With the upcoming photography teaching event and photo walk I will be teaching at Clay Pit Ponds State Park Preserve I decided to shoot a little before going over some of the presentation. I am without my wildlife lenses unfortunately as they are being serviced, so to landscapes it is! The skies were cloudy and a fresh painting of snow had touched the landscape. Before I even took the camera out of the car I knew I was going to shoot for HDR (High Dynamic Range.)

One thing I love about HDR is what it does to the clouds. It adds an incredible amount of drama. If you ever underexpose a shot heavily with stormy skies you will see what I mean. I am working on a tripod 90% of the time when working with HDR. You need to make sure all the images will easily overlay and line up to reduce any artifacts. The one problem too is wind. Zoomed in you can see a few branches that look like they are ghosting due to the wind. I could have not shot the image, but I felt it didn’t suffer because of it. Once I had my tripod I stopped down for a large depth of field and I usually start with no exposure compensation. In typical scenes like these a 5-stop range of light will cover my needs. I go into my cameras bracketing function and set it for a total of 5 images. A normal meter reading, -1 underexposed, -2 underexposed , +1 overexposed, +2 over exposed. Then from those images I will compile them all later in Photo Matrix Pro to get the image I desire. There are a ton of sliders in photomatrix and I push and pull them until the image feels just right. A tip I use to know when I shot a 5-image sequence when reviewing my images from the day is to go back to a single exposure shot and photograph my hand. It’s a signal to me that before that shot is my sequence. I took a total of 8 HDR sequences and trying to keep up amongst all the other photos can be a blur. I got the tip from Matt Kloskowski at DTownTV for shooting panoramas. I would take a lot of images and not knowing where one starts and one begins can drive you nuts!

Notice something in this image that wasn’t in the last? Same location, but there are no foot prints! I actually walked back in my own foot prints to keep this look going. The HDR technique really brought out the detail in the depth of the snow.

I was captivated by this one walkway. It is just across Sharrotts road near the park and I was the first one to step foot there. Well besides the wildlife at least. I ran this through Silver Efex Pro and choose the Dark Sepia filter. No adjustments beyond that. This is the same image as the first one posted.

I wanted to shoot some images that weren’t HDR. Although I enjoy HDR photographs I don’t like to fill a location with them. The advantage is I keep all 5 shots so I could pluck out an exposure I like. These non HDR images however were shot for the sole purpose of not using HDR. I used the Pro Contrast filter in Color eFex pro that made my whites bright and crisped up the edges.

I also ran it in B&W. Although I realize most of these images are  the same location/position there are subtle differences. We all too often walk by a scene as something we have seen before. Something that has been photographed and we have grown tired off. Don’t get me wrong I have done it too. I try and correct myself when I do so however. I try and remember that every moment in time is unique. Why was this last photo (color and B&W version) so unique? Well if you notice the shadows came out. The day being overcast left no shadows. I had MAYBE 15seconds to take this image. I panicked and shot it at f/8. Not the f/16 I had wanted, but we take what we can get.

The reason I was shooting at f/8 was I wanted to be ready for anything. Remember I alluded to wildlife before? Well if something walked in the frame he/she wasn’t going to stand still for an f/16 exposure. I have left my settings in bracketing or stopped down real hard before and payed for it with missed opportunities. So this is the flip side of trying to avoid that. Can’t win them all they say

My goal was to get to Sharrotts Pond. As you can see everything was untouched and just a beautiful sight. I kept the cooler tone that the HDR had created as I felt it told a batter story as to how the temperature felt.

The pond was perfect. Frozen just enough for a fantastic winter landscape. I wanted to bring you along for this one

I wanted to finish out the day with a portrait of the pond. Sometimes an image speaks to you and when it does don’t let it get away! Whether it is HDR or a quick snap the hesitation of holding off that photograph is not worth it. Just Click! (sorry Nike :-p)

What your seeing here is the older Con-Ed station that is in contrast to the methane wells on the Fresh Kills landfill. Inspired by another local photographer to get up and see this new project I decided to take the tour. What project am I talking about? Why the Fresh Kills Park restoration project of course. You may know or remember Fresh Kills as being the largest landfill in the world at one time and it only recently closed in 2001. Being the world largest may be a real feat some may say, but it was a real scar to the residents of  the borough Staten Island. This dump was by no means small on any scale. It was originally created by the developer Robert Moses. Thankfully even when it was created in 1948 the infrastructure came along with it for the future. The site was designed specifically to hold the 150million tons of trash it contains plus 20+ more years. Thankfully those extra 20+yrs weren’t carried out and we have what is a great project for the future of all visitors to Fresh Kills.

