3 Hours birding at Whitnall

The six inches of snow we received on Thursday was sure refreshing and yesterday (Saturday) I finally got to get out into it. Unfortunately, I just didn't have time to hit the Biathlon race at the McMiller Sports Center near Eagle, nor the XC Ski sprint races at the capitol in Madison, but I did poke around the woods at nearby Whitnall Park and despite there being WAY too many people walking about, I got some great bird shots.

American Tree Sparrow.





Flicker



Black Capped Chickadee





Downey Woodpecker.

Winter Time

Stuck at work.

I'm stuck at work this weekend, using Explorer 7.0 from 2006, so there isn't much I can do here except share some older photos that I've taken.

Recently, I picked up a remote flash transmitter which I was testing when I took this shot. I believe this was with the Canon 135mm f2.0 lens which is remarkably sharp.



One of the experiments I tried this past summer was shooting with a 10 stop welding plate used in welding helmets. I got this one at Farm and Fleet for just a few bucks. With a 10 stop filter, one can shoot with longer exposures during the day. Here I shoot the freeway, which was actually jammed with traffic, but the longer exposure magically makes the cars and trucks disappear!





I'm still looking for a good spot to shoot the freeway from that would really emphasise the emptiness of the road.

As much as I want to, it doesn't look like I'm going to get to shoot any ski jumping this winter. Work is getting in the way. This is such a hard sport to shoot because of the cold, the speed of the skiers, weird angles of the sun, but when you nail one ... it's something special.