I have to feel a bit sorrow for all the SoaRs out there (Spouse of a Runner) or more specific SoaIRs – Spouse of an Injured Runner. Clearly we can be a difficult lot as Linda continues to remind me daily. Beginning to think my full name is really “Don’t You Dare”, purely based on the number of times that is proclaimed lately and as far as I can tell..always directed at … well, ME. She caught me heading out to a pile of concrete with a sledgehammer the other day (we had some new concrete poured and the contractors left huge slabs for me to deal with). My excuse that it couldn’t be any worse than what the therapists were going to do me apparently didn’t hold water. The good news is Doc says the elbow is healing nicely, but wants to re-xray it in three weeks. Obligatory head nod while inner Bri goes postal “THREE WEEKS, is he crazy!?! I have a road race this Saturday and an ultra in October to train for – where did she hide that sledgehammer, I need to get on with building my strength back up …when Linda is away, of course”. While my accelerated recover plan germinates, thought I would see if I could get a quick post out. Brad was kind enough to take us along on his Huntington bird walk last we met. Unfortunately, my birding days are put on hold for some time – even decided to send The Beast in for some spa recovery time at a local Nikon repair shop – so, how about we take a walk of a different kind.
This adventure will be from the comfort (and safety) of my den. Yep, it is time for a hodgepodge of images that either didn’t make the first cut, one-offs or in some cases just some fun images that have been perpetually stuck in 5 o’clock traffic.
Hit the jump for a walk for those of us with no particular place to go.
It is kind of nice not having a playbook for a particular feature. Those that have been adventuring with me for a while, know that my posts always start with running. Not the discussion per se (although I do talk about running a lot in my preambles), rather that is where the topics come from. A nice long run gives you plenty of time to breathe in nature, figure out your pressing problems and somewhere along the trail, figure out what the hell I am going to write about next. The trick is being able to remember what you came up with when the legs are screaming, you’re dripping wet and desperately trying to recall what it is about this torturefest you find “fun”. If lucky, I head back home, jump on the computer and flesh out a new post with the images from a particular outing or series. From there I review the shots, keep the subjective “best” and delete the rest. The culled shots are moved to a discard folder likely never to be seen again. Many of today’s shots were pulled back out of that folder – maybe I decided I liked them on second review (like the first shot of the Long-Billed Curlew found at South Padre Island) or thought I would comment on why they made it to the “seconds” folder like the shot below.
The Cape-May Warbler below is part of a series that I posted on previously (link here). The one above was just a victim of having other similar images, but the one below was a failed attempt at a clever composition. You may have noticed the arcing branch in the background…I thought it would be a cool if I could match that up with the white barring on the wing. For a second I patted myself on the back for pulling that off with a rather hyper bird..then quickly realized it look more like someone shot an arrow right through the little guy.
The Orchard Oriole has a similar story in that they were both from Dauphin Island and both were featured previously (link here). At first I thought this female looked rather smug, but I have to admit, I am growing fonder of it. I would have preferred her bill up slightly more off of her tail.
Another area that tends to get scrutinized in the cut-down is color. In the last three shots we had a lot of color (some could argue too much), but I prefer that over a duller wash which this poor Willet fell victim to. They are rather pale birds to begin with and being shorebirds, they often hang out in duller earth tone color environments. If those match up, it just seems a bit blah. Think if the flats had been more sandy brown instead of grey, it would have popped the bird a lot more.
Next up a Black-Throated Green Warbler also found on Dauphin Island. Anyone familiar with bird photography knows that you are pretty much at the subject’s mercy when it comes to background/foreground. Sure, you can definitely move around and improve on the angle, but some species are especially deft at countering any move you try to make. Warblers are definitely in that category. Better be quick on the trigger as they rarely let an opportunity pass to put some form of twig or leaf in between. As long as I can get a clear shot of the head I am generally happy like in the shot below. What I didn’t like is probably the ONLY brown leaf on that tree being stabbed into its belly like a tranq dart out of an Elephant gun.
