Category: Nikon

Wild Weds. 18/52 Great Horned Owls

Posted in Bird Photography, Birds in the Wild, Nikon, Owls and Owlets, Photography, Wild WednesdayTagged , , , , , , 40 Comments

Copyright ©2018 Deborah M. Zajac.  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Saturday some friends and I met up to go look for the Owls again.

The Owlets were out of the nest and high up in the foliage with Mom. I didn’t get any shots of them, but both the Male, and Female Adults gave us great looks.

When we first arrived in the park Gordon from https://undiscoverdimagesamongstus.wordpress.com/

was there already and had spotted the Male Adult Great Horned Owl in a tree opposite the nesting tree. Fortunately he was on a branch in the open, but it was well shaded.

He hooted off and on to the Mrs. and the chicks which was really neat to hear. I’m pretty sure he’s hooting in this image b/c his white chest feathers are prominent. When he was quiet it was just a line across his chest.

Great Horned Owl Male

Several hours later the Female flew out of the nesting tree to a huge Eucalyptus tree across from the nesting tree, and out in the open so we had a great look at her.  I’m sure she was able to keep an eye on the chicks from there.  It was evening by then and the sun was sinking lower, and getting more golden.

The light was so lovely on her. Isn’t she pretty!

Great Horned Owl Female

Here are just a handful of the Owl watchers that passed through to look at the owls.

In front row all in black is Gordon, then our friend Anna who you can barely see next to him, and our friend Brian the last one in the front row.  Myself and Dali were still taking images of the Female while these photographers, and birders were looking for the Owlets.  (This image I made with my iPhone 7 Plus.)

Owl Watching Golden Gate Park

It was another good birding day despite me not getting a good look at the owlets this time.

Nikon D810| Nikkor 200-500mm| PSCC 2018

more to come…

Spring makes an appearance in the Backyard

Posted in Cultivated Flowers, Flowers, Nikon, Photography, Spring, Still LifeTagged , , , , , , , , 23 Comments

Copyright ©2018 Deborah M. Zajac.  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Baby Girl’s cruiser looks cute there among the flowers.

Bicycle among the Flowers

I wish it wasn’t so windy I’d do some macro photography. Maybe this week-end. Fingers crossed.

Hope you all have a wonderful week!

Nikon D810| Nikkor 50mm f/1.8 @ f/8| 1/50s| ISO250| SanDisk Digital Film| PSCC 2018

more to come…

Thursday Doors: Blake Garden

Posted in Cultivated Flowers, Nikon, Photography, Thursday DoorsTagged , , , , , , , , , , , , 52 Comments

Copyright ©2018 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

I haven’t shared any doors in a long time, but thought I’d share a couple of doors, and some flowers that are in bloom from my visit to Blake Garden last Saturday with Gordon from undiscoveredimagesamonstus and a few other friends.

Blake Garden is owned and operated by UC Berkeley. It’s open Mon-Fri. Closed on week-ends except once a year it opens on the week-end for public visiting.

I’d never been there before and was looking forward to seeing and photographing flowers in bloom.  I wasn’t disappointed, and there were DOORS! Well, just a couple.

This Mission Style building was marked private. It looked empty, but had huge windows overlooking the view of the bay and San Francisco. Unfortunately, on this morning it was very overcast so the view wasn’t good.

This view was very good I thought, but the reflection had me the moment I saw it.  Anna and I waited sometime for this view to be people free.

Private Building with Koi Pond reflection

A closer look at the door:

Door Blake Garden

Standing in front of the house/building and looking east you see this! Do you see the Koi?

I love Stone Bridges, and this one is so cute. There’s a little door and a hidey hole too.

Koi Pond and Stone Bridge_DMZ6540-crop

A Columbine. I think it’s a Blue Columbine, but I’m not positive.

Blue Columbine

I laid down on the path to get a view of its face which was hidden when looking down and walking along the path.

Columbine

The Green Tool Shed had its door open and I liked the little peek inside and the foliage framing it.

Tool Shed

I have quite a few flower images, but I’ll end with a Red Poppy so it doesn’t turn into a Flower Post. 🙂

Red Poppy

This post has been part of Norm Frampton’s Thursday Doors.  He’s a master gardener of doors.

Click on over to his website here and at the bottom of his post you’ll find the little blue frog. Click that and be taken to a list of all Door Gardeners that are sharing their door finds this week.

If you have a door or two you’d like to share please do! Norm gives us until noon Saturday Quebec time to post and link up!