The former landfill is set to become a 2200 acre park. A park that is both recreational and dedicated to wildlife. Some recreational areas will include: mountain biking, non-motor water sports, soccer fields, comfort stations (composting), equestrian trails, jogging/hiking trails, and baseball fields to name a few. The bigger excitement for me is of course wildlife. The best part is that nature is already getting a hold of the habitat before the park is even close to being completed. Although in 18 months 100 acres or so will be open to the public, the vast majority is still under construction. The great part is that the William T. Davis Wildlife Refuge ties right into the park. This is going to be the 2nd largest park in all of NYC. Yes, bigger then central park Just on our tour alone you can see turkey vultures soaring high, red-tailed hawks searching for prey amongst the fields, and even a male buck ran up the slope as we drove by. Unfortunately we were kept in the vehicle for most of the tour, but it was truly exciting to see an initiative that will hopefully continue on its current path to not just build recreational for the public, but with conservation in mind as well.

Lots of infrastructure for this immense location still remains.  The Dept. of Sanitation here still operates shipping out Staten Islands trash down to a processing plant down in South Carolina via freight train. Fresh Kills is decomposing and putting off vast amounts of methane pumped up by these wells you see in many of the photographs. This methane is a bi-product from all the natural decomposition that is done by Nature itself. The city makes around 12million dollars a year selling all that methane back to the power companies. The supply will lessen over time, but it will continue to be captured. The entire site is capped with this heavy gauged plastic that is constantly monitored. A substance called Leachate is something that has to be collected in large numbers everyday and shipped out as well to neutralize it for reintroduction into the ecosystem. Leachate is a fancy term for the run off from the trash that is produced over time. Its composition will vary depending on the landfills age and its contents. Cakes are made of the solid material that may be contained and is then put in a different landfill. Unfortunately there isn’t a new use for the Leachate cakes at the moment. However I am told the cakes aren’t harmful and will decompose over time.

When I mention the scar on Staten Island; the reason for this is just how close the landfill was in proximity to commercial and residential districts. As close as this may feel there are other portions of the park that have residential districts only a few hundred feet from its borders. Of course part of this blame relies on the developers who decided it would be a bright idea to keep building without remorse and keep sticking more and more into a once untouched habitat (or at least strike a fair balance.) New facilities for the park is aiming to harness the power of renewable energy. Not just methane run off (as it will decrease significantly with time), but options such as geothermal, wind, and solar. The big issue with wind however is that these mounds are decreasing in size by approximately 1mm a year. The typical wind mills are very large (an awesome beautiful site if you have had the chance to see them) and will sink into the ground. Not good after all the monetary investment you might imagine. Solar is currently being looked into as there are vast areas of open space. Very unique to NYC if you have ever visited; ha ha. My suggestion would be to use solar as shade, like parking lots or overhangs serving a dual purpose.

Infrastructure such as the comfort stations are also going to be LEED certified. A building standard that makes large efforts to be sustainable and have the lightest impact on the earth in which it resides.

The views are nothing short of spectacular. From the top of south mound you can see the city skyline in the top left of the image and the College of Staten Island tower on the top right. Something I don’t have a 360 degree panorama to show you is that you can actually see parts of all the four bridges connecting to Staten Island. Including the parachute jump in Coney Island!

Looking up into the William T. Davis Wildlife Refuge you can see the open wetlands that are home to many wading birds and migratory species. The grasses are shorter because I happened to arrive on the trip soon after they mowed the grasses for the year.  The haze held up just enough to get a clear shot of the Bayonne Bridge. I think this shot says it all. Where nature meets man and for the few times in the history of man it may happen; Nature will be the victor running unopposed.

The photography side of things:

When I reserved my seat for this tour I was unsure how to approach the trip. I knew I may be in a cramped tour bus (I was, but everyone was a good sport) and that the use of a tripod just wouldn’t work. Checking the forecast for a sunny day helped boost my confidences there. I then wanted to bring my wildlife lens since I knew there can be all sorts of great animals to find. However I would be without a tripod and I don’t think the general public has an interest in watching me photograph some birds they don’t know the name of. So I set a plan and a goal for myself. One to two lenses is all I would be working with. I used a Tamrac Model 5405 Shoulder bag to carry everything.