This next example is more of a digital darkroom error and definitely could have used a 2 degree shift on the positioning to keep that palm leaf from going directly into the head. If you haven’t noticed with my offerings as a whole, I almost always adhere to the rule of thirds and more primary, giving the subject room to move. In this case I was so focused on giving Mr. Hood freedom to fly forward that I left an ugly, blurry foreground element in the lower corner. I could easily fix that, but luckily there were other shots in the series that saved me from having to backtrack (another thing I hate doing).
The shot below was a late scratch in its series post. I like to give my readers a full experience with a featured bird, different angles, different poses and maybe environments. This Yellow-Throated Vireo, found at Audubon Bird Sanctuary on Dauphin Island, provided me a good shot of its bright yellow throat and how it gradually transitions into the brilliant white belly. Eventually decided to pull it as it looked like it had been drinking until 3am at the local bar and was feeling a wee bit tipsy (I didn’t want to rat it out to its mate).
Like a few of the shots above, I’ve grown to like this Dickcissal found at Midewin National Tallgrass Prairie, Wilmington IL. The harmonies of the yellow/green palette and the fact that the key markings are all visible on the bird have led me to reconsider. I’m glad it got a second chance to be in the limelight.
All things considered, I don’t think the next shot is that bad. Got a nice pose, glint in the eye, really like how the background smoothed out but still had a touch of coloring and in this particular case, the slightly blurred foreground helps to give it depth. Maybe could have added a bit more sharpening to the upper part of the bird to pull it out like the tail.
Sometimes an image just makes me uncomfortable. The shot below of the Bank Swallow found at Montrose Beach fits that description perfectly. Overall, I like the composition, maintained the nice texture in the sand, the bird pulls out nicely, intriguing pose as it acknowledges the presence of the viewer….but who didn’t scratch their eye after looking at this picture…come on, you can admit it, that hunk of sand in the Swallows eye is getting to you. I guess if you spend a good portion of your life in the hole of a sand dune you probably get used to it. I’ll be right back, I need to go put some drops in my eyes.
Some shots just fall victim to timing. Modern day photographers owe a huge debt to the inventor(s) of the digital format. When you look across the spectrum of reducing the gap between a pro and an amateur you have to include this advancement among the examples. There was zero chance I was going to do any burst mode shooting during my film days. Quite honestly, I couldn’t afford it. It was hard enough to toss the shots I thought were going to be good, but willingly accepting tossing ‘x’ shots before and after the one I wanted … not happening in those frugal days. Today, a different story as my rig never comes off ‘Ch’. The shot below is interesting as you do not always get to see the pretty stitching on the Common Loon’s back – just wasn’t as good as the next shot in the burst which had its wings fully out (link here).
I have to confess, I worked this image to death in the digital darkroom. I spent so much time trying to get it just right in the field – centered the log, made sure I got the log’s shadow included, waited until the Spoonbill opened its eyes, shot it darker to makes sure I didn’t lose any of the white details later in processing. Even took a number of pre shots to determine which side I wanted to give space to (note, most of the time it is the direction the face is pointing for me). After all that work, decided “eh” and let it go. I might come back to it in the future with some more aggressive light manipulation.
The next shots are more of bonus material and came out of my working folder versus the castoffs. The lady who watches our dogs really likes Pelicans floating over water, so we gave her this shot in appreciation. I was working with specific frame dimensions as we already had that or I would have definitely given it more room to the left. She really liked it and in the end that is the primary goal of any customer image.
Right off the presses, a Bunny shot from our trip to Vegas earlier in the year. I may be biased, but I have seen these furballs in many places and, without question, I feel these Vegas residents are the cutest. Just look at those ears and those back feet! Problem is they either do not stay around long enough or they simply do NOT move one centimeter, so we rarely get a variety of interesting shots in a series. I may have to incorporate Wordless Wednesdays into Intrigued to handle these cute but low count series.
Speaking of cute, how about another shot from Vegas, the Henderson Bird Viewing Center to be exact. Maybe a close second to none but the Least Grebe (link here), the Eared Grebe is a joy to experience. Fluffy, beautiful contrast in the feathering and that blood red eye, well, you get the picture (see what I did there ha). This is more of tease as there will be a future post on this series. I just need to figure out which ones I want to use as I took probably 500 shots of them trying to find the ONE Horned Grebe that was hanging out there. Never did get one of those in the tin there, but if you like the Eared variety, look for that post in the future and grab some popcorn.