Nikon D810| Nikkor 105mm macro lens & 24-120mm variable lens| SanDisk Digital Film|PS CC 2018

more to come…

 

 

Wild Wednesday 17/52 Wild Chicks in the Park

Posted in Bird Photography, birding, Nikon, Owls and Owlets, Photography, Wild WednesdayTagged , , , , 42 Comments

Copyright ©2018 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Saturday I was feeling strong, and well enough to do some birding with friends. I rose 4:15am to be ready for my friend to pick me up then from there we drove north 50 minutes to meet Gordon from undiscoveredimagesamonstus

After meeting Gordon we headed north across the Golden Gate Bridge to go to a pond for birding.  We spent over an hour there then we headed over the Richmond Bridge to meet more friends at Blake Garden. After spending a couple hours at the Garden we headed to lunch. It was a great breakfast place. I’d go back and order the same thing.  I didn’t take any photos of my food I was too hungry by then.

After lunch and saying farewell to a friend we headed to Golden Gate Park to look for the Owlets we heard were there.

I was familiar with the tree the owls like to nest in having been to it several years ago, so finding that was easy, but we relied on birders there ahead of us to point us in the direction of the owlet nest.

Mama Owl was there too, but she was well camouflaged in the foliage much higher in the tree.  I have a really bad image of her I’ll spare you from seeing.

There are 3 owlets, but I was only able to see two of their faces. 😦  The one in the very far right is still sleeping.

Owlets San Francisco CA_DMZ6602

I changed positions to the other side of the tree and got this shot of one of the owlets.

Owlet San Francisco CA_DMZ6629-3

The only bummer for me was that I couldn’t find my 200-500mm lens to use that day.  I put it away somewhere safe when I went hiking in Quarry Hill Garden several weeks ago. Then I got the flu and was out of it for nearly two weeks. When I went to get my lens where I thought I put it it wasn’t there. I looked high and low, and couldn’t find it, so only had my 300mm with me, and it really was too short for the day.  Aside from that it was a fun, and successful day of birding.

I did finally find my 200-500mm the following day in a box with the Christmas ribbons and bows. I totally forgot putting it in there!

I’ll be sharing images from our trip to the pond and garden in other posts.

Nikon D810| Nikkor 300mm f/4| SanDisk Digital Film| PSCC 2018

more to come…

 

Wild Weds. 14/52 A Wild Good Time at the Races

Posted in Drag Racing, Event Photography, Nikon, Photography, Wild WednesdayTagged , , , , , 42 Comments

Copyright ©2018 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

On Saturday I went to a car show, but discovered the night before that there would be drag racing too, so I spent all my time there photographing the racing, and not the many, many cars that were parked for viewing.

Two of my photography girlfriends in our group decided to join me, and we had so much fun.  We were trying the “panning technique”.   It’s not a technique I employ often. This technique requires one to slow the shutter down a bit, then track your subject while it’s moving then when it gets to the spot you want it to be gently squeeze the shutter while following your subject through the squeezing/releasing of the shutter.  It happens in a nano second.  I didn’t think I was doing it very well, but have more keepers than I thought I would.

The idea is to show movement/speed/motion while trying to keep the subject in focus.  It takes a bit of practice.

Settings I used were f/10-f/14, and I varied my shutter speed between 1/125s, 1/100s, and 1/80s in the beginning, and ended up using 1/125s and 1/100s the most.  I had really good light so kept my ISO at 100.

I liked f/13-f/14 the best for keeping more of the car in focus.

I also wanted to stop the action to show different parts of what was going on.  I just raised my Shutter Speed in those instances.

I was using Manual Priority, Auto White Balance, Matrix Metering mode, Single Point Focus, and Single shot shooting mode throughout the shoot.

So, there’s the technical bits, lemme show you some images from the races. “)

N738sp

Drag Racing Car

Dan Nayl Or

Drag Racing Dan Nayl Or

They approach the starting line with attitude, noise, and whole lot of burning rubber. 🙂

Burn Rubber!

These cars are fast! From the start to finish this car did it in 10.962 seconds at 134.44 miles per hour! One dragster later on clocked in over 200 miles per hour! WILD! 🙂

10.962s 134.44MPH

We spent 2 1/2 hours shooting just cars racing up this track. The time flew by! When it was time to head down to the car show to meet the rest of our group we stopped by the pit area for a closer look.

Can you smell the burn? 🙂  Man it was ear drum bursting noise down there!

Can you smell the burn-Burning Rubber

It was so much fun. I can’t wait to go back.

