Tuesday, July 9th was my 1st excursion out with the 25 mm lens. It was a typical summer day here in Alberta, typical for this year anyway; cloudy, bit of wind and looking like it would rain any minute were my conditions on my lunch break.
I started with a couple empty buildings.
Prairie moved a year ago but when did the Old Mill close?Games, Music relocated but this is a big empty space
I wandered through City Hall Park on my way to the parkade.
I took a few shots to make a couple of panoramas.
Had to get another shot of my favorite rose bush.
I took all of 1 photo on Wednesday, July 10th.
Thursday found me at the Service Canada office with my mom as she filled out her passport application.
My wife and I went to Sylvan Lake for an outdoor movie in the park. Enjoyed a beautiful sunset and half of Top Gun before an impending thunder storm shut it all down.
Saturday, July 13th found the sun shining so I took my scenic route to work.
The water level is starting to go down.
I found a scraggly looking rose.
I found a nicer looking rose so I thought I’d try varying degrees of depth of field.
If you look real close you can spot the young buck. 25 mm is not much of a wildlife lens. (Even with 2x digital zoom turned on.)
I wanted to get my 10 thousand steps in on Sunday so I went out in the morning and took my camera with me. I started on my scenic route and planned to do a loop up to Heritage Ranch, then down past Bower Ponds on my way home. It’s a bit over 9 kilometers so I was sure I’d make my goal.
Oh look, silvery leaves
There was a fence here a couple weeks ago. I did notice that next week the trail would be closed for construction in the new neighbourhood that is going in. (Closed and the bike path has been removed.)
With all the recent rain, plants grows like gangbusters.
When I first saw him I thought to myself, “It’s just one of them joggers.” Turned out to be one of my co-workers husband and their dog out for a run. I didn’t realize it at the time but he would be the first of 6 people I knew that I would run into on my walk. I met the next person I knew just by the 1st building.
Looking down from the top of the hill I spied the pretentiousness that is the Red Deer Golf and Country Club. I was in that building only one time when I was a freelance reporter at the Red Deer Express covering a press conference for some event that I don’t remember. Even at that you had to follow the dress code to be there.
Seemed like a good time to try out the clear image zoom.
As I was heading back down the hill at Heritage Ranch, I saw a couple out walking their dogs. They are customers in the store and my wife worked with the lady for a while a few years back. Maybe my wife is correct when she say I know everyone.
I tried to get a bit closer to get their photo but they saw me before I was where I wanted to be.
The fishing pond at Heritage Ranch is named after Barry Mitchell, a long time customer of mine and a very nice guy. Barry published the Alberta Fishing Guide and often told me that if I ever wanted to go fishing he’d take me to the good spots.
I took this one for the Trans Canada Trail marker. It’s readable, right?
I saw the geese on Bower Pond zooming along the water but my lens was just a bit too wide an angle to show it.
This was the most used lens in my month long test. I think part of that was because it wasn’t my lens (not yet, but…).
I must say that I really, really liked the 25 mm Batis. I think I would rate it and my 40 mm Batis as a tie for my favorites. The 85 mm Batis would be next and oddly enough, the 18 mm Batis as my least favorite during the test. I say oddly because I usually like a wide perspective as I see wider than most people, even after a couple eye surgeries.
I think I’ll have to try another test with some static subjects and the camera on a tripod and change the lenses out to change perspective.
With all the rain on Canada day, I never even left the house to try using my widest angle lens for week 3.
As it was I waited until after 9:30 pm to go out on the 2nd. The light was so nice I thought I’d go see if I could get a nice sunset shot or 2. I decided to take the scenic route (You may have noticed that I like scenic routes.) to Bower Ponds by taking the South Bank Trail to get there.
The destruction of the old water treatment plant was progressing and I wanted to get a shot over the construction fence but it was too tall for that so I had to improvise the shot I had envisioned in my head.
As I thought I’d try some shallow depth of field to see how I like it.
Then I tried for a shot of more depth of field with the foreground in focus.
Lastly, I went for the background to be the sharpest point of focus.
As I continued along my way, I saw a shot that I think would of worked better with last week’s lens choice.
The sun was going down and the colour was starting to show in the sky.
So I hustled across Taylor Bridge and looked for photo opportunities.
The wind was calm and so was the pond. My only real disappointment was that the lights along the bike path were already on when I got there.
The reflected cloud really caught my eye. Again, a narrower field of view probably would have been better, but use what you brought.
I didn’t take any more photos till Saturday, July 6th and Sunday, July 7th at the Ellis Bird Farm. I posted these photos in an earlier post but they belong here as well so…
A very short photo week. As much as I liked the results I found the 18 mm was actually too wide some times. (I never, ever thought I would think something was too wide.)