Beyond a few agility brags here and there I do not feature our boys very much. Here’s a shot of our nationally ranked agility star Raven. Technically my dog, but we know who he likes best ha. Here he is giving his best “Hey, I’m a bird dog why can’t I go birding with you look”. I keep trying to tell him that Gators would love to snack on a 4.8 pound Poodle, but he claims he isn’t afraid ha.
Then there is Linda’s baby, Ruger or as we like to call him “the cute one” whenever he decides to take his “own” path around the obstacle course or worse yet, gets the “zoomies” in which case nobody knows what the hell is going on in that still developing brain. Needless to say, Raven covers his face and slinks into a corner in complete embarrassment. Just like Raven everything will click some day and even though we do not admit it to Raven, he’s probably going to outshine his older brother. Ruger is more of the “I’m going to stay right here and make sure none of those Gators even try to look at my mommy”.
Well, we’ve come to the end of our virtual photowalk. You probably already deduced I am back to full typing ability now. Hope you enjoyed seeing a variety of images and learning a few insights behind the processes and decisions made here at Intrigued. I know I had fun going back through a folder I toss a lot of images in after a post, but hardly ever look at afterwards.
Take care, Linda is away, time to get some work done ha!
Wildlife Intrigued 
A beautiful hodgepodge of photos. I can feel sorry for you on not getting at least limited training on you feet as you don’t run on your elbow. Except when the root of all evil body slams you. Maybe you should get some MMA training in to deal with evil roots. But I’m with Linda on the sledgehammer, señor Don’t You Dare.
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Thank you Tim. The main issue are the hills – the arms are what drives me up and they keep my balance going down so I’ve had to really slow down on those parts or the elbow starts screaming crap about doctors orders and Linda said “no” along with the rest of the negativity by body spews out during a run….wait, did I say run, meant walk, definitely walk. I can tell you without one ounce of doubt, my years of martial art training were NO match for the Tree-Fu. Brushed my elbow strike off like nobody’s business and then dropped me.
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Maybe you should do an Everybody Was Tree Fu Fighting song while recovering.
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I like that!!!
…
Everybody was Tree-Fu fighting
Those runners were fast as lightning
In fact, the roots was a little bit frightening
But they clipped the feet with expert timing
There was funky runners from funky Brimtown
They were tripping them up
They were chopping them down
It’s an ancient Nature art
And the Ents knew their part
From a clip, to a slip
with a break’ of the elbow
…
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Oh. You are good. Great lyrics.
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Just learning from you!
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I happy I’m inspiring you.
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I agree with Tim, many of your “seconds” are better than most of my firsts. I have to agree, my cameras rarely come off CH. Unfortunately, that means importing and sorting later are much, much, much longer than they probably need to be. I’m just not a good enough photographer yet to be able to get that one shot in a single shutter release. Besides, doesn’t it make you feel better when you hear the playing card in the spokes sound? I agree with Linda, ‘Don’t you Dare!’. I can’t fend off the Intrigued Legal team forever. I am very glad that many of the new masking features in LR make some of the “seconds” become strong candidates to be “firsts” again.
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People are always commenting on my backlog .. there is absolutely one core contributor to that and that is Ch. I have tried to be a bit more selective in its use ..or more accurately judicious in the burst length, but as you know, the best things tend to happen just before or just after you think shot point is. I do chuckle when standing next to someone that has the “spoke cards” whipping around back to back to back to back to back. Ron can usually pick up on my low laughter when that happens “dude, it’s a GBH, guarantee you it isn’t going to do ANYTHING that fast”. I have to go check your employment contract…pretty sure somewhere in the fine print it says you have to take the side of your boss regardless of whether the other person (like say Linda) happens to be right.
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But when a GBH is trying to swallow a fish bigger than its head you need CH “cards in spokes” like frame rates. Am I right? What do our readers think? And just for the record, I almost always agree with the boss. That’s how I survived 33 years in a corporate environment. Except that one time …
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There are exceptions to every rule and fish gargling is definitely one of them … and it’s good to be the boss ha!
