outdoor photography

Sunrise at Orlando Wetlands Park I bought my Canon Powershot G7X so that I would be able take landscapes and other non-bird photographs without having to change lenses all the time. I spend all my time in nature just looking for birds, and so often I forget to photograph the scenery around me.  Well on November 30th the sunrise was too spectacular to ignore, so I pulled out my other camera and started taking photos. I'm pretty happy with these. These may be my favorite sunrise photos from the park. Sunrise at Orlando Wetlands Park

Canon Powershot G7X I've been using my Canon G7X for about a month now.  Obviously given my interest in bird photography, I didn't buy it to be my primary camera. However, I always like to take a second camera with me for photos of landscapes, flowers and other non-birds in nature. Bringing a second DSLR or changing lenses is not really an option, so this camera seemed to fit the bill. So far I have been very impressed with it.  I haven't done any formal tests, but it seems like noise levels are not appreciably different from my Canon 7D, and the lens is nice and sharp, even at 1:1 on my computer.  All my landscape shots have been shot hand held. Here are a few that I like best. Mead Gardens Mead Gardens Sunrise Over Miami Ocean View For macro and flower photography, the Canon G7X has done quite well so far. With a smaller sensor, this camera will not give you the kind of blurry backgrounds you'd expect to get out of a DSLR, but it's a gigantic...

Sunrise Over the Atlantic Ocean Last week I went on a pelagic trip into the Atlantic Ocean. We left Ponce Inlet at 4 am in search of a sunrise and some pelagic birds. We were not disappointed. The sunrise was spectacular, and we had a chance to see some nice pelagic birds. We didn't see anything rare, but it was fun nonetheless. Cory's Shearwater Great Shearwater Audubon's Shearwater Shortly after sunrise, we saw our first pelagic bird--a Cory's Shearwater. Soon we were in the midst of the Gulf Stream (about 40 miles off shore), and we began to see more Cory's Shearwaters (a couple were Scopoli type), one Great Shearwater, several Audubon Shearwaters, and both Sooty and Bridled Terns. We had at least one Parasitic Jaeger (my only lifer on the day), one likely Pomarine Jaeger, and a few Brown Boobies. Sooty Tern Bridled Tern We went out 65 miles to the western edge of a canyon that was about 2,500 ft deep about half way across the Gulf...

Sunrise Over Lake Monroe This past Saturday I had to be at a little park on the southern shore of Lake Monroe before 7 am.  He was running in a 5k race, so I brought my point and shoot to photograph him during the event.  The sunrise over Lake Monroe that morning was pretty spectacular, so I found a couple spots to brace my camera (since I didn't have a tripod) and took a few landscape photos of the sunrise.  The top image is an HDR composite image, and the image below is a single image.  Both of these were taken with the Canon PowerShot S100HS. Oh, and my son came in first in his high school and first in his age group.  So it was a win all around. Sunrise Over Lake Monroe

Sunrise Beyond finding the Brown-crested Flycatcher and other flycatchers I was looking for, I had fun finding other birds as well.  Several birds posed for photographs, most notably Red-winged Blackbirds, Eastern Phoebe, and Ospreys.  Also a Red Admiral landed on a tree trunk for me. In my haste to find the flycatchers, I didn't stop much for photos, but here are a few I did take. Red-winged Blackbird Red-Admiral Eastern Phoebe Osprey

Red Bug Lake Park Sunrise On my way into work today, I decided to stop by a park that is right by my daughter's school.  I walked to the lake right as the sun was rising.  I took several images to do some HDR work, but this picture in particular had enough detail for me to make adjustments in Lightroom.  So here's the sunrise over my daughter's school (which you can't see) at Red Bug Lake Park.