The golden hour


You know, poetic license is all well and good, but you’d think photographers could be more specific and descriptive. The periods where the sun is low on the horizon are usually called the “golden hours,” but the colors are often not just gold, and spend more time in the various orange hues than yellow or gold. We could have the amber minutes, and the saffron, the read more

On this date 26


This week, we’re reminiscing about 2006 (to begin with,) a summer with a series of fierce electrical storms. These growing thunderheads were catching the light of the setting sun, so peaks of different heights and distances were getting contrasting colors dictated by the atmosphere you’ll notice that the very bottoms, and the foreground details, had read more

Another try


So, Monday night I went down to the lake to try again on those focus and tracking tests. The light was again ideal, only this time, it remained that way until the sun disappeared behind the trees. Unfortunately, I saw even fewer birds than before. I may be partially to blame here, since we’re now past nesting season and the adults have much less to do with no babies to feed. read more

You wanted to know

“Hey, Al,” started the thousands of e-mails I received the past couple of days, more-or-less-kinda (which means absolutely not,) “how come you haven’t posted anything for almost a week? This is prime season – why aren’t you out shooting?” Though no one nearby actually asked that (no duh,) because they knew what the local conditions were like: read more

On this date 25


This week, we have entries from 2010, 2013, 2015, and 2016 – just to make it easier to fill out your scorecard. Our 2010 submission above is a cluster of stink bugs, lacking a common name (well, other than ‘stink bug’) but bearing the scientific name of Menecles insertus. read more

We got birds

Boy, howdy, we got birds


These are actually from several different shooting sessions, and the first here is from May, a grab shot as a red-shouldered hawk (Buteo lineatus) cruised by near the sun – I just liked how the feathers turned out, though this gives a rotten impression of the actual coloration. I’ve had this sitting in the folder for a couple of weeks read more

Oh, hey, welcome…

I’ve got a lot of photos to edit for a major post coming up, but I happened across this a few minutes ago and had to feature it. Remember when I said that I’d like to get some Carolina anoles (Anolis carolinensis) established in our yard here? Tsch!, of course you do – I apologize for insulting your recall, or insinuating that you haven’t read everything read more

On this date 24


This week, we’re back in Florida, in 2004, looking at a distant thunderhead dumping some heavy rains onto a region far to the west. Such displays were and are extremely common in Florida, as the prevailing winds carried moisture-laden air off of the Gulf of Mexico and across the state, where it encountered the overheated and rapidly rising air from the land mass, driving the read more

Your patriotic duty

I just realized, on typing that title rather awkwardly, that I don’t use the word “patriotic” much at all. Which is good, because I find patriotism on a par with tribalism, and that’s just arbitrary “us-vs-them”ism, which we don’t need. Personal rants aside, Saturday, June 13th is National Get Outdoors Day, and I know, read more

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