Nikon Df| Nikkor 24-120mm f/4| SanDisk Digital Film| PS CC 2018

more to come…

Wild Weds. 11/52 En Media Res

Posted in Butterflies, Insects, Nature Photography, Nikon, Photography, Wild WednesdayTagged , , , , , , , 53 Comments

Copyright © Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

I went hiking both Saturday and Sunday hoping to find something interesting in nature as well as stretch my legs, but I hoped to see wildflowers. Saturday I saw flowering trees looking lush and pink in their full bloom and not much else in the way of flowers. I did see a pair of Does resting in the grass near the creek at the bottom of the trail.  I really do think Deer are my Spirit Animal.  He-Man and I stuck to the wooded area trails and did the steep switchbacks to gain some elevation.  We hiked over 2 miles and gained approx. 500ft in elevation.  I also rode the Fit Desk for 4 miles on Saturday which did not burn off nearly enough calories! 😦

On Sunday I proposed a different route that would take us along meadow and grassy trails, but still be hiking uphill, and if I didn’t run out of steam I’d even go up the wall.  Our mileage wouldn’t much  over two miles, but the elevation gain would be close to 600 ft having to go uphill to the top of the mountain/hill then down to the valley and back up the steep hill, and WALL then down the back hill to the car.

I saw several wildflowers in  bloom, there were fiddle necks, Hounds Tooth, Pacific Pea; Lupine; and a few others, but the best came when hiking up the hill leading to the WALL.

He-Man was well ahead of me because I kept stopping to photograph flowers, new pine-cone buds, a lizard in camouflage or so it thought,  so I was making tracks trying to catch up before he hit the WALL- which is the last section of this hill, but it’s nearly vertical.  I’m not kidding it’s really steep.  The grade must be 9 or 10%. Everyone calls it the Wall.  Thankfully it’s fairly short from there to the top.

Anyway, I was looking high, low, and sideways for flowers, birds, insects, etc, and in a thicket of dry and dead thistle or teasel I spied something like leaves, and kept going up the hill a few steps then my brain said, ” uh, no there shouldn’t be leaves  like that on those, back up!” So, I did and look what I saw when I really looked at it!  A pair of Silvery Blue Butterflies en Media Res!

Silvery Gray Butterflies en Media Res 2

 

I have never seen this type of Butterfly before and never in this position! I was so thrilled and excited; doing my happy dance!

The Silvery Blue is in the Gossamer-Wing Family.  Its habitat is varied but, not in deserts, but there is an exception as they are found in the Mohave Desert.  They are found where there are Lupine, Pea family, and Vetches. All of which were present when I saw these two.  Their season here is Feb- Aug.

He-Man missed it completely. 😦  I was tired and running out  of gas so took the cutoff right before the wall so, gained a little more mileage, but a wee bit less elevation. Next week I’ll take my hiking poles and claim the Wall again! 🙂

I was so grateful to have seen this. I’m still Wowed by it!

I’ll share some of the wildflowers in future posts.

Happy Hump Day!

Nikon D810| Nikkor 105mm @f/5.6| ISO 400| 1/1250s| Handheld

more to come…

Wild Weds. 7/52 Wild 4 You!

Posted in Holidays and Observances, Nikon, Photography, Still Life Photography, Wild WednesdayTagged , , , , , , , , , 27 Comments

Copyright ©2018 Deborah M. Zajac.  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

For Valentine’s Day. “)

Wild 4 YOU

I composed and shot this image back in 2014.   Since I hadn’t thought of anything else to compose for today I thought why not publish it for Wild Wednesday?

I did change what the Sweetheart said to fit both of today’s themes using Photoshop CC.  Here’s a quick run down on how I did that in case you’d like to know how I did it.

Firstly, I created a new layer then I grabbed the spot removal tool and erased what the Sweetheart said.

Next, I grabbed the Horizontal Text Tool and switched my paint/text color to bright pink, changed the font size to 6pt I think it was then I typed the first line WILD. Then I summoned the Free Transform Tool to turn the text to the right direction, then summoning the move tool I moved it into place.

I did that two more times for the number 4, and word YOU!. Then I saved the whole thing as a PSD file.  After that I added a new layer and cleaned up a few specular highlights on the ceramic figures then I merged the layers, resized it for the web, added my watermark, and saved it as a JPEG.

There is more than one to change the word on something like this, and probably an easier way too, but that’s how I did it. 🙂

I hope you all have a sweet day!

Nikon D700| Nikkor 105mm| Lexar Digital Film| Continuous Lights right and left with light modifiers| PS CC 2018

more to come…