around here. We also have the piliated woodpeckers, but we hear them more often than see them. They are definitely odd-looking birds. Must be all those bugs & grubs they eat.

piperbarb said:

We have a lot of downy woodpeckers around here. We also have the piliated woodpeckers, but we hear them more often than see them. They are definitely odd-looking birds. Must be all those bugs & grubs they eat.

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The nice thing about Pileateds are that they're loud, so I can hear them through the closed windows, and they're BIG (about the same size as a Sharp-Shinned Hawk), so if they're in the yard you can usually spot them if they're not on the back side of the tree (which is where they always seem to hide!!). We have a pair that makes their way up and down the tree line that runs down our street every so often. They are particularly fond of a cherry tree in our yard and will cover the entire thing from bottom to top on most visits.

Alas, as I feared it might, life and work have complicated my time and the idea of moving forward with an even mostly-daily "out the office window" project is not going to happen. I could force it, posting hurried and uninteresting photos just to check the day off. But I believe you'd be getting a lot of pseudo-sunrises as I snap a photo walking in first thing, and was left with no other time. Or a hurried "find one last critter while you still have light" shot at the end of the day.

So while I'm abandoning the "365" nature of the project, the fact is that I should have opportunities to follow through and I'll keep this going as a themed project, promising to get you all at least something every week.

Do a weekly... Project 52

That's more or less what this will become.

BackdoorHippie said:

That's more or less what this will become.

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I am thinking mine will become the same as my roster is week on week off and it would mean I can concentrate on using my D800 and not my crappy iphone.

Managed to squeak one in last week, even if I didn't get a chance to process it until this past weekend.

This week, however, has started out rather busy. A mother white-tailed deer and two yearlings have made almost daily pilgrimages to our yard to pick under the feeders. I don't always catch them, but they leave reminders that they've been here, which I spot when I head out to fill them. Yesterday they made several appearances. Thought about the tryptic thing, but decided I've got other ideas and that this thread is sorely lacking.

BackdoorHippie said:

This week, however, has started out rather busy. A mother white-tailed deer and two yearlings have made almost daily pilgrimages to our yard to pick under the feeders. I don't always catch them, but they leave reminders that they've been here, which I spot when I head out to fill them. Yesterday they made several appearances. Thought about the tryptic thing, but decided I've got other ideas and that this thread is sorely lacking.

Click to expand...

You have some very nice shots here. It must be nice to have your subjects come to you, that would be handy.

Very handy indeed!! Especially when the hours I have to get out and shoot during daylight is restricted thanks to the need to earn a living.

In a desperate attempt to keep this going, here's another from the end of last week. This week it will require great conviction for me to open the office window and face the temperatures on the other side. We'll see how I do. LOL