Month: October 2015

Autumn Leaves II

Posted in Fall Leaves, Flowering Plum Tree, Lonely Trees, Macro Photography, PhotographyTagged , , , 14 Comments

Copyright ©2015 Deborah M. Zajac  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

My Flowering Plum Tree in Autumn…

Autumn Leaves II

Time is moving so fast. #1 Grandson is eating with a spoon and isn’t as messy as I thought he’d be, and he’s talking up a blue streak and knows more words, and is articulating sentences and thoughts I had no idea he was able to understand. He’s planning for, and stratagising for Christmas at 2yrs 10 months while I’m still trying to compose a good macro image of leaves in Autumn! Perhaps I should give him my camera.

I’ll give you an example of how clued in he is. His mom had her lips done at my Doctors office a couple of weeks back, but I was talking to #1 Grandson about the importance of going to the Doctor for Health, not just being sick.  I said, ” We go to the Doctor for check ups to make sure we’re growing big and strong, and we get shots to prevent sickness and infections.” He added,” And, to get big lips.”  WE HAD NO IDEA HE WAS AWARE!  We are now!

My Flowering Plum Tree in Autumn. It’s dropping leaves as fast as #1 Grandson is learning, and the Squirrels are trying to break my Squirrel Free Bird Feeder.

I love the veins, and colors of these leaves right now. We don’t have many trees that turn red in Autumn in California. It’s a treat to actually own one!

Nikon 105mm Micro| Hoodman STEEL Ultra High Speed Digital Film| CS6| Nikon Df

More to come…

Monochrome Madness 2 30/52 Morning Light and Fog over San Francisco

Posted in Black and White Photography, Bridges, California, Cityscape, Fog, Golden Gate Bridge, Monochrome Madness2, San FranciscoTagged , , , , , , 10 Comments

Copyright ©2015 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

For this week’s Monochrome Madness 2 I chose another image of Sunrise over San Francisco with the fog

beginning to pull back a bit. Revealing some of the taller building’s upper floors and a couple of famous buildings too.  To make this image I switched to my telephoto lens. This is a view of the South Tower of the Golden Gate Bridge, and the city behind it.

Morning Light and Fog over San Francisco CA

Can you spot The Transamerica Building’s Pyramid, and the Palace of Fine Arts?

To see all of this week’s entries into Leanne Cole’s Monochrome Madness 2 click here.

Nikon Df| Nikon 80-200mm D| Hoodman STEEL Ultra High Speed Digital Film| Tripod| CS6 &Silver Efex Pro

More to come…

P52 44/52 Chicken Noodle Soup

Posted in Comfort Foods, Food Photography, Off Camera Flash, Project 52, Soup, StrobistTagged , , , , , , 21 Comments

Copyright ©2015 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Project 52 44 of 52 Chicken Noodle Soup

It’s getting chilly here in the morning and evenings which makes me crave comfort foods. One of my favorite comfort foods is Soup! I had some left over chicken in the fridge so while #1 Grandson napped I deboned the chicken, and chopped up all my veggies then made my soup.

Earlier I took #1 Grandson for a run around the block looking for Spooky stuff and he ran 3/4 of the block before slowing down to a walk. When we got home he asked for cold juice then cuddled up next to me and promptly fell asleep. He napped long enough for me to get the soup done! 🙂

My soup is semi-homemade. The chicken was a store bought rotisserie chicken, and I bought Organic Chicken Stock to speed up the prep time, and cooking time. From there it’s a pretty basic Chicken Noodle Soup.

Nikon Df| AF-S 50mm f1.8g| SB910 camera left front @1/4pwr| Hoodman STEEL Ultra High Speed Digital Film| CS6

More to come…

P52 43/52: Golden Gate Sunrise

Posted in Golden Gate Bridge, Marin Headlands, Photography, Project 52, San Francisco, San Francisco Bay, SunriseTagged , , , , , , , 22 Comments

Copyright ©2015 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

I rose this morning at 2:40am to be on time to meet with a group of Photographers at 5:00am in Marin County to photograph the Sunrise over San Francisco Bay, and Golden Gate Bridge. We hoped for fog on the deck of the Golden Gate Bridge, but it looked like there wouldn’t be any fog rolling into the city when we met, but as we waited for others in the group to arrive the fog began to creep in.

