I made it down to Squaw Creek again for another trip on the way through to Kansas City. On one of the trips around the lake, I captured these two Canada geese hanging out on a muskrat hut. They just watched as I took their photo, content to be together. I felt the black and white treatment here was the best to isolate the subjects.
I wanted to get some up close shots of the Snow Geese at Squaw Creek, but every time I got fairly close, they decided to up and run away. So, I tried my hand at the American Coots. I got a little close, and when they go they almost look like little road runners before they take off.
Another type of image I wanted to capture from the visit to Squaw Creek was a wide-angle view of all the birds. In this photograph, some of the birds are discernible, while the majority exist only as a large black wave in the background. This really exemplifies the shear magnitude of this flock of geese on the lake.
For today's image, I wanted to shoot directly into the flock of snow geese in such a way, that unless you knew that they were birds, you might not be able to ascertain what exactly the photograph was. Here, I waited until they were really stirred up by something and then shot several directly into the storm of birds. It appears as an abstract with black and white and small touches of blue.
A few days ago I mentioned that I made it down to Squaw Creek National Wildlife Refuge for the snow geese migration. It was quite an experience, one that is hard to describe without being there. Today's image is just a minute selection of the birds that were hanging out on the lake. Here, the they are defined and you can actually see individual birds. In the next couple of days I will post some that simply look like an abstract painting. I wanted to post this image first so that you could get an idea of what a snow goose actually looks like if you haven't seen one.
I made a trek down to Squaw Creek National Wildlife Refuge yesterday since they had over one million snow geese and 150 bald eagles. Recently, I rebuilt my computer to install the latest version of Photoshop and I haven't had an opportunity to color profile my monitor again, so I will have a lot of work when that is done. In the meantime, I found this blue jay photograph that I took on one of my circles around the lake.
A couple of weeks ago I managed to capture this image of a duck at Scramm State Recreation Area. While I like the color version of this image, the thing that really drew me into this photograph was the composition. To accentuate the composition, I decided to remove the color. I used a new plugin, Nik Silver Efex Pro to do the conversion. This is the first time I have used that utility and I found that I liked the results and the ease at which I was able to do it. It definitely opened some good Black and White possibilities for me.
Today's image was taken a couple of weeks ago when I went to DeSoto National Wildlife Refuge to capture some sunset images. The sunset fizzled, but there were plenty of geese flying around overhead and I captured this when they flew directly over me. The pattern this creates in the sky is always different and always fascinates me.
Last week the highs were in the 60s and the birds were out chirping. I couldn't help but go capture a couple of images of the robins as they scurried around in the warm sun.
As I was returning the other morning when I ventured out to photograph the Platte River at sunrise, I heard an incessant chirping from a nearby tree. There I found a little red cardinal that was welcoming the day. Not wanting to disturb him for too long, I took only a couple of shots and then continued on. 
As a nature, landscape, and wildlife photographer, I have to be aware of the natural world around me. As such, I have learned things about weather, moon phases, migratory patterns, and species than I ever thought I would ever learn, a nice side reward of what I do.
To the Sky
The third item I am going to address is ISO performance. There has been quite a bit of discussion on the net surrounding the noise levels at higher settings. Since this is more of a real-world look than a technical review (there are lots of sites dedicated to that), I am going to simply discuss what I have seen. The ISO levels seem better than the Canon 5d by somewhere from about 1 to a little less than 2 stops. This means that greater detail and less noise is available at higher ISOs. On my Canon 5d I never had any problem dialing the ISO up to about 800 for some shots. 1600 was about my absolute maximum for retaining detail. Beyond that I found that I had to use noise programs fairly liberally. All the wildlife photographs on this blog post were shot using a minimum of ISO 400 up to 640. This allowed me to achieve shutter speeds that would stop the action, but allow a little blur to show the movement of the birds. At these speeds there is virtually no noise.
Quiet Day
Technical Details:
Canon 5d Mark II, 50 CM, f/5.6, 1/50 sec., ISO 6400
To follow up with a little more testing in a (little) more controlled environment, I decided to purposely photograph my stationary cats at ISO 6400. I found the noise was well-controlled and definitely an welcome improvement. Another nice feature is that the ISOs are set at third (or half depending on your preferences) stops up to 6400. That means that I have good selection of ISO speeds between 1600 and 6400 to use without changing a full stop. On the Canon 5d, after 1600 the only choice was a full stop up to 3200. Beyond 6400 on the Canon 5d Mark II, the noise makes the image degrade to a point where I would find it unusable for a print, unless I was applying liberal use of filters and noise control. Even then I question it's real-world application for my primary work. In a pinch, though it is useful to capture the shot in conditions that I would have been unable to get it before, although it may just frustrate me in post-processing.
Reflection on Libby
Technical Details:
Canon 5d Mark II, 50 CM, f/2.5, 1/60 sec., ISO 6400
Overall, I find the Canon 5d Mark II to be a worthy successor to the Canon 5d. It doesn't have everything I wanted (I would like DEP mode back, but that's just me I think), but it has enough to warrant an upgrade. There are always function and features to be added and on future posts I may comment on a few of those. Check back to see what new feature I might dig up.
One last note, I processed all these photographs from RAW using Adobe Photoshop CS3 and the free DNG converter found here. Adobe conveniently ended RAW support for CS3 right before the Canon 5d Mark II was released (and well after it was announced). Some couldn't even get a copy of CS4 prior to receiving their camera! While I agree with drawing a line in the sand for support, most companies, including ones like Microsoft offer support for the current version and one previous. I find that ending support as a way of forcing upgrade when the product (CS4) isn't even released a bit much. For those who cannot afford the upgrade there are several support sites dedicated to the DNG converter (such as scripting and processing) and I recommend that you look into those.
A couple of weeks ago, my family and I went through the Wildlife Safari park near Mahoney State Park in eastern Nebraska. It allows one to get an upclose view of several birds and animals that wouldn't be normal in the wild. Here, a pelican grooms himself while carefully watching me get some close shots.
As many people know, I do not do a lot of bird photography. I find that there are quite a few good photographers who specialize in this and who have equipment that enables them to get in close for a shot. My equipment for the most part usually puts me too far away, especially from the easily scared birds such as herons. Recently, I have been visiting DeSoto National Wildlife Refuge since they have had quite a few birds fairly close. While driving around we came across a lone pelican. When I got out of my car to take a shot of him floating down the lake, he took flight. At first he started flying away from me and I thought that he was going to be no where near me, but then banked and came right in front of me. I was able to snap about 3 shots off as he continued into the distance.
During the 50th anniversary celebration at DeSoto National Wildlife Refuge, I had the opportunity to dine with the manager of Squaw Creek National Wildlife Refuge in Northwestern Missouri. It is a place I have passed perhaps 40 times and never stopped on trips to Kansas City from Omaha. I knew that I would be making the trip again in just a couple of weeks and I decided that I should stop this time, and ended up stopping on both directions of the journey.
