Week 51 by Becky

WHATEVER, I AM OUTTA HERE!

Well, since my comrades posted their heron photos I figured it was only befitting I post mine.  This is the same heron in their photos that was getting yelled at by the other heron.  After awhile, this guy just took off because he was tired of being yelled at.  Normally, when you see these birds, they are very peaceful.  So, imagine our surprise when we heard the one heron yelling at the other.  Was kind of funny.  The one yelling was totally beside himself.  The one being yelled at was looking at him like "Whatever".  Hard to believe this is week 51 of our 52 project.  Boo Hoo. Hope we have another one.  Especially look forward to our NWG outings.  Thanks Judy, for planning them :)

Week 45 by Becky

Mockingbird

At our photo club meeting, this past Tuesday, we had a couple speakers come in to talk about "Birding Photography".  Both are awesome bird photographers.  Well, the opportunity presented itself for me to try my hand at a little bird photography.  This Mockingbird has built a nest in a bush just off our front porch.  She laid three eggs a few weeks ago.  I checked them this morning and at least two have them have hatched. I told my son who came to look and that is when the mommy decided to fly over our heads to scare us away.  I ran in the house to get my camera to see if I could catch her flying into the nest.  This is her flying from one tree to the next.  She wouldn't come near the nest until I went inside.  The lens I used was a 18-200mm and I had to crop it down.

Week 27 by Becky

Water Moccasin (aka Cottonmouth)

McKee Gardens is definitely a photographer's paradise. There was so much to photograph and the cafe's food was absolutely mouthwatering. It was hard to choose what to submit this week. Flowers, dragonflies, snakes, OH MY! I encountered two water moccasins next to the pond where I was about lay down to get a closer look at some water flowers when I happened to notice them. Which for me is pretty good because I am usually not observant of my surroundings when I am focusing on my next shot. The other snake disappeared as I was focusing on them. I so enjoy our No Wimpy Girls outings.

Week 20 by Becky

Jumping Jack Flash

Wednesday night after work I was walking around the yard at 6:30pm. It was quickly getting dark so I was forced to use my on camera flash. I was also carrying around tin foil so that any light that came from the flash could be redirected by the tin foil. I came across this Rainbow Fly minding his own business on this leaf. Snapped the shot. I guess the flash scared the fly so much that it jumped off the leaf. Not the best focus on the fly since it moved, but the movement shows it jumped off the leaf in response to the flash. I named the fly Jack :)

Week 18 by Becky

TILL DEATH DO US PART

While photographing the ever colorful rainbow flies in my front garden I came across these two ants fighting. Looks like one of the ants was stronger than the other. Shortly after taking this photo the winner dropped the other ant to the ground.

Week 17 by Becky

CHICKADEE

Went to Michigan for my husband's 30th High School Class Reunion over the weekend. I was looking out my mother-in-law's kitchen window and saw this little guy.

Week 16 by Becky

We See You

Playing around with my new Nikon Macro 105mm lens. Took a variety of photos this morning which caused me to have a hard time determining what to enter for the blog this week. Came across these nasty things in the garden and decided to post them for the blog. Especially since tomorrow they are going bye bye. Don't like the blurry plant in the foreground, but I was not about to clip it away. These guys are really nasty and they were watching my every movement. I moved, they moved. Pretty weird. Tried to clone part of the plant out, but it just didn't look right. Very happy with the lens. My settings were f9.0, ISO 160, 1/6 sec. Opened in Adobe Raw and did some tweaking. Did Topaz Adjust, but don't remember what I did. Really need to get better about documenting that stuff. Unsharp Mask, crop, smart sharpened, then saved for web.

Week 8 by Becky

Gold

My son's soccer team was doing some beach clean up. So I took my camera and one of my cokin filters to play around with. This is some of the grass on the beach. You can vaguely make out people in the background. Not to exciting of a photo, but I didn't have much time. I kinda of like the golden look the filter gave the photo. I will have to play with it some more.