Once the group assembled we drove over to Battery Spencer in the Marin Headlands to shoot. Then several of us broke off from the group to move higher. We drove up to Hawk Hill and photographed the rest of Blue Hour, Dawn, and the Sunrise from there.

Golden Gate Sunrise_4310

The fog never did make it to the bridge, but the colors, and light of the sunrise this morning was glorious. Well worth the O’Dark Thirty wake up call.

Nikon Df| AF-S Nikkor 20mm f/1.8@f/11 | 0.3s| ISO 100| Singh Ray 2 stop REV Grad| Hoodman STEEL Ultra High Speed Digital Film| CS6| Tripod

More to come…

Monochrome Madness 2 29/52 Peek-a-Boo!

Posted in birding, Birds in the Wild, Birds of North America, Black and White Photography, Monochrome Madness2, Nikon Gear, Yellow-rumped WarblerTagged , , , , , , , 18 Comments

Copyright © 2015 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

MM2 29 of 52 Peek a Boo!

A shy Yellow-rumped Warbler that was so adorable! Taken while out birding last Saturday morning.

I think my old 300mm f4 is having auto-focus issues again. It has quit auto-focusing a few times lately, so I switched to my D700 camera to test the lens verses camera since my D300s is also long in the tooth I need to go through the process of elimination to be sure it’s the lens and not the camera. While shooting last Saturday my lens stopped auto-focusing, and suddenly my camera settings switched from f5.6 to f22! I turned the camera off and on again and all was well the rest of the morning. That’s a pretty good indication that it’s my lens. It’s pretty old now and was sent in to Nikon in January for auto-focus issues. I’m afraid it may be ready to go back for repairs again. Sadly, it’s not under warranty anymore. Sigh.  Reality check! It may be time for a new lens.

My D300s’ flash doesn’t pop up anymore either, and it’s getting near 60,000 shutter clicks. I think it’s rated for 100K.  My poor gear. I treat it really well, but use it a lot. I may have to retire my D300s too.  That makes me a little sad. They’ve been such good company, and a huge part of my life for many years. Time to start saving big time for their replacements! 🙂

To see the other images posted for this week’s Monochrome Madness2 visit Leanne Cole’s site here.

Nikon 700| AF-S Nikkor 300mm f/4| SanDisk Pro Extreme Digital Film| CS6 & Silver Efex Pro| Tripod

More to come…

Lesser Goldfinch: Female

Posted in birding, Birds in the Wild, Birds of North America, Lesser Goldfinch, Santa Clara County BirdingTagged , , , , , 20 Comments

Copyright ©2015 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

This morning I went back to the reserve where I went a couple of weeks ago; where I saw my first Yellow Warbler hoping to see it again only closer, and longer. I was seeing lots of Sparrows, and Yellow Rumped Warblers, the pair California Towhee’s were present, and so too was the Blue Jay, and a Northern Flicker flew in, but he kept his back to me only giving me side looks. Stuck up bird! 🙂

40 minutes after I arrived a yellow blur caught my eye and there it was! I quickly swung my rig around and fired off 3 rapid bursts. Then the bird was gone.

My first shot caught him landing and was so blurry it was unusable, the middle shot the bird was there, and the 3rd frame…no bird in it at all. I wouldn’t know for sure if I had a keeper image or not until I saw it on my computer. Though it did look promising in playback.

I didn’t see the Yellow Warbler again, and I stayed in the area until well after 9AM when it began to get busy with runners, dog walkers, and Saturday morning strollers.

Yellow Warbler Male Winter

He’s a beauty. I’ll be heading back over there again soon hoping to see him, and that Northern Flickr again.

Nikon D700| AF-S Nikkor 300mm f/4| SanDisk Extreme Pro Digital Film| CS6

More to come…

Addendum: It’s  been brought to my attention that this isn’t a Yellow Warbler after all; it’s a Lesser Goldfinch Female. Thank you https://myrsbytes.wordpress.com/ !

I’ll keep trying to capture that Yellow Warbler, but I’m glad I saw and was able to make an image of this little beauty especially since she didn’t hang around long!