Sandhill Cranes

This year marked the third year I've gone out to take pictures of the Sandhill Cranes near Kearney, NE.  I'd say I've improved, if for no other reason because I shot fewer total pictures but ended up with about the same number of shots that I liked.

I rented Canon's 300mm f/2.8L non-IS again this year because I was so pleased with its performance (well I should hope so from glass that expensive.)  If I came back without any quality shots I would have no one to blame but myself.  Luckily that wasn't the case :o)

Sandhill Cranes

We went out again this year near Kearney, NE for the Sandhill Crane migration, and this year I ended up renting Canon's 300mm f/2.8 (non-IS) lens and the 1.4x Mark II teleconverter.  On my 20D that gave me a 672mm f/4 (300mm x 1.4 extender x 1.6 crop factor); not too shabby.  Initially I thought not having Image Stabilization would hurt me, but after looking at my shots from last year I figured I would be fine as long as the light was similar since most of them we 1/500 sec or faster.    I am very glad I rented this lens.

Neither sunrise nor sunset were all that impressive this year, but for the rest of the time the cranes were very active and were dancing their hearts out trying to impress potential mates.  One thing they do is to toss corn stalks and cobs into the air as part of their gimmick.  We got to see a lot of personality come out this year, as you'll see with many of the shots below:

ISO 100 | f/8.0 | 1/250

ISO 100 | f/4.0 | 1/1000

ISO 100 | f/4.0 | 1/1000

ISO 100 | f/4.0 | 1/800

This pair cracked me up because it seemed they were arguing back and forth, perhaps vying for the attention of the same potential mate observing them both from the background:

ISO 200 | f/4.0 | 1/500

These two looked to be like two old men comparing fish stories, "I once caught a fish this big!" "Oh yeah, well I swear mine was this big!"

ISO 100 | f/4.0 | 1/500

And these next few also show them making their best efforts to impress the ladies, sometimes to an audience that would rather be elsewhere.  I guess some things never change, even among different species:

ISO 100 | f/4.0 | 1/1000

ISO 100 | f/4.0 | 1/640

ISO 100 | f/4.0 | 1/640

Many of the other shots that I liked showed a simple elegance.  I hope you like them.

ISO 400 | f/4.0 | 1/400

ISO 100 | f/4.0 | 1/1000

ISO 100 | f/4.0 | 1/800

ISO 200 | f/4.0 | 1/500

ISO 100 | f/4.0 | 1/4000

We also timed our trip to be on a full moon, and it happened to be at the Apogee of the moon's orbit, which in layman's terms means it is the largest it will be for another 18 years (or something like that.)  This provided some key opportunities to get some nice silhouettes:

Fun with Liquid Drops

A group of friends, neighbors and friends of friends and neighbors started a Photo Co-op Blog where we post our individual interpretations of each month's theme.  It is going to be a fun, creative way of sharing and learning.

The first theme was "Bright Colors" and one of the ideas I had was to experiment with taking macro shots of dropping different liquids into each other.  There were created with different combinations of water, food coloring, vegetable oil and milk.  I submitted two of them on the other blog, but there were many more that I loved or were just plain fun.  There were all shot on my Canon 20D with 100mm f/2.8L macro at ISO 100, f/16 and 1/250sec.  Enjoy!

Eagles

In December Bald Eagles tend to hang out at Squaw Creek National Wildlife Refuge in Northwestern Missouri, so a couple of us went down there the first weekend of December after hearing from them that there were about 125 eagles there.  Apparently they feed on the snow geese that also stop there during their migration.


Nothing.  We saw maybe a few total, and most were immature.


Then we went down the next weekend.


Nothing.


And this time I mean nothing.  So after being disappointed twice in a row we decided not to go back.  Then on the 26th I decided to go down there by myself just on a fluke and I got lucky.  There were still only about 6 or so, but they were all mature and were hanging out close enough to get some pretty good pictures.  Below are my favorites of the day.  Enjoy!

ISO 100 | 1/400 | f/5.6 | 300mm

ISO 100 | 1/320 | f/5.6 | 300mm

ISO 100 | 1/800 | f/5.6 | 300mm

ISO 100 | 1/800 | f/5.6 | 300mm

ISO 100 | 1/1000 | f/5.6 | 300mm

Western Nebraska/Badlands

Last week The Professor and I found ourselves out in Western Nebraska and South Dakota.  My favorite shot was of Carhenge in Alliance, NE that we took at night.  There aren't any lights at Carhenge so we had to paint the cars with light over the course of 7 1/2 minutes or so.  In this shot you can see movement in the clouds as well as star trails; there are so many things I love about this shot:

ISO 100 | 457 sec. | f/5.6 | 17mm

Along the historic Oregon Trail around Bridgeport, NE is Courthouse Rock and Jail Rock.  I stitched the following image together from about 7 different shots:

ISO 100 | 1/80 | f/22.0 | 36mm

We walked around Cedar Butte in the southern part of Badlands National Park to get the following shots:

ISO 100 | 1/400 | f/11.0 | 17mm

What I liked about the above shot was the tree that just showed up out of nowhere.  In that area are no trees, just prairie grass and some shrubs.  In the following shot I tried to capture the strange rock formations:

ISO 100 | 1/50 | f/11.0 | 17mm

We stuck around the same area in hopes of catching an awesome sunset, and although the sunset was relatively uneventful, I still liked this panorama I captured as the setting sun lit up the rock formations from the left (click on it to enlarge it):

ISO 200 | 1/60 | f/8.0 | 70mm

I will definitely jump at any chance to take pictures in the Badlands again.  We were there for only a few hours in one spot, and there is so much to explore.  Even in the relatively small area we walked around there were so many amazing opportunities.

Omaha Landmarks

Over the last month I've gone out with The Professor to take pictures of Omaha's landmarks.  First we went to the Bob Kerrey Pedestrian Bridge at sunrise but the sunrise didn't happen, but I still grabbed this perspective of the bridge that I liked:

ISO 200 | 1/15 | f/11.0 | 28mm

After that we headed downtown and, although it has been photographed all too often, I figured I'd grab one for myself.  I like the way the tree branches in the foreground framed the skyscrapers in the background:

ISO 100 | 1/50 | f/11.0 | 28mm

Omaha's Rosenblatt Stadium will be torn down this year after having hosted the NCAA College World Series since 1950, so again I figured I'd grab some shots of my own:

ISO 100 | 1/50 | f/22.0 | 28mm

ISO 100 | 1/8 | f/3.5 | 28mm