Tuesday, June 25th was my first picture taking day during week 2 of my trial. I was now using my 85 mm lens for testing.
A little tighter perspective than I usually get from up here
I really liked the compression I got from the slight telephoto. I did have to check angles a bit more to make things fit where I wanted them to as opposed to my usual wider angle shooting.
These fragrant roses are my 2nd favorite spring/summer flowers just after Lilacs
The 26th dawned as another walk to work day so I revisited some familiar ground.
I like the way the sun lit up the cloudA tighter perspective of my silver leaves
I was glad the bike path was open because where I had to walk last week was a bit of a mini lake to walk through.
I only took 1 photo on the 28th on my way to work. (3 actually to make a panorama.) Demolition had started on the old water treatment plant. The fence had been up for a couple of weeks without seeing much activity so it was nice to see what was happening.
I had noticed that the Lazer Tag place had closed down a couple of weeks earlier but the “For Lease” sign was fairly newly installed. I only went there one time for one of Adam’s birthdays but I walked past it a lot over the past 5 years so I was a bit sad to see it close. The building looks pretty sad all in all.
That’s a lot of empty space
Week 2 was in the books. Again, not a very taxing week photographically but it was challenging none the less.
Sometime around the beginning of June as I contemplated picking up another used Zeiss Batis lens that had come in to work I decided that I should try using just 1 lens for an entire week’s worth of photography to see how it went. I figured that I had 3 prime lenses, that gave me 3 weeks to experiment and if the used lens was still in the store I could try it to decide if I liked it.
The rather wet weather to end Spring and start Summer made this a bit of a challenging endeavor but I thought I’d give it a go.
Monday June 17th had a sunny start to the day so I decided to take the scenic route to walking to work.
The rose petals looked like a pink butterfly to me I don’t know what kind of plants these are but I always like the silvery leaves
I almost had the scenic route interrupted just past Taylor Bridge as there was some tree trimming going on along the bike path. Luckily the fellow keeping the tourists out of the way was standing nearby and when I told him what I was doing he told me to just keep left of the fence and go ahead.
Nothing else caught my eye on my walk nor for the next couple of days.
My next opportunity to take photos was when my son’s best friend, Carter, had his high school graduation on June 20th. There was a chilly wind blowing and the threat of rain was hanging in the air but it was the only time I was going to get to take a photo for him.
Adam and CarterMy wife wanted in on the actionMy, what a big ladder you have
Saturday, June 22nd was another good day to walk to and from work and I managed to grab a shot of the often photographed ex-CPR rail bridge.
I wanted to get a photo of the lady carrying her groceries but I didn’t want to bother her and I didn’t feel right just taking her photo without asking so I included her in the overall shot.
So a fairly short week photographically speaking. I will have to take another week to use just this lens in the future for more results. I do like it though as it is a bit wider than a “normal” lens and a bit tighter than a 35 mm perspective as that focal length never used to appeal to me
On Saturday, July the 6th I helped out Leo de Groot, a former president of my local camera club, do a workshop on photographing flying birds at the Ellis Bird Farm.
Leo is a Nikon shooter and I was there to help interpret Nikon speak for the Canon shooters. I’ve never actually owned a Canon, but with my job I know them a whole lot better than Leo did. I was pleasantly surprised to not be the token Sony shooter as there were 3 participants using Sony cameras.
I was told I would get paid and get lunch out of the deal. Having eaten at the tea house before; I would of been happy working for food so it was a double bonus in my mind. Triple, if you count getting to take photos of the birds and stuff at the farm.
After a little over an hour of classroom time, with some nice example photos thrown in; the 14 workshop participants, Leo, farm biologist Myrna Pearman and I headed outside to put the learning to practical use.
Since I wasn’t actually leading the workshop, I drifted off with a small group in search of a Baltimore Oriole that is a very long way away from Baltimore.
Along the way I saw one of the Great Horned Owlette triplets sitting high in a tree trying to blend in.
I didn’t see any Oriole but I did fall in love with watching the House Wrens zoom in and out of their house almost non stop to feed their young.
The Wrens are tiny but fierce. I’m sure they never really stay still and they chase away any thing that comes anywhere near their nest.
I switched gears to shoot some flora.
As lunch time was quickly approaching I headed up to the tea house and shared a table with some of the workshop participants and enjoyed an excellent lunch. After an hour or so of sharing stories it was time to go back out to see what else I could photograph.
I headed over to the pond area to see if I could see the owls again but saw this female Red Winged Blackbird sitting on the deck rail. I thought I’d try to get a shot or two of her taking off but she really wasn’t in any hurry to leave. I had almost given up when away she went. The results are kind of like passport photos in that they portray her but they aren’t really very flattering.
More practice will be needed to make that work.