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Really enjoyed your critique here, gave me some things to think about in my own photos. Looking forward to your Eared Grebe post, that one photo is intriguing, for sure. Agree on the uncomfortability factor – I’ve set aside several photos of prey speared or half-swallowed, because they are a bit difficult to look at. Glad you can type now, and I’m with everyone else on tossing the “don’t-you-dare” flag upon your wilder escapades. Sledge, indeed!
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Glad you enjoyed it Sam, it gave me a chance to think out loud and validate (or in some cases contradict) my original perspectives. I hope to get the Grebe series out this month depending on how the healing goes. Definitely don’t want to push it very far into September as that is when the annual Halloween event takes place and I am already dreading the work to get done there thanks to losing this month. Is there anyone out there that is going to take my side on this whole healing process voodoo hehehehe!?! Note, I think Linda is going to grab that sledge and use it on me after my latest escapade….gotta go, I think I see her coming.
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Really enjoyed this post B and your reasoning behind the shots. I guess on some of them if you had not pointed out what put you off in the first place I would never had noticed!
Trouble is it’s nature. We all strive for that perfect image and , to be fair, we sometimes get one, maybe, probably, possibly, depends who the judge is. I often think some of these ‘perfect’ magazine type images people post have had a too heavy dose of meeting Mr Photoshop, or perhaps I’m just crap at taking photos!
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Great to hear B. Figured I would just put my thoughts to paper in case someone was interested and to sharpen my own reasoning – as was noted, I have since changed my initial opinion on some of those shots. I had to chuckle when I saw you used the word “fair” as this post was really conceived after going through a process of selecting some images to submit to a competition at our local county fair. Turned out more difficult than I had planned as I kept finding things I didn’t like about images in my “firsts” folder. Spoiler alert, Linda ended up beating me in that competition … never going to live that down ha. I am with you on some of the “perfect” pictures being absolute crap, especially the obviously shopped works, Appreciate you dropping in – hope all is well across the pond.
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Great post, Brian. I sympathize with you and Linda for the difficulties and challenges of your injury; and it’s especially hard to be physically impaired in the summertime. But I sure liked seeing the fruits of your earlier labors, and was especially awed by this amazing series of warbler photos. OMG. This birder would so love to get a glimpse of some of those gorgeous warblers, and your excellent photos go a long way toward seeing the real thing. Also enjoyed the dickcissel, brush rabbit, pelican, grebe, loon, and your smiling wife and poodles. One thing we learn about injuries is how to love life without the usual activities…and it shows here…thanks.
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Thrilled you enjoyed Jet! As they say, life happens and with the new metal additions this is probably one of the few times where it made me stronger ha. I think we could probably make some kind of swap deal.. I’ll convince a few of our prettier Warblers to take a flight out to see you if you could get a few of your Woodpeckers and Hummers to give us a quick visit out here in the Midwest. It was fun to go back through the seconds folder and give a few of them a second chance – especially after the positive feedback I have been getting. Will definitely look into doing this a bit more frequently, if nothing else, just to add to the variety. Usually I focus on one particular subject, but I enjoyed covering the multiple species, even adding in some of the non-feathered ones. Took a page out of your fabulous posts which tend to provide us a more comprehensive view of the interesting places you get to explore. Take care and really appreciate you stopping by.
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I can sense a theme forming in the comments so far. Most would be very happy indeed to have obtained images as good as these! Your thought processes accompanying the photos are interesting and sound familiar.
Continuing to wish you well as you recover. It may now be a race of a different sort for you. Will you heal completely before there are consequences for your misbehavior from SWMBO?
(She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed)
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Glad you enjoyed the post Wally, it was quite interesting to go back through the folder and see what didn’t make the cut and then given them a second analysis as it were. We grow when we have the chance to rethink our previous decisions – unfortunately I can’t go back and change decision that put me up against the tree ha. Appreciate the recovery encouragement and love the SWMBO label – it is now part of my daily vocabulary hehehehe. I can admit she isn’t happy at all with my recent decision (more to come), but so far my legs are still in good shape so I’ve been able to keep out of the “danger distance”. In my defense I haven’t changed that much from when we met and she still married me.