Contents of my bag:

• Nikon D300
• Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8
• Sigma 150mm f/2.8 Macro
• SB-800 flash unit
• Polarizer for my landscape lens
• di-GPS Pro
• Extra Memory Cards
• Extra Battery
• Microfiber
• Sigg bottle to hold my water

That’s about it. I felt these two lenses would cover just about anything I would run into. You might be asking why I would grab my macro lens, but it probably isn’t for the reason you think. It wasn’t for critters, but to compress the field of view. In the first, second, and fourth images I used the telephoto lens.  Using a wide angle proved to be an issue for many of my photographs. When shooting wide your subject in the distance gets small and your fore-object gains too much attention. By compacting the scene I tied both together to help better tell the story. If you get a chance to try it out you might just say wow. That’s what I did when I saw how the scene took on a whole new look. Using a prime was a fun exercise as well as it made my feet do the zooming. Thankfully I didn’t have to walk too far though.

Post production was pretty simple. I edited my levels and set a black point for a few where I knew I could grab a definite black. That’s it. If your curious about the numbers such as shutter speed and aperture I don’t have it off the top of my head to be honest (I know where to find it too since it’s digital .) When I’m shooting I work from Aperture priority. Depth of field if my creative tool 98% of the time and the shutter speed follows along. Working from matrix metering and exposing up or down depending on the scene takes care of the rest. it may sound like I’m leaving something out. but I guarantee you I’m not.

This weekend I spent at the salt marsh and also a new local at pouch camp. It was an early day starting out at the salt marsh timing the tides with sunrise. Thankfully low tide was around 7:30am so I could  have the tide still receding as I ventured through the marsh. I put on my wellingtons (petroleum knee high boots) and carefully worked my way through the marsh. Many people walk into this marsh unaware of what they may be stepping on. All these grasses as well as fauna are all important to the biodiversity and food chain of the area. There are often thousands upon thousands of snails and tons of crab just below your feet. Not to mention the polychaetes and other annelids (worms) below the surface. Might not be our idea of a tasty treat, but it sure is to many birds and other species that share this habitat.

So as I arrived to my surprise there was a great egret, two snowy egrets, and three little blue herons. Really cool to see for size comparison and just plain fun to photograph.

Depth of field was tough on this one, but it was just enough to pull the little blue and great egret into sharp focus leaving the snowy egret a tad soft. I spent at least an hour taking my time shooting and getting ever so closer. These three birds love to fly away from you at very far distances. I often find the trick is to take your time (although I know that isn’t easy when you are eager to shoot) and use your camera as a blind. Make short movements that are slow from beginning to end. They need to realize you aren’t a threat and mean no harm to them. Shoot a few frames every time you approach. Don’t just wait until you can achieve eyeball shots. They may fly before you get there and you will have nothing, plus it helps the birds get used to the sound of your shutter. I find ripping real fast the first time is also not a good idea. A loud noise going fast and continuously is a good way to spook’em. If you make a slight mistake they don’t always take off in the other direction, sometimes just a little hop in their air to another near by location.

You don’t want to lose concentration and think the game is over. These are opportunities not to be missed. They can often provide flight shots at slower speeds easier to catch then the bird coming at or near you. Hard to tell the difference of a bird flying five feet or half a mile. Flying is flying to most viewers. Don’t go spooking them on purpose to get this shot however. It isn’t very nice; plus they often do this as they move from one hunting location to the next. All good things come to those who wait they say. Being prepared can make it all come to fruition.

After the marsh I decided to see what was hanging out at one of the fresh water ponds. On my way I could see nothing hanging out, but the usual mallards. However there was a cotton tail! A common bunny, but they sure are a pain in the ass to photograph. They have a nearly 360 degree angle of view making sneaking up on these suckers nearly impossible. The trick? walk like your 100 years old. No offense to the elderly, but it is the only thing that seems to work. Well there is one other thing, but I’ll mention that later. I had to approach this bunny walking incredibly slow across asphalt and a grass field. Not much cover. This was as close as I could get to him after 10 min of effort. A decent habitat catch, but I wanted more.

A bit disappointed I decided to head out of the park and meet up with my friend Seth to work on the Staten Island Dragonfly Atlas. On the drive out I thought I saw something. Looked odd, but I moved on for another hundred feet questioning if I should turn around. Instead of regretting it later I did a u-turn and headed back. What did I find? Another cotton tailed rabbit! I pulled over onto the grass real slow (silent hybrid prob helped a bit) and began shooting from the car. Thought my other trick was capturing them? Nah. I use the car as a blind whenever I can. Due to what we have done to our environment animals have become accustomed to cars being around and fear them a bit less then the humans that are in them.

