(1/1250 sec @ f/7.1; ISO 400; 0 EV)

My wife and I took a trip down to the North Shore area of the New Jersey coast this morning. We covered the inland lakes from Little Silver Lake in Point Pleasant Beach up to Fletcher Lake in Bradley Beach. For those of you unfamiliar with the area [...]]]>

(1/1250 sec @ f/7.1; ISO 400; 0 EV)

My wife and I took a trip down to the North Shore area of the New Jersey coast this morning. We covered the inland lakes from Little Silver Lake in Point Pleasant Beach up to Fletcher Lake in Bradley Beach. For those of you unfamiliar with the area (which would probably be most of you), these lake are so close to the ocean that you can practically spit from one to the other. In most cases, it is ocean, beach, small boardwalk, street, lake. Anyway, these lakes are winter home to a wide variety of ducks, cormorants, herons and such.

This particular Great Blue Heron seems to have taken up residence along Fletcher Lake in Bradley Beach. I saw him there last weekend with another photographer getting close-up after close-up. Today was my turn. I was able to ease up to about 8-10 feet of him and get my shots while resting the camera on the back of a park bench. What you see here is a full frame image (no cropping) from my Canon 50D and 300mm f/2.8L IS lens with a 2x TC. I was able to get way up close and personal with this guy.

GBH #2

GBH #3

Anthropomorphism is the attribution of uniquely human characteristics to non-human creatures and beings. It talking about what the cats are thinking or the birds doing and translating the behavior by attributing human motivations and feelings. Well that’s I was doing with the first image  here (GBH #2). This was the final photograph that I took of this Great [...]]]>

GBH #2

GBH #3

Anthropomorphism is the attribution of uniquely human characteristics to non-human creatures and beings. It talking about what the cats are thinking or the birds doing and translating the behavior by attributing human motivations and feelings. Well that’s I was doing with the first image  here (GBH #2). This was the final photograph that I took of this Great Blue Heron last evening. His look struck me as  priceless. First, is there any question that he knew I was there? I think not. And second, is there any question that the look says “Enough already! You can leave now!” So I slowly got up and left the stream bank. 

The second image (GBH #3) is just a classic Heron pose made a little earlier in the evening and done as a horizontal composition.

This will bring an end to this GBH series. Hope you enjoyed the images.

(Both images are Copyright Ed Vatza 2009. Usage without my prior written approval is prohibited.)

This came oh so close to being and “oh for..” weekend. After yesterday’s “oh for”, we set off this morning for a couple of local birding spots to see if we could come up with something to photograph. The only thing I came up with was a distant shot of some Northern Pintail ducks swimming [...]]]>

This came oh so close to being and “oh for..” weekend. After yesterday’s “oh for”, we set off this morning for a couple of local birding spots to see if we could come up with something to photograph. The only thing I came up with was a distant shot of some Northern Pintail ducks swimming among the reeds. They were too far out for any type of decent image. 

That left this evening. I went out along our local creek again after dinner. I wasn’t really expecting anything too different from last evening when I came home without taking a single photo. As a matter of fact, I left the heavy artillery at home and went out with just a Canon 30D and 70-200mm f/2.8L IS lens. No tripod – really nothing else. As I walked along the creek, I quickly came across this Great Blue Heron and to my surprise and delight, he didn’t immediately fly off. So I slowly eased myself into position – first walking very slowly, then getting down on my knees and moving closer to where I wanted to be before finally sitting on the bank of the stream no more than 20 feet away from him. He knew I was there but, for some reason, he stayed put standing on one leg in a small rapids along the stream. I sat there watching him for more than 30 minutes, taking photographs as we went along. It was a wonderful experience. I felt he had let me enter his world.

And then I topped off the evening by coming across a small herd of white-tailed deer just before dark and got some decent photos of them. So the weekend ended well.

NOTE (3/16/09): I noticed that the original image that I had posted had a bluish cast which could be seen in the background. So I increased the color temperature and tint just a bit in Lightroom to remove it and re-posted the image. 

(This image is Copyright Ed Vatza 2009. Usage without my prior written approval is prohibited.)