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I’m glad you pulled these out of the “folder.” They are great.
Listen to Linda.
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Appreciate it Vic, based on the feedback so far I am beginning to think I was way to hard on my first critiques and have since renamed my seconds folder to be “Review Later”. Will try to go back from time to time and do a similar look back post as it was quite fun to revisit past work. To be perfectly honest, I always “listen” to Linda. the problem is putting what I hear into “action”..or should that be “lack of action”. Quite possibly a defect in my genes somewhere or a byproduct of an overly competitive inner Bri. I’ll try to do better.
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Distracted or stretched thin?
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More like a bad case of selective hearing.
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Ha!
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Love this series of photos and explanation of how you pick or don’t pick them as features.
I am sure “Don’t You Dare” will be around your area for awhile.😂🤣 If you want to run with the bulls you first must listen to the master of the bull pen (Linda).
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Thank you CJ, it was both educational and fun for me as it gave me a chance to rethink some of those earlier decisions. Lately it’s like my childhood all over again with my mother hammering on my full name… I cringe to this day when I hear someone use my middle name. Mom was right, of course, but all those early mistakes has led to the well adjusted man I am today. Linda would clearly argue the “well” aspect of that as of late and let there be no doubt, she is the master of the bull pen…but every once in a while the gate is accidentally left open and there isn’t a prize bull on the rodeo circuit that doesn’t launch when he sees that gate pulled open hehehehe.
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Oh, my gosh, your discards are a million times better than my keepers! I’m glad you decided to take a second look because they’re gorgeous. Ruger is definitely the cute one. I hope your elbow is doing well.
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You are too kind but most appreciated. Really enjoyed the opportunity to look back and give these shots a second viewing. Based on the feedback, I think I am going to do this more often as it also really helps to hone my decision process and grow as a photographer. Yeah, Ruger is definitely the cute one, problem is he knows how to use it to get what he wants and that is NEVER a good thing hehehe. Elbow is progressing for sure and doctors are very pleased with the healing so far – I on the other hand. would appreciate it if we could accelerate the recovery, I have so many things to do. As always, appreciate you dropping in.
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Nice images. I agree with those who already commented that you have far more keepers than I. Then again, maybe my hard drives are not as full.
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Thank you Jerry! Admittedly, my hard drives are definitely full to the brim (at least on the preprocessing side) and one of the reasons I have such a long backlog of outings to get to. I have been getting a lot better at deleting images I’ll assuredly never go back to and just keeping the shots that I think are most interesting to share. Unless it is a fabulous shot (technical/behavior/composition) of the common birds, those are probably tossed before ever getting to the digital darkroom. Sure has saved on the NAS storage costs. I just won’t be as quick to purge the “seconds” folder before I give them another look. Appreciate you taking the time to dropping in Jerry.
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Hi Brian,
I’m glad you decided not to hit the delete button for these images. I would be thrilled with any of them, but I’m not really a perfectionist when it comes to photos, letting my camera choose the technical details. I also hate spending too much time with photo-editing later on, would rather be out there looking for more birds.
I’m glad to hear you are recovering, even if 3 weeks sounds like an eternity to you.
Best,
Tanja
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Thanks Tanja. I can understand the desire to avoid post processing, that can be tedious and quite frankly can suck the joy out of photography if not judicious on when you use the various features. With you on rather be spending that time in the field. The elbow is coming along – we will see what the therapist says tomorrow and hoping to get released to start pushing it more when we see the doctor again next week – fingers crossed. I am sure Linda is going to tattle on me about all the bad things I have been doing with it lately ha.
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The Cape May Warbler is gorgeous, especially next to the red flower. The pelican photo is perfect.
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Thank you so much Siobhan! As I’ve mentioned to several commenters now, I am glad I took a second look at these. Those Cape Mays really like those Bottlebrush plants which come with so much rich color themselves. Paired with one of the prettier Warblers we have it turned out rather nice. Appreciate you stopping in!
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