I don’t do this nearly often enough, but yesterday I popped over to the Stony Swamp area to wander over to the beaver lodge and see what was shaking. Not much, of course, as the sun was rather brutal so everything was staying out of it and the lighting was terrible for photography. But there were lots of squirrels, chipmunks and dragonflies around and of course the plants cannot go anywhere as they have limited mobility … and a walk in the woods is always relaxing. So it was worth the try …
The very first creature I encountered was a lovely grey squirrel. he was a long way off, but the G5 with the 100-300 is the great equalizer at 600mm effective focal length (EFL.) Here, I shoot the lens at f/7.1 to avoid the loss of contrast you suffer wide open yet leave it fast enough to get decent shutter speeds and bokeh. Still, the deep woods is darker than you think it is and the camera needed 3200iso to get a shutter speed commensurate with 600mm.
The dappled sunlight was really challenging but managed to not ruin this shot. the background is controlled and the squirrel has a lovely softness and dimensionality to it with terrific detail in his fur. I am loving this camera, and in fact any of the m4/3 16Mp sensors.
I was carrying three cameras in my shoulder bag – the G5 with 100-300, the GH2 with 14-140, and the GX1 with the Samyang 7.5mm Fisheye. The 14-140 is sharp and makes lovely wide shots and close ups with its 280mm EFL and very close focus. However, I did not shoot the GH2 at all because there was little to shoot at that distance that the 100-300 could not handle from somewhat further away.
I did encounter a nice scene almost right away with the fisheye … the GX1 handled the image very nicely, but I do have to process this output quite a bit. The Samyang is almost too sharp, leaving a very busy impression, so I tend to make the image a bit more “dreamy” by adding a lot of saturation and some “glow” … in Lightroom this is trivial with the clarity slider moved backwards.
To illustrate what I mean by the harshness of the normal presentation of these shot sin the woods at fisheye levels of detail, here is an image basically unprocessed. The GX1 was shooting JPEG + RAW so this is the JPEG straight out of camera (well, resized and exported by Lightroom.)
And here is the image with similar processing to the upward facing image previously shown …
There will be a few people who prefer the more “realistic” approach, and that is there prerogative. The fact that they are completely wrong should not deter them on iota :-)
Clearly, not a rolling stone …
There is a Wild Bird Center on the property, and this is the second time that I have seen a buzzard recuperating in their large outdoor pen. I wonder if it is the same one … but staying here for years?
This, by the way, is absolutely brutally challenging lighting, as he likes to sit in dark shadow with only his head in the bright sunshine. Once in a while, he moves into a position where you can get a shot that does not completely suck.
I got another really nice shot of a creature at the wild bird center. The reason I like this one is that it is tack sharp, and that’s not easy to get at 300mm in the dark part of the woods. This was again at 3200iso …
As I entered the meadow area, I noticed a young woman half way across carrying a huge insect net and a camera. Nice to see young people revel in their nerdyness :-)
Fairly tall grass with bull-rush like pods dominate this area …
I have always had a thing for daisies … even these wee field daisies …
And of course the airy look of the dandelion seed pod …
This lens is particularly adept at getting that “water color look with its excellent bokeh. There are advantages to shooting at 600mm …
I’m going to show an image shot at base ISO where I made a huge mistake of fixing the ISO and not allowing it to climb to support a faster shutter speed. I normally would not bother keeping such an image, but it is illustrative of why it is necessary to keep an eye on your shutter speed. This terrible shutter shock double image shows up at speeds this low (1/100s) and simply turning on auto ISO as I did a few moments later would have solved it.
It would have been a very nice image with a better exposure.
This one came closer as the shutter climbed to 1/160s … but there is still blur if you look at it at 100% and that shows through … so again no cigar …
Here is an example that perfectly illustrates why shooting at mid day is such a bad idea. This shot has the detail I was after, but it has harsh lighting that is just plain ugly. The background is close enough to be quite obvious and the harsh lighting on that area is not helping at all.
Here, the subject dominates enough to make the lighting a secondary issue. I am happy to see the boardwalks getting some regular maintenance …
There’s a spot along this section where there are bladed plants that stick up pretty high. These look like classic aquarium plants but for something like 3 or 4 feet tall. Very nice … and in this case I was able to get a nice soft look that ended up as an abstract.
Approaching the beaver pond with lodge, it is a nice warm day with a lot of greenery. The lookout is pleasant because of the shade.
The lodge is visible on the right side of the pond.
The burnt out area is still struggling to recover. I think it will be a while.
Stumpy here is a real fungi …
Little yellow wild flowers along the trail look especially nice when photographed against the deep woods behind them.
The second lookout over the swamp has one of those gorgeous blue dragonflies flying around … every time he lands, I try to capture him.And with the water and various nicely lit plants, the background looks again like a water color painting …
A more mundane dragon happens to land in the perfect pose in front of some bright highlights … and the results is pretty neat.
I then rattle off a bunch of images of the blue dragon again and this is one of the better ones.
Some more of those lovely mini daisies a short way down the trail …
Lots of young maple trees juxtaposed against the background foliage … very pretty …
And of course the ubiquitous ferns …
And the last image I shoot on my way out is a wild flower in white … not a great shot, but I like the background. the deep woods really work well when your subject is in dappled light …
So while I abhor midday light, there are definitely images out there to be shot. Just put some effort into your exposures and your backgrounds. Get the best angle for the shot as the background makes all the difference when the light is not great …
