"Saint Marguerite" - A statue of Saint Marguerite Bourgeoys stands in La Basilique Notre-Dame in Montreal, Canada. Canon 6D Mark II, Rokinon 14mm f/2.8 lens, 1/30 second, f/8.0, ISO 3200, handheld. I know it's been a long while since I've written a blog post. I'm sorry for that. If you have Instagram, please follow me there: @whimbrel_nature as that is where I've been posting the most these days. But I promise to blog more in the coming months and hopefully start to add more video to the mix as well. "Opulent" - The altar area of La Basilique Notre-Dame in Montreal, Canada. C ..read more

"Snake Bird" An immature anhinga (Anhinga anhinga) takes a break from preening at the Venice Audubon Rookery in Venice, Florida.   You may have noticed I've been a bit lax in updating the blog and Facebook page recently. That's partly because I've been very busy lately, including some great photography trips, and partly because I've been focusing my social media efforts lately on jump-starting my Instagram presence. I realize I'm pretty late to the game here. An older model phone with no memory left, and the requirement that images be uploaded from mobile, kept me from rea ..read more

It's come time for my traditional countdown of my favorite twelve images from the previous year. 2017 was a good year for photography, despite my third (and final) year of wood thrush field work taking up much of my time between the end of April and the beginning of October. As usual, there were some tough choices to be made to narrow it down to just twelve images. Here are my favorites from this year, in no particular order. 1. "Placid Lake, Turbulent Skies" This image was taken near the top of Whiteface Mountain looking down towards Lake Placid during peak foliage at the beginning of Oct ..read more

I'm sure I've talked about this before, but it bears repeating. Don't just settle for your first view of your subject and leave it at that. If you really want to increase your chances of making your best photograph (and develop your eye for composition along the way), you've got to work your subject. Photograph from a variety of angles, a variety of heights, zoom in or out (by lens or by foot), and experiment with different lighting, if possible. Always ask yourself what attracted you to the subject in the first place, and if your current composition is best highlighting those elements. I can ..read more

"Monumental Death"-  Light painting of the Harbeck Mausoleum on the grounds of the historic Woodlawn Cemetery, Bronx, New York. Harbeck is one of the largest and most ornate mausoleums on the grounds. Canon 7D, Tokina 11-16mm f/2.8 lens, ISO 200, f/11, 30 seconds. As usual with my light painting, this image is built up from several separately light painted images, allowing me finer control over the final image and the ability to produce several different interpretations from one relatively short session. Those who follow the blog, or my work in general, will know that in additi ..read more

"Puddle"- An aspen leaf floats on a puddle in the parking area next to Chapel Pond along Route 73. Canon 7D, Sigma 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6 DG APO lens, ISO 400, f/16, 0.4 seconds. As I mentioned in my previous post, I wanted to share with you some images I made during my last trip to the Adirondacks, and over the last few years, that take a more impressionistic view of the Fall scenery. All of these images were created either using camera motion with a slow shutter speed or by photographing reflections in moving water (with and without slow shutter speed). As I was updating my Creati ..read more

"Placid Lake, Turbulent Skies"- A small group ventured to the top of Whiteface Mountain and were rewarded stunning light and gorgeous foliage, but also 20-50 mph winds with temperatures in the 50s. To capture this image I used my 70-300mm zoom set at 70mm. This is a panorama composed from seven vertically-oriented frames. I bracketed each of the frames at +/- one stop and combined each individual frame into a 32 bit image using the HDR feature in Lightroom, then adjusted accordingly to capture the full dynamic range of the scene. Then I merged the seven HDR frames into the final pan ..read more

"Ruffled" A semipalmated sandpiper looking disheveled after shaking out its plumage. It's mottled appearance of light grey and darker feathers, plus pointy feathers without buffy edges indicates that this individual is an adult (AHY) bird and not a young bird from this year. The wear on the old plumage and molt makes the adults look distinctly shabby compared to the new, bright, rounded, and neatly bordered plumage of young birds. Canon 7D, Sigma 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6 DG APO lens, ISO 400, f/8, 1/1250 sec. No, not the marshmallow ones, that's a blog entry for another time. This po ..read more

"Amusement" While I got a lot of successful images of the ferris wheel lit up with a variety of color patterns, this long exposure was my favorite combination of pattern in the ferris wheel and color/pattern in the foreground ride. Canon 7D, Rokinon 14mm f/2.8, 2.5 seconds, f/16, ISO 100. All right, this might be a little "off-brand" for Whimbrel Nature (emphasis on the nature) and quite a contrast to my two recent wilderness posts, but I also enjoy and specialize in night photography. While I particularly like to do more nature-related night photography, including astrophotography ..read more

"Wilderness Cascade" Bald River Gorge Wilderness, Cherokee National Forest, TN. Canon 7D, Sigma 70-300mm f/4-5.6 DG APO lens, 1/5 second, f/22, ISO 100, two shot panorama on tripod. For today's behind the image, I thought I'd take a look at one of my images from my spring "Smallest Wilderness" project trip to Tennessee. These smaller cascades were upstream of the ninety foot Bald River Falls on the edge of the beautiful Bald River Gorge Wilderness. Composition First, let's start with my compositional intentions. I wanted to capture a somewhat abstract image that illustrated t ..read more