The Little Things In Life....

On the beach in Bonita Beach, FL again. Early morning, low light and these cute little birds just never stop running!!! Very hard to track with your camera and difficult to get in focus! With the low light, I'm shooting at ISO 1600, which is the practical limit for my D300. Any higher and the image just gets too grainy. And you've got to watch out for the shell collectors, who will run you over if you are in their way!

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More to come as I get time to work on the images..... can't let my beer get warm!!! 

Frost Free

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We have finally made it to sunny Florida!!! We got out on the beach this morning for some bird pics and I thought you might like this one! GBH are a common sight down here on the beaches, but for a northerner it was a bit of a strange sight! More to come as I do some more post-processing!

Road Trip

We decided to skip work on Wednesday and take a trip to Longwood Gardens, near Philadelphia. If you are a flower lover or a photographer, or both, this place should be on your bucket list! Over a thousand acres of beautiful gardens and architecture, Longwood is the former estate of the Dupont family. 

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We couldn't have picked a better day temperature wise but the wind was blowing, making outdoor flower photography very challenging. Fortunately the garden also has a large conservatory with plenty of photo ops. This Orchid photo was taken inside and the reason I picked this flower was that I had never seen this many blooms so close together on an Orchid. And all the blooms were in good shape and all pointing in the same direction, so I knew I had to try and get a good pic! I call this image "six-pack" and I hope you like it.....

Cabin Fever

I knew that Saturday was going to be a nice day, so I grabbed the D300 and headed for the sports complex at BU. The girls had a game against UNH and I needed to clear the cobwebs after not shooting much for the last month. I had never shot lacrosse before so I was excited to try something new.

The day was filled with brilliant sunshine which can also fill your images with deep shadows, but all in all I got some decent pics. I was handicapped because I couldn't get inside the gate onto the field (you need a special pass), and the 70-200 f2.8 was just a little too short in focal length. I had my 1.7 teleconverter with me, but I was a bit disappointed with the results. I went back to just the 70-200 and my keeper ratio went back up. Most of the pics are shot at 1/1600-1/2000 sec., with aperture around 5.6. I'm hoping to get a media pass soon so I can get some really good pics! More to come....

Orchids at the Cooperative Gallery

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Today we were the guests of the Cooperative Gallery on State Street in Binghamton. Gallery member Geof Gould was nice enough to invite us down to shoot some orchids that were going to be part of the Orchid Society competition. Of course we couldn't refuse!! Everyone got some good shots and it was a fun afternoon with friends and a good learning experience for us all. We decided the next flower foray will be at the Cornell Plantations. Stay tuned!

Molly & Mary do it right....

Remember, Molly is the nice one....​

On Saturday we were lucky enough to have the dynamic duo of Molly Isaacs and Mary Lindhjem as featured speakers at the 2013 Teach-In, sponsored by the Two Rivers Photography Club. If you don't know who Molly & Mary are, head over to their website Awake the Light​, and get acquainted. In addition to being highly regarded photographers and educators, they are actually very funny. The constant banter between the two makes for a light-hearted way to spend a day and it is a pleasure to watch two photographers who really enjoy what they are doing. And I believe that they were successful in convincing several people to try Lightroom after M&M showed them that they didn't have to spend hours in front of the computer to get terrific images.

If you weren't able to attend last weekend, Molly & Mary will be at the NECCC Conference this summer, which many of the photo club members attend. I'm sure we'll have more information about NECCC at our upcoming club meetings. If you do get a chance to go, tell them I said Hi! And remember, Mary Molly is the nice one......​

Dinosaur found in Apalachin!!

I know, I know, I can hear the snide comments already. Yes, it's true. The old guy is actually going to start posting once or twice a week. I figured it was time to take a leap into the deep end of the pool and get up to speed with the rest of you. I'm going to try and be informative without being particularly serious, so don't expect anything too deep. But between what I'm doing personally and what is happening with the photo club, I think I'll have enough info to justify a blog post. If I don't.... I'll make something up!!