Prairie Chicken Photography Equipment
June 04, 2023
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The fighting season starts in early Spring (the beginning of March). The Mid-west can be cold with howling wind. To make matters worse you have to be out there long before sunrise. So before talking about photography gear let's talk about gear for you. One of the blinds faced the wind, meaning that I had wind on me all the time. Did I mention that...
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My Prairie Chicken journey
May 28, 2023
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A year or so ago I saw a gorgeous image of two male Prairie Chickens fighting. That image inspired me to embark on my own Prairie Chicken photography journey. First, I started to research these birds. They fight during early Spring to gain mating rights with the females. The fighting takes place on a "lek," a mound with low grass on it. They return...
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Cropping
May 21, 2023
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Cropping images to our linking can be subjective. There is the famous rule of thirds that many people follow. But even following a well established guide does not always tell you how tight or wide to crop. First let's talk about cropping tools that you may find helpful. Adobe Photoshop, like all other image editing software, offers a cropping tool.
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Creating separation between the subject and the background
May 14, 2023
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Sometimes the subject of the image stands out beautifully from the background. Such images are often striking and beautiful. The subject just pops out. Here is an example.
Many times we are not this lucky. Perhaps the background in not blurred as nicely and the bird blends in with the background more. At other times, even with a very nicely blur...
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Luminar Neo SALE
May 12, 2023
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Breaking News! Luminar Neo is having a mother's day sale. Luminar Neo is image editing software that is easy to use and can yield great results fast.
Here are the details:
Luminar Neo Explore Plan now costs $79 instead of $99 + Collection for free.
The Pro plan now costs $99 versus $119 + Collection for free
The Lifetime License (no subscript...
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Creating extra space in Photoshop
May 07, 2023
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As promised last week, today we are going to magically create extra space. I use this technique from time to time to fix framing. Perhaps I need to crop out another bird in the background that is distracting but in so doing it leaves me with too little room around the edge of the image. Perhaps the bird was too fast for me and by the time I pressed...
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Birds in flight
April 23, 2023
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Photographing birds in flight can be some of the most difficult photography to undertake. They can fly very fast and erratic making tracking them in the viewfinder very hard. Once you are able to track them in flight the question becomes if your camera's auto focus can lock on and track them. If you are starting out learning this craft I suggest yo...
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Common birds
April 16, 2023
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Everybody wants great Eagle images. Yet the tiny common birds also have much to offer. I was laying on the sand watching and photographing these little fellows:
They are amazing. They can run incredibly fast. They run so fast that you can hardly see their little legs. This makes them hard to photograph since most cameras' autofocus systems are j...
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Birds in action
April 09, 2023
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Action always makes photographs more interesting. I am a novice when it comes to birds, their identity, and their behavior. However, to increase our changes of getting good images we have to learn the birds' behavior so that we can better predict when action will happen. Hence I spend time just watching the birds, getting to know them. Then I start...
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Low Light Bird Photography
April 02, 2023
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Low light bird photography is problematic since birds move, sometimes very quickly. So a fast shutter speed is required to freeze the action, but with low light availability that is not possible lest the evils of high ISO noise ruin the image. Secondly, long lenses tend to be slower, F4 if you are rich and F6.3 if you are poor-ish and even up to F1...
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