A touch of frost

The first frost of the year; I can’t wait for the winter to arrive …

* Canon EOS 5D Mark II with 17-40mm/f4 @ 33mm; ISO-400, f9, 0.3s; polarization filter and 2 stop ND gradient filter; from tripod.

Alien between lichens

One of those grey autumn Sundays. I went with Jarno van Bussel to the Strabrechtsche Heide to search for Jack Snipes (Lymnocryptes minimus/Bokje), which we did not find. There was not much to do. When we were about to go home I saw a trunk covered with Lichens (Cladonia cf./Bekermos), the ones with red caps (here just tiny spots) are also known as British Soldiers, and decided to try some macros. I bend over to take a closer look, and then I saw this Common Newt (Lissotriton vulgaris/Kleine Watersalamander). I choose a wide aperture (short DOF) to emphasize the E.T. look of this amphibian, and of course to have a shutter time that is fast enough to shoot without tripod. After the photo session the newt crawled under the trunk, probably to winter there.

* Canon EOS 5D Mark II with 100mm/f2.8; ISO-800, f5.6, 1/100s; hand held.

Vortex

And now something completely different! It was a big honor for me to join Andrew George, one of the winners of the “BBC Wildlife Photographer of the Year Award 2011”, to the Ardennes, Belgium. We hoped for an explosion of color in the trees. Unfortunately almost all leaves had already fallen and so we had to deal with autumn colors in this torrent.

* Canon EOS 5D Mark II with 17-40mm/f4 @ 26mm; ISO-50, f16, 15s; polarization filter, 3 stop ND filter and 2 stop ND gradient filter; from tripod.

Amsterdamned I

This afternoon I had an appointment with these 2 Snipes (Gallinago gallinago/Watersnip). I enjoyed a nice cup of coffee; they probed now and then in the ground looking for a delicatesse. It was cozy and very quiet … until this ADHD Waterrail (Rallus aquaticus/Waterral) appeared on the scene and disturbed our high-tea party.
Ton Döpp many thanks!

* Canon EOS 5D Mark II with 500mm/f4 IS; ISO-400, f6.3, 1/200s; -0.3 stop; from beanbag.
* Canon EOS 5D Mark II with 500mm/f4 IS; ISO-400, f5.6, 1/500s; from beanbag.
* Canon EOS 5D Mark II with 500mm/f4 IS; ISO-800, f5.6, 1/400s; from beanbag.

Feet of floor

At the pier of IJmuiden you can always find interesting birds at this time of year. Checking out the beach revealed a few groups of foraging Sanderlings (Calidris alba/Drieteenstrandloper). This time I managed to capture the characteristic feet-of-floor shot! As you could see I could not keek-up with its speed. Later on the day I saw o.a. Red-throated Diver (Gavia stellata/Roodkeelduiker), Gannet (Sula bassana/Jan-van-Gent), Arctic Skua (Stercorarius parasiticus/Kleine Jager), Kittiwake (Rissa tridactyla/Drieteenmeeuw), and Guillemot (Uria aalge/Zeekoet) around the pier.

* Canon EOS 7D with 500mm/f4 IS; ISO-400, f6.3, 1/2500s; -0.3 stop; from beanbag (in frying pan).

Orange in green

Today my wife celebrated her 48-th birthday. A good reason to take a day off. In the late afternoon I could ‘escape’ from the party for an hour. The local forest offered a few Saffron Parasols (Cystoderma amianthinum/Okergele Korrelhoed) in a bed of mos.

* Canon EOS 5D Mark II with 100mm/f2.8; ISO-400, f4.5, 1/20s; from beanbag.

Undutchable

Terschelling offers more than shore birds. This photo was taken last sunday at sunrise. The view from this high dune top on the ‘Zeereep’ was magical and quite undutchable. Enjoy! I created a panorama of 5:2 out of 2 overlapping exposures (the size of the composed image is 8425x3370 pixels!).

* Canon EOS 5D Mark II with 100mm/f2.8; ISO-200, f16, 1/50s (2x); from tripod; panorama stitch.