Moose News Blog

Back when I was in school in the ’70s, there use to be a book called American Showcase that was published yearly. It was a place where commercial shooters of the day would buy a page or 3 or 5 and showcase their best work in the hopes of finding new clients. There were always cool shots of oil storage fields that I just loved, admired and wanted. They were usually shot at highnoon with the tanks looking like high polished aluminum and the ladder’s shadow painted in with ink.

On the way back in last night I saw these tanks. The late afternoon light grabbed my attention but I couldn’t stop to make anything of the opportunity. Tonight, I made a point to stop. So, I jumped out and handholding the 600VR, I shot for about 10min until I got what I desired. I’ve always wanted shots like this. Now I’ve finally got a cool start to them.

And yes, I was skunked again today.

Photos captured by D3, 600VR w/1.7x on Lexar UDMA digital film

Drove five hours (it was snowing when we left the house) and put in our time at the spot the biologists had emailed me about yesterday. What you see above is what I have to show for my time. Zip!

Why am I blogging zip? This is just as much a part of my success as an actual image. Wildlife is just that, wild life and it does whatever it wants to do whether I’m sitting there waiting or not. Coming back with nothing is simply part of the game.

And tomorrow, I’ll be in place before the sun comes up and waiting there until the sun sets. If things go my way, I’ll be spending my time tomorrow night going through images rather than blogging. If not, well, I’ll be looking at the same thing, an empty flash card. Either way, I’m still ahead of the game.

It’s been one heck of Monday and I’ve been stuck at my desk the whole entire day. That’s the way it goes when you run a business that’s successful. Knowing how I just hate four walls, when we built our office, I designed it so I can literally sit at my desk and turn right and work at my desk, turn left and shoot. The 600VR sits set up right at my desk, it’s purty schweet and a huge relief valve from sitting at my desk!

Well, about 10 days ago, our Stellar Jays returned and they just now are starting to take on their great looks for nesting season. We’ve got around 20 in the yard right now, vying for territories and get fattened on our seed (they go through about 20lbs of seed a day). They wait in line for the feeders there are so many. In the late evening, this one perch has just the most subtle of light this time of year, so the lens is focused on that perch waiting for a subject. Typically, when the Band-tailed Pigeons are feeding, the jays stack up and hold still for a moment so I can get a shot off. Shooting at 1/30, their holding still is important.

I just love the background. I move the lens ever so slightly to rim the bird by lit pine needles way off in the background. No, I don’t like the foot being cut off but I’m not going to delete the photo because of that. The power of the eye overrides the missing foot. Of course, now that I’ve brought your attention to it, you’ll have to decide if you like it.

Photo captured by D3, 600VR w/1.7x on Lexar UDMA digital film

So, we’ve got these gorgeous *^+%#@# lillies in the house. They’ve been driving my nose to the extreme of sneezing explosions. But they are gorgeous, and they just won’t die! So, it occurred to me that I should get even in my own unique way, I’d shoot them bastards!

The lighting is a very simple two flash set up. On the lens (105VR) is a single R1C1 flash unit (the SB-R200) with a second R1C1 flash on a C Stand holding it right behind the petals. And this is what I came up with.

My bad luck, after shooting them, they are still gorgeous (didn’t even have to do anything in post) and still they live so back they go to the living room to continue on tickling my nose.

Photos captured by D3 (firmware 1.10), 105VR, 2 SB-R200 flashes on Lexar UDMA digital film

Termination of D3 Digital-SLR Camera Firmware Ver. 1.10 Download

On April 15, 2008, an announcement was made on the Nikon website that the Ver. 1.10 firmware update for the D3 digital-SLR camera was available for download. However, it has been confirmed that when the following settings are applied with the updated firmware, image data may, in some rare cases, be corrupted. Therefore, we have terminated the firmware update download. We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this issue may have caused.

Release mode: Continuous high speed (CH), or Continuous low speed (CL) with Custom Setting d2 set to 9 fps

Image area: FX format (36×24) or 5:4 (30×24)

Image quality: NEF (RAW) or NEF (RAW) + JPEG fine/normal/basic

NEF (RAW) recording>NEF (RAW) bit depth: 14-bit

*The issue related to NEF (RAW) recording>NEF (RAW) bit depth may occur regardless of the option selected for NEF (RAW) recording>Type (Lossless compressed, Compressed, or Uncompressed).

If you have downloaded the D3 Ver. 1.10 firmware update but have not yet updated the camera’s firmware, please do NOT perform the update. If you have already updated the D3 firmware, please do not shoot with the combination of settings indicated above. This issue does not occur with other combinations of camera settings (for example, when NEF (RAW) bit depth is set to 12-bit, or when shooting in continuous low speed (CL) release mode with Custom Setting d2 set to 8 fps or lower.)

The download version of the revised firmware update is expected to be available in late April. For more information regarding this matter, please contact Nikon Customer Support.

Again, we sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this issue may have caused. We hope that you will continue to choose Nikon for your photography needs.