I caught him with a mouth full. He continued for what must have been a good twenty minuted just going about his business. Lucky me a park ranger didn’t come by as it is part of the national parks system :-\. Oh, the things we do for Photography.

My last treat of the day was coming upon this eastern painted turtle spotted by Seth along out dragonfly walk in Pouch Camp with dragonfly expert Paul. She appeared to be looking for a place to lay her eggs. Not wanting to disturb her all that much I patiently sat for a while to gain a comfort level with her.

I was shooting with my 150mm macro giving me the ability to shoot macro photography at a further distance then shorter lenses. This exposure was done with ambient light opposed to my next shot which I used flash fill for.

I dialed down the flash unit to around 1 2/3 stop on my SB-800. I had the flash dome diffuser on and tilted to the side away from my subject. I wanted to dial the flash down enough so that it wouldn’t dominate and be apparent that it was used. Flash fill can be useful for certain subjects in areas of shade and to remove color cast. The goal is to not to blast your subject. We want to to look as if we never used it. Pouch Camp is private property so do please receive permission before walking its grounds. Hope your weekend brought pleasant surprises for you as well.

With the first day spent at the salt marsh in adverse weather I came back more prepared and with comfort! The day would prove to be a long one. Six hours in total watching and waiting; which can be its own entertainment as well. I was even greeted by two deer (sorry no photo of that, camera was pre-occupied.) The nest has been around for approximately 2-3 weeks according to a local beach walker. Leaning toward the third week. Meaning they could hatch any day now and today was that day.

The killdeer began to hatch one after the other. She had laid three eggs which tends to be more rare then the more common four (how they hold a huge portion of the future inside them like that is beyond me with the size of the eggs in relation to her body.) Later that day while I changed a card (own nothing bigger then 8gb cards) I saw a hatchling tucked away. After quickly retreating I observed a head pop-up. Probably the first one I saw. When finally dry and with enough strength to greet the world a second soon followed. The third egg remained unhatched for the remainder of the stay. No worries however.The next day I returned to make sure all three eggs & eggshells were missing. Although stray cats can and could be the culprit I learned something new behaviorally from watching the killdeer.

Killdeer (and possibly other shore birds) will carry the egg shells away from the nest in order to protect it. After seeing the action occur more then once I was able to confirm it for myself. Later talking to Dina she told me one of the reasons this is done is to reduce the likeliness of visibility to aerial predators. The outside of the shell is spotted and beige similar to the sand with dark spots; while the inside is a pearly white and can shimmer being wet from the embryo.

Watching as the 2 of 3 were born, knowing my cards were getting full and the light was going from good to bad I left them to finish getting the offspring ready for their journey. Killdeer chicks will be ready to feed almost immediately and just need their parents to protect and guide them.

Taking some of their first peeks into the world.

Finally mustering up the courage to share their face with the world.

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Two side notes here. Some cool news tips:

• Mozilla is coming out with a newer version with their Firefox internet browser that is going to support color profiles. Finally coming one step closer to sharing the way we want to share the images we take with the world. Check this link out for all the details! (make sure to test it as it needs to be turned on. I wasn;t a fan in certain circumstances. Hope they work out the bugs.)
• Google buys up one million phone numbers for their upcoming Google Voice service. Wanted to update anyone who was still interested in getting full control of their phone services. Can’t wait for it to become available? Sign up here to get an invite as soon as it is available. Read about it’s features here and see how much it can do to help your business line.

Another weekend and another search for subjects. As Spring begins to grow I get more and more antsy with finding some exciting subjects. Migration is in full swing and you would think it would be easy to find an animal to pose in front of your lens.

The morning started out with an early sunrise at 6am awakening the dew on the freshly sprouting grass. The temperature was a cool sixty degrees. You just knew it was going to be a beautiful day. Walking across the fields is still a viable option as they are still low growing and damage is kept at a minimum. This photo came about camping out for some glossy ibis hanging out by the pools of water left by the recent rain. Boredom sparks creativity they say.
This photo was put through a tonal contrast filter using Nik’s Color efex pro.

Talk about touchy! These glossy Ibis take the cake when it comes to being sensitive. You could not approach these glossy ibis even if you were at 100ft. They flew if you blinked wrong. After tracking them between several pools I moved on to see what else I could find.

