Just Ducky

Mallard Duck

“The ducks are back! The ducks are back! “, called my daughter, and although under the weather, I performed the spring rite of  documenting their return. Every year we have a pair of Mallard ducks visit the garden pond, and Saturday they arrived for the first time. Sunday I was feeling a bit better, so I crept out low to get in close and try for some portraits of the pair.

I know these are common birds, and like gulls, crows, jays and magpies they are often maligned. I don’t quite understand the prejudice, but I think they deserve more respect. After all, it is our alienation from nature, in one way or another, that brings these birds to irritate us to begin with.

Mallard Drake

Looking at the two, although the drake is flashy, are not the details in the duck’s feathers more refined?

(CLICK TO ENLARGE)

 

Cooperative Cat. Not.

Since the arrival of our cat Freya, it has been my wish to photograph her in mid-leap as she jumps to reach a dangling cat toy. Last night I set up a black background, our two wireless Nikon flashes and, with my daughter’s assistance as official toy-dangler, I tried to take some photographs…

Freya van Thyssenhoff

She did not cooperate. After one or two feeble leaps, she found more pleasure lying under the chair or pouncing on wrinkles in the fabric. Despite Arwen’s skilled twitching of the cat toy, Freya remained aloof. It was as frustrating as, …well, …herding cats!

(Nikon D70 with Nikon 18 – 200mm VR zoom lens. Lighting with Nikon SB-600 and SB-900 flashes)

 

Sunday Video – Endangered Cultures

From Ted Talks:

Photographer Phil Borges shows rarely seen images of people from the mountains of Dharamsala, India, and the jungles of the Ecuadorean Amazon. In documenting these endangered cultures, he intends to help preserve them.

 

Best of Britain

Now you may be wondering, why was he sitting by the window of opportunity rather than roaming about doing real photography? Why read about T.H. Huxley when the morning light is at its best? Frankly, I was tired. Jet lag, daily frustraton with crowds (and, admittedly, with the family dynamics) led me to choose reading over photography during the only quiet and peaceful period of the day. I failed when conscientiousness was required – and I justified it with a few shots of birds taken between slurps of coffee and reading.

But all was not lost. Now and again time and light and our position on the planet coincided to provide photographic opportunities.

 

The Big Vacation – Introduction

Every year seems to rotate around the summer holiday: the great escape from the drudgery of work and the monotony of home that seems to make life worthwhile. OK, I’m exaggerating a bit, but that month we get off takes months of prior thought, and then afterwards requires months to recover from. The family vacation  for me usually starts with dreams of dedicated and masterful photography and ends with, four weeks later, “What? Holidays over already?” It is like the dinner we slave 2 hours to prepare and then takes only 15 minutes to consume…

The family vacation is not the prime event of the photographic year. I have yet to fully understand this, but the words family and vacation do not mix with the art of photography…in fact, they barely can be spoken in the same sentence as the craft of photography. There is always the rush – to not be late, to stand in line,  to finish before closing time…and that doesn’t even begin to account for the time trying to satisfy a diverse family  and their pets and all their interests and diversions. The only time you are not on the go is when you are recovering from it, and there goes your photographic window.

Speaking of photographic windows, In our farmhouse in Yorkshire, my favourite spot for reading was by the living room window. From here I could watch the birds coming down to the lawn to catch insects and haul up worms. I could sit with the D80 and the 80 – 400mm zoom attached, and while reading about T.H. Huxley (my major distraction during the holiday), I could photograph the birds an they flew into range.