Roseate Spoonbill at The National Aviary

In 2014 while visiting the Ding Darling Preserve in Florida I photographed a flock of spoonbills which you can see here,

In our winter visit to the National Aviary I was pleased to see the pair of spoonbills were nesting. I couldn’t get a clear shot then but on our visit last week they were quite active and I managed to get a closeup image.

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Roseate Spoonbill

Happy Independence Day at the National Aviary

I love my country and Independence Day. I don’t really like fireworks though. I worry to much about our veterans with PTSD and the dogs hiding under the bed. I like cookouts and barbecue and am not going to let the current political climate detract from celebrating our independence from Great Britain.

So what better way to celebrate than by visiting our national symbol at The National Aviary. Pittsburgh should be proud of having the largest aviary in the United States and it is currently having the tropical room refurbished but still worth visiting if only to see this nesting pair.

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Our National Symbol

Smithsonian Candidate #11…Death from Above

I am thinking of entering the Smithsonian Photo Contest even though I have zero chance of winning. I say that not to denigrate my ability as a photographer, but each category already has over 50,000 entries. Sure a lot of them are crap but some, well follow the link above and see for yourself. Also you can only submit work from 1/1/2016 until the present and all works with people must have a model release.

If you are familiar with any of my work (e.g. Moment and Souls) you probably realize I don’t have a lot of model releases.

Fortunately I do have some images that may qualify in other categories and will be publishing some here to see if you feel they quality. Please comment and let me know your thoughts. This is an entry in the nature category and is an image of the death throes of a gecko in the grasp of a blue heron.

To see other images and buy apparel or prints, please visit my commercial gallery.

Death from Above

Smithsonian Candidate #9…Pittsburgh Rembrandt Tulip

I am thinking of entering the Smithsonian Photo Contest even though I have zero chance of winning. I say that not to denigrate my ability as a photographer, but each category already has over 50,000 entries. Sure a lot of them are crap but some, well follow the link above and see for yourself. Also you can only submit work from 1/1/2016 until the present and all works with people must have a model release.

If you are familiar with any of my work (e.g. Moment and Souls) you probably realize I don’t have a lot of model releases.

Fortunately I do have some images that may qualify in other categories and will be publishing some here to see if you feel they quality. Please comment and let me know your thoughts. This is an entry in the nature category and shows a Rembrandt Tulip from our Pittsburgh Garden

To see other images and buy apparel or prints, please visit my commercial gallery.

Rembrandt Tulip

Smithsonian Candidate #8…Long Boards on The Gulf

I am thinking of entering the Smithsonian Photo Contest even though I have zero chance of winning. I say that not to denigrate my ability as a photographer, but each category already has over 50,000 entries. Sure a lot of them are crap but some, well follow the link above and see for yourself. Also you can only submit work from 1/1/2016 until the present and all works with people must have a model release.

If you are familiar with any of my work (e.g. Moment and Souls) you probably realize I don’t have a lot of model releases.

Fortunately I do have some images that may qualify in other categories and will be publishing some here to see if you feel they quality. Please comment and let me know your thoughts. This is an entry in the people category and shows two longboards in the Gulf of Mexico near Sunset Beach.

To see other images and buy apparel or prints, please visit my commercial gallery.

Long Boarding

Pittsburgh’s Waterfalls—Fall Run Park

We live in Regent Square and wanted to take our dog (Trey) to see her first water fall. We didn’t want to drive a long way to Cucumber Falls so I did a little research and found out there are a few water falls in the Greater Pittsburgh Area,
This is Fall Run Park in Allison Park. Its not a giant waterfall but it is a nice short hike of about a mile through a wooded area with wooden bridges over the streams. There are also wooden steps leading to a lookout at the top of the falls.

The whole experience made Trey smile and me too.

To see other images and buy apparel or prints, please visit my commercial gallery.

Fall Run Park

Fall Run Park

Trey at The Falls

Smithsonian Candidate #7…Strasbourg France

I am thinking of entering the Smithsonian Photo Contest even though I have zero chance of winning. I say that not to denigrate my ability as a photographer, but each category already has over 50,000 entries. Sure a lot of them are crap but some, well follow the link above and see for yourself. Also you can only submit work from 1/1/2016 until the present and all works with people must have a model release.

If you are familiar with any of my work (e.g. Moment and Souls) you probably realize I don’t have a lot of model releases.

Fortunately I do have some images that may qualify in other categories and will be publishing some here to see if you feel they quality. Please comment and let me know your thoughts.This one is in the Travel Category and is a view Strasbourg France from Bassin de la Citadelle.

To see other images and buy apparel or prints, please visit my commercial gallery.

Strasbourg France

Smithsonian Candidate #6…Kinderjik

I am thinking of entering the Smithsonian Photo Contest even though I have zero chance of winning. I say that not to denigrate my ability as a photographer, but each category already has over 50,000 entries. Sure a lot of them are crap but some, well follow the link above and see for yourself. Also you can only submit work from 1/1/2016 until the present and all works with people must have a model release.

If you are familiar with any of my work (e.g. Moment and Souls) you probably realize I don’t have a lot of model releases.

Fortunately I do have some images that may qualify in other categories and will be publishing some here to see if you feel they quality. Please comment and let me know your thoughts.This one is in the Travel Category and is a view of a windmill of Kinderjik, Holland.

To see other images and buy apparel or prints, please visit my commercial gallery.

Kinderjik

Our Pittsburgh Garden– White Iris

White flowers are the hardest to photograph. Iris especially are difficult because they reflect so much light but are thin enough to also refract a fair amount of light and light therefore transmits through the leaves.

To compensate for this, you must use a tripod so that you can use a low ISO setting and achieve enough depth of field to capture the transmitted light as well as the reflected light. During editing in post production it will be necessary to reduce the highlights by at least one and a half f-stops to be able to see the texture of the bloom in the white area.

To see other images and buy apparel or prints, please visit my commercial gallery.

White Iris

Our Pittsburgh Garden– Purple Iris

Regent Square is overrun with rabbits. Fortunately our dog raises the alarm
every time she spots one. However she is in an enclosed area and can’t lay chase. I can’t use my pellet gun like I did when we lived in the mountains so we try to control them with dried blood and pepper spray.

The have destroyed most of our tulips and some other flowers but they don’t like daffodils and they don’t eat Iris. I expect we will be adding more Iris in the future. This purple beauty is in our front garden.

To see other images and buy apparel or prints, please visit my commercial gallery.

Purple Iris