It’s just turned February and the feeders are under attack by a dozen or so Goldfinches, which we haven’t seen in months. They are pretty good at hovering while they wait their turn at a feeding post while others wait in the nearby trees. I caught this guy waiting on a branch in a brisk breeze.
I had to crop the picture pretty dramatically to get this framing and pump up the vibrance and reduce the noise a bit to reach this final.
Camera: Nikon D7100 • ISO 640 • 300mm • -0.67 ev • f/5.6 • 1/640
These two were taking some time out in the day to digest their food and observe the wonders. They lounge out here quite often, noticed as we walk by a window and glanced.
Camera: Nikon D7100 • ISO 6400 • 300mm • -0.67 ev • f/5.6 • 1/500
This fawn was resting near her mama on the path down to our lake dock. We see them around most of the year as the graze around and then find a spot to lay and digest. The horse pasture is one of their favorite grazing areas
I capture this image from our dinning room window with a 300mm Nikon lens.
Camera: Nikon D7100 • ISO 6400 • 300mm • -0.67 ev • f/5.6 • 1/500
This was probably the closet I’ve come to a bald eagle I was photographing. We were in a neighbor’s boat when these two guys started flying around us.
Camera: Nikon D7100 • ISO 500 • 240mm • -0.67 ev • f/6.3 • 1/500
I caught this guy in the grass, saying, “Aaaaaah.” We were walking around the Magnolia Plantation and Gardens and caught lots of pictures of wildlife.
Camera: Nikon D7100 • ISO 100 • 165mm • -0.67 ev • f/13 • 1/200
This was my first Paleated Woodpecker. He was working a tree above “Bubba Pond,” where bubba the giant alligator lives. I got lots of pictures that day wondering around the Magnolia Plantation and Gardens near Charleston, SC.
Camera: Nikon D7100 • ISO 1400 • 300mm • -0.67 ev • f/13 • 1/640
I’ve seen them do this before, balling up. It wasn’t especially cold, and none of the other gulls were acting like this, but I was glad that I caught this one. I used Photomatix Pro to pump up the color and the texture.
We spent part of the afternoon walking around Copperhead Island at Lake Wylie. The first cove we encountered held about a dozen resting cormorants and a whole hill of Coots (not shown here).
This photo was taken through the trees and there were a number of out-of-focus branches and twigs in the way. I used the gradient tool in Adobe Lightroom to brighten up the right side of the photo, which erased the twits and branches.
The baffle is the stopper. If the squirrel enters the baffle, looking for food, it gets lost and finally comes out the bottom. There is part of me that is eager for this pest to experience the terror of the dark. But they’re still a cute creature.
This photo is a result of some HDR post processing for better color and texture. It’s rare to find wildlife so willing to stand still for it.
These deer waited in some trees to the right until they apparent found the appropriate moment to dash across the street in front of us.
This photo took a great deal of post processing, including an initial HDR treatment with PhotoMatix Pro. Then I divided the photo into layers in Photoshop, masked out the animals, and then applied a motion blur on the background to convey more of a sense of motion and speed.
