Happy New Year

As a gift to myself this year I upgraded from the Nikon D80 to a D90. This is not a significant upgrade but the features that I am gaining will be very useful to me. This includes more pixels, faster multiple frame shooting, and better noise performance. This means I will get better resolution, better selection of action shots (especially birds), and faster shutter speeds in many situations which allows for sharper images.

As I often do I purchased this camera secondhand, from a seller on craigslist. I find this a very useful way to buy and sell camera equipment, since it gives the buyer the ability to check out the equipment and the seller a chance to get cash in hand and/or a quick sale (assuming the item is priced right). There are other sites which are also specialize in camera equipment sales (such as fredmiranda.com) and I have used these as well. This time I just happened to find a lightly-used D90 listed at a very good price, so I wasted no time.

Here is a bird photo I took last fall. It has an ideal background - fully blurred, and a nice color as well.


"Tufted Titmouse"

Main Site: Photography by Matt Schrier

Photo Contests

This has been a pet peeve of mine for years. It seems innocent enough. You find out about a photo contest, find your best photos, then upload them. Along the way you select "Yes" or "Agree" to every checkbox you encounter, never bothering to read what you're agreeing to.

You may be lucky enough to win, and that's great. But let's say you don't win (like most people) - what have you just agreed to? As an example here's an excerpt from the Smithsonian Magazine's latest photo contest:

"By entering the contest, entrants grant the Smithsonian Institution a royalty-free, world-wide, perpetual, non-exclusive license to display, distribute, reproduce, and create derivative works of the entries, in whole or in part, in any media now existing or subsequently developed, for any educational, promotional, publicity, exhibition, archival, scholarly, and all other standard Smithsonian purposes. Any photograph reproduced will include a photographer credit as feasible. The Smithsonian Institution will not be required to pay any additional consideration or seek any additional approval in connection with such uses."

Sooooo ... for absolutely no compensation you are giving Smithsonian the right to use your image(s) in any way they want ... forever. Did I mention that you get not a dime from them for that right?

For some contests your entries are limited in size, which is a good thing because it limits the potential usefulness of your image by those running the contest. But the Smithsonian has no resolution requirement:

"Digital photographs should be taken at the highest resolution possible."

Oh, and maybe you're thinking they severely limit how many images you can enter. Nope:

"You may enter up to seven (7) photographs in each of the five categories with a total contest submission of thirty-five (35) photographs."

Thirty Five is a LOT of photographs. And you're just handing over hi-rez copies to a magazine to use any way it sees fit, forever, with no compensation.

Still interested in entering that contest? I'm not.

Feeney's Nursery

The holiday shopping season is in full swing, and for something new this year my work is included in a special item produced by a local landmark. Feeney's Nursery has created an "afghan" (aka a "throw" or blanket) with nine images of local Bucks County scenes, and one of my images is included. The image is a popular winter scene of Lake Afton in Yardley. They are selling it for only $59.99. As an added bonus the store is also selling copies of my prints.

Forgive the quality of the photos below, as I took them with my phone.





Closeup:





Site: Photography by Matt Schrier

A Very Nice Morning

Now that I have some more reach in my lens "arsenal" I'm on the lookout for good bird photography opportunities. Now is a good time for this since we are in the fall migration season. Birds are on the move, and/or loading up on some good food.

This morning I spent the morning at the Conowingo Dam in Maryland. Here there are a large number of bald eagles that feast on the fish that make their way through the dam. The water of the Susquehanna River is fast moving and relatively shallow on the downstream side of the dam, and the fishing (for both birds and humans) is relatively easy.

I came away with a few good shots, and since this was my first time shooting birds of this type I missed a few due to lack of technique and experience with the equipment. That will all come in good time.

What's In My Bag

I've made some adjustments to my camera equipment recently. This reflects on the kind of photography I am moving towards. Here's what I have now:

• Nikon 18-55mm: This is my everyday lens, nice and sharp. Most of my scenic and landscape shots were taken with this lens.
• Nikon 70-300mm: This is an inexpensive zoom lens that has its drawbacks but it lightweight and easy to use. It's not the newer VR version, but it gives me adequate coverage in this zoom range.
  
• Sigma 70-200mm f2.8: This is a little larger - and heavier - lens, but it is "fast" (i.e. it has a wide maximum aperture) and focuses very quickly. I use this for medium-range shots that require either quick reactions (such as shooting people or large animals at relatively close range) or for low-light situations, such as my daughter's high school theatrical productions.
• Tamron 90mm f2.8 Macro: This is a specialty lens. It is designed primarily for macro situations, although it can also double as a nice portrait lens. This is my "fun" lens.
  
• Sigma 150-500mm: I just purchased this lens, to allow me to create better wildlife photos. It is quite large and heavy, and has some performance and usability drawbacks. But for the reasonable price I get a reasonably sharp 500mm reach with optical stabilization. This is something I'm going to enjoy for a while. I'm already lining up bird-shoot trips.
  

Previously I was using a nice Nikon 300mm AF lens for my wildlife shots, sometimes with a 1.4x teleconverter. But this either didn't get me close enough to the animals, or lacked sharpness with the TC. I've since sold the 300mm lens, but I've kept the TC although I'm not sure how well it works on this 150-500mm behemoth.

I also recently sold a 50mm f1.8 prime lens. I picked this up a few years ago but I rarely used it. It is an older Nikkor lens that operated in manual focus on my newer DSLR.

So I think I'm set for a few years, but you never know ...

Bucks County Backroad

Autumn is a wonderful thing. Although the cool crisp air foretells the potential for more frigid weather to come, and ever larger heating bills, there is life in this season. The animals are actively finding all of the food they can, either in preparation for the long winter or for their upcoming migratory journeys. Also, plain scenes turn into beautiful ones, as with this back-road near Lake Nockamixon.

Active Egrets

I spent about an hour at a local pond this afternoon, testing out my new Sigma 150-500mm lens on my Nikon D80. This was not much a challenge technically, mainly because of the bright sunlight and white subjects. My shutter speed was usually well over 1/1000 sec. But regardless the lens performed very well, and the egrets were active. Here is one of the better ones.

In Between Shows

Last weekend I attended a very successful Doylestown Arts Festival, despite the Sunday morning rain that failed to dampen the crowds (and the exciting road bike rice).

Next weekend (Sept 25 and 26) I have the New Hope Arts and Crafts Festival. Hopefully the rain will hold off. It's a busy week for me as I'll be on a business trip most of the week, so I am spending this in-between weekend preparing for the show.

Below is a local photograph that is becoming quite popular. In this early morning shot of the historic Fonthill Castle I was fortunate to capture some lingering fog.

More Butterfly

This butterfly image was taken at Northampton Township park.

Bunch o' Butterflies

Taken the same day as my previous post. This one plant had about ten butterflies feeding on it.