I drifted up to the Purple Martin houses to see what I could catch up there. I didn’t find them all that helpful in letting me get photos of them. They either didn’t want to move or they fly off at high speed and don’t fly in a straight line for very long. Best I could do was not all that impressive.
Switching back to a static subject seemed a lot easier.
I started making my way back to my truck to head home and just had to see the Wrens again on the way out.
One last flower photo and I was on my way home.
I got up Sunday morning and decided that since I had borrowed the Sony A9 and 100-400 mm lens for the weekend I should go back to the farm to see if I could get some photos down at the West Woods since I hadn’t gone there on Saturday.
I walked along the east side of the pond to avoid hanging out around the Wren’s house. (It didn’t help.)
I got a few photos with my wide angle lens to get a different perspective than yesterday.
As I was photographing the flowers I heard a splash in the pond so I switched back to the big gun and saw this little lady sitting on the water.
I noticed a bunch of wasps on the flowers and when I picked one to try and photograph it another one joined him on the same flower and the fight was on. I shot them for about 3 seconds at 20 frames per second. I made a GIF of it but can’t seem to upload it here so I just picked one frame to put up.
Soon I heard the Wrens calling my name.
1/500th of a second works pretty good for a bird sitting still1/500th of a second doesn’t work so good for a small moving bird
I just stood around and watched for a while and a bunch of activity happened around me.
A group of squirrels took turns chasing each other and getting food from and around a bird feeder.
The Wrens would zoom in and chase a squirrel away and another one would run out and take his place.
More birds started showing up too.
Bohemian Waxwing
While I was taking in all the action, the Oriole made an appearance.
I realized that an hour had passed and I was no were near the West Woods yet so I reluctantly left the Wrens behind as I walked in that general direction.
Just before you get to the woods, there is a little pond that is always a nice quiet place to sit so I did just that.
From my bench seat I noticed how the grass was still pretty wet from last night’s rain.
I watched a few ducks swim past and listened to the Red Winged Blackbirds sing. Suddenly there was quite a commotion and over a dozen blackbirds were in an uproar on the other side of the pond.
When a hawk clutching a gopher in his talons burst out of the grass, the chase was on. I hadn’t seen him go into the grass so I have no idea how long he was there before they noticed him.
So I finally got some birds in flight photos but they are farther away than I’d like them to be but I really didn’t want to carry a bigger lens around.
I left once the action was over and managed to get a shot of some the geese that wouldn’t come anywhere near me.
As I was on my way out I noticed that a lot of the blackbirds were sitting quietly in trees and on the power lines but none of them would let me get all that close to them. Again, a bigger lens would be the answer but I took what I could get.
The path into the woods had been mowed fairly recently by the look of it but with all the recent rain the grass along it was very long so it made the path a lot narrower than usual. I could smell lilacs and stopped to get a shot of some that were past their glory days.
I heard a Red Tail Hawk calling and looked up to see her circling overhead. Someone should really teach hawks to circle in a flat arc instead of constantly climbing as they circle to make it easier on us photographers trying to take their picture. She was already up a ways and just kept getting smaller and smaller as she circled.
I thought the weak sunlight filtering through the clouds made the Visitors Centre stand out nicely against the industrial looking background the plant provided.
I pulled out my camera with the wide angle lens again just as I headed into the woods.
I noticed some mosquitoes here in the grassy shade that I hadn’t had to deal with up to this point. I walked just a little farther and took a photo of some trees that caught my eye.
And that’s when I realized that I hadn’t just found some mosquitoes, I’d found all the mosquitoes in Alberta. Being stubborn, I kept walking on my route through the trees, trying to reduce the food supply for some of the birds living here but I wasn’t going to stop to take any more photos till I was well and gone from there.
Back in the sunlight and open space I finally stopped feeling really, really itchy. I decided to head home.
Just one more visit to the Wrens.
I finally got a flying bird photo that I was happy with. Although, I wouldn’t enlarge it very much as she isn’t nearly as sharp as her stationary house is.
So all in all I had a very enjoyable weekend at the Ellis Bird Farm. I like to think of it as one of my happy places but then again, I’m usually pretty happy just being outside.
One thing that surprised me a bit was I notice that the about half of the participants in the workshop were from the Edmonton area. I also found most of the people I talked to out on the grounds were from up that direction. It is very cool that people will drive almost 2 hours for a visit to this little farm in Central Alberta.
Since I take photos of everything that catches my eye; which is a lot sometimes, I know I could never be a strictly a wildlife photographer. That, and I really have no desire to spend the money on or haul around the big lenses that would make it so much easier to get the shots.
I guess for now, I will stick to recording what I see in my little corner of the world.
Hank's Blog - Musings of a Wandering Mind 