Although common I really loved the light coming in at dawn and wanted to make the best of it. All too often the common and ordinary gets over looked. This Canada goose was very patient with me and allowed me to work any angle I wanted. Truly a perfect model and gracious host.

As I mentioned before, the sun was rising and I was on a quest to put as many subject in the light as possible. I have grown fond of the egrets found here. I have found a great location to blend in and with hours of patients some really great shots develop. To me something I am working on is control with spontaneous action. I feel the key is to stay calm, cool and collected. When a bird is about to take flight you need to keep your cool and be observant. Keep your eye on the subject and try not to spotlight your subject. By that I mean don’t keep your eye in one place on their body. Try and use a type of  ’scatter vision’ to get a sense of motion of your subject and not just one key area. One great indicator is to watch out for any bowel releases. It might not be the most pretty of subject, but it sure is easier flying with a light load… could that have been said better? :-p

After the egret took flight and was out of sight I headed out for a new location. Scouring the shore line I came upon a great abundance of common and boat-tailed grackles. There were a few perched grackles that kept approaching a great sunlit perch. The key here for me was to keep an eye out for repeated movement of behavior. You can use this to your advantage. After slowly and carefully making my way into a close proximity with the perch I just waited until they came back. And what a treat it was. Not just a male, but a female as well! It was great to have them side by side to see the direct comparison. You can see the males iridescence and how the male is ‘prettier’ then the female is. A key component in attracting a female. It is especially important too as the female builds the nest in 4-5 days so you can bet she won’t let her work go to waste. The male almost does nothing with the brood and nest except  remain around for defense.

The female and others would take advantage of this fresh water deposit. Getting close while having brightly colored trash attached to your tripod (I clean the shore as I do my photography; usually prefer to do it heading back and make mental notes of certain items) is no easy task. Staying perfectly still and crouched for about 30min did the trick. A female trusted me just enough to wander the waters wedge. Boy am I glad too as it took me about 30 seconds to get full feeling back in my legs.

Males would occasionally fly in and in the presence of the female would do a matting dance. The males would hike up their wings, cock their head forward and call out a loud bellowing call while parading around her. I got him here just after passing the female and before he was about to take a drink.

Right before he decided to fly the coop (bad pun) he hopped closer and pulled his head up for his portrait.

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Sunday was a short, but a well spent part of the day. My friend Seth text me and asked me to come down to clove lakes to see what we could find. I threw put my camera in the trunk and headed on down to see what we could find.

This might not seem all too much like a great shot, but it’s the content that was truly exciting. This is a black crowned night heron who has just caught a nice sized catfish. The moral of this story? ALWAYS BRING YOUR CAMERA WHEREVER YOU GO! Did you catch that? Like the primate I truly am; I decided it was gonna be a regular birding visit and not grab my camera.  Heart pounding, dehydrated and a shaky handed shot from my blood pumping so fast later; I got this shot. I had to run back to the car for the camera and thankfully he was still hanging around. Not in as good a location as possible, but we make due with what we have. Feel free to click on the image to get a “Zoomify” view and see the expression on that fishes face. Poor little guy. All natural however.

On the way back I still had my camera in hand after he flew and found him perched close to where I found him. I tried to approach the best I could across snapping twigs (cringe) and thick muck. Sneakers are not ideal if you want to go wandering in this. I however don’t pay attention to what may or may not work and went on in with them. Wet, mud soaked shoes and a bunch of snapped twigs later I came up with this. Something I am really happy with. The lighting was difficult, but it’s very dramatic. And he gave me just enough of a head turn to light up his beautiful eye.

The black crowned night heron was a perfect way to close out the weekend. I actually thought at the time this shot wasn’t up to the caliber I see now. All I did was set a black point and left it alone (I don’t like editing wildlife in Photoshop/Capture NX.) When getting back to the car I went flipping through some of the images and was a bit disappointed. I mean what photographer can’t hold back from taking advantage of today’s modern technology and checking your images out instantaniously. I however avoid the urge when I am at work as it provides a great distraction and can make you miss a moment. One of the many things I picked up from Moose. If it is one thing I would share with you today is to not hit that delete button while in the field. Storage is cheap. Have enough storage going out and take them home to scan through. Learn from your mistakes and get back out there capturing Natures finest moments!

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I am working on a fun piece about motion with a some carnival rides I photographed at night. Stay tuned for more!

Also I updated my About Me section with an aknowledgment to just say thanks to those who have gotten me through and keep me moving along (here.)