http://www.birdwatchersdigest.net/cd1000 Mon, 05 Oct 2009 02:46:28 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Not too far from the Common Loon, this Red-throated Loon was diving and resurfacing.   I kept moving the car to try and anticipate where it would resurface – I call that The Game.   Finally it rested on the surface for a while, did a little preening, and flapped.   The sequence ... http://www.birdwatchersdigest.net/cd1000/?p=395 Another dark bird on an overcast day, placed against a gray background.   Now the dark head and the white breast are competing, and shooting the image in JPEG format limited the options I had for drawing out the details in both those extremes.    In hindsight, I probably should have switched ... http://www.birdwatchersdigest.net/cd1000/?p=394 An all-black bird against a light background under overcast skies is a VERY challenging photo.   The camera’s light meter either sees too much of the background and turns the bird into a silhouette, while a spot-meter reading on the bird gives a gray bird with blown-out highlights that is tricky ... http://www.birdwatchersdigest.net/cd1000/?p=393 A drizzly day in Crescent City, the waterfowl were not cooperating, so I parked over by the lighthouse and aimed the camera at the thicket of vines and blackberry canes.   A few squeaks and “pishhing” noises, and up came the Fox Sparrow.    These West-coast Foxes are very different-looking than our ... http://www.birdwatchersdigest.net/cd1000/?p=392 Yes, I know, this is the third Orange-crowned picture I have put into CD 1000!   Well, I kept getting better shots.    This also illustrates the process of taking nature photos – yesterday’s masterpiece can be bettered tomorrow.    The light had become pretty poor, and I was about ready to quit ... http://www.birdwatchersdigest.net/cd1000/?p=391 The western races of Lesser Goldfinch tend to have green-backed males, while the ones I see at my feeder in TX are the black-backed type.   This one was in Oregon, but one of these days I hope to see a similar one at my house in TX.   You can see ... http://www.birdwatchersdigest.net/cd1000/?p=390 Now, THIS ONE gets a lot of “WOW”s!    It is one of my favorite digiscoping shots to date. We were in Kalmath Falls itself, and there was a flock of Ring-billed Gulls hanging around the edge of the river.  The gulls were in spectacular breeding plumage – bright white feathers, bill and soft ... http://www.birdwatchersdigest.net/cd1000/?p=389 Just a few hundred yards down from the snipe, there was a flock of “Speckle-bellies” both on the water and up on the grassy bank.   The light was coming from a decent angle, but I struggled with framing and the way the birds were composed.    It was pretty annoying, especially ... http://www.birdwatchersdigest.net/cd1000/?p=388 This one is a pure digiscope “grab shot”.   I spotted a bird along the edge of the marsh, pulled up and stopped the car, slipped the scope and window mount into place and shot half a dozen photos of the snipe “hiding in plain sight”.    After a few seconds it ... http://www.birdwatchersdigest.net/cd1000/?p=387 As we drove around the refuge looking at the ducks and geese, there were a few swans at long distance.   We found a nearer one, but the light was not great – coming from the right and backlit.   Ugh.   The swan was swimming left, away from the light, placing the ... http://www.birdwatchersdigest.net/cd1000/?p=386