I feel bad today. Some of my friends told me yesterday they felt I put a lot of stress on the pelican in the video by flying the Phantom too close to him. I really appreciate their honesty and I certainly did not intend to cause any stress to any wildlife. I love to capture images and video of wildlife but it is never my intent to make them uncomfortable. I assure you that won’t happen again.
Last night was such a nice evening. No wind at all so I took the Vision 2 up for a quick flight. I got it a little too far away and it jumped into “come home mode.” That’s the same mode that kept it from dumping itself into the Mississippi River last February. I didn’t even shoot any video just wanted to fly in some very clam conditions and it was amazing how much control you have when the wind is not constantly trying to blow it off course.
I’ve shot a lot of images of gulls this year. They have been in abundance and there are a couple of places by the river that they let you get very close to them. I took this little guy’s image on Sunday afternoon.
Short post today. I have an interesting day ahead of me. Don’t know how it’s going to turn out but it will be interesting none the less.
I hope you enjoy your day. Thanks for stopping by and be careful.
Saturday was pretty much a veg day. Jeanne came home with a bad case of Bronchitis and was pretty much under the weather Friday and Saturday. She got to feeling better yesterday and so yesterday afternoon we did our normal photo trip around town.
First stop as always was the 16th Street Basin. We had heard there were a lot of Pelicans there but we could only find 3 or 4 at most. A couple came in while we were there but certainly not what we have experienced in past years. So in anticipation of finding a body of water full of Pelicans I packed my long lens (500 mm) and the Phantom and we took off.
Before I get too much in to this story I have to tell you about the two flights I did on Saturday. The first flight I flew from the back patio (basketball court) and went over to a small pond that is located on the school grounds. It is about 750 feet away and that is the farthest I have ever flown the Phantom and still maintained video link between the Phantom and my receiver. There were two ducks in the pond and I got as close as I could but the reception wasn’t all that good so I didn’t want to put it in the pond. 🙂
The second flight was later in the afternoon when I decided to take it up and see if I could above 1,000. Actually I got to 1,320 feet. It is amazing how things look from that high. I worked most of yesterday on editing that video but lost my work two times. I’m still trying to learn the video editing program and apparently I still have a bunch to learn.
This image was grabbed from the video and it shows what the neighborhood looks like at 1,320 feet.
Okay, so back to the story of the 16th Street Basin. I shot a few images of the one Pelican that was closest to the shore and then some other wildlife that was close enough to capture and then it was time to fly the Phantom and see if I could get some overhead shots of the Basin.
We went around to the other side (away from all the power lines) and I launched the Phantom. There were two Pelicans out in the middle of the Basin and I flew pretty close to them for several minutes. Came back to where we were and made a perfect landing. No really I did it was beautiful. Went over to turn the Phantom off and realized that I had accidentally switched the GoPro camera from video to still shots. The problem is I don’t have anyway to take still shots with the GoPro when it’s in the air. So all that flying was for nothing.
Well, I reset the camera and took it up again. I got pretty close to a gull and a Pelican and had some fun tracking the Pelican. I know I made him a little nervous but I didn’t stress him very long. Good thing I decided to come back when I did because I was running on fumes (battery wise) as I came in for a landing there was a gust of wind and with the battery so low the controls did not respond as they normally do so I crashed. Yep, it’s on the video. My good fortune I crashed into some soft grass so no damage to the Phantom or the camera. 🙂
I do not know what this duck is and I didn’t have time to look him up. If you know please post in the comments.
The video below is only a little over 5 minutes. Some good music and I think you’ll like the Pelican and Gull. That’s it for today. Hope you enjoy your day. Thanks for stopping by and be careful.
Here are some Common Grackles and a Red-Winged black bird sharing a communal bath. You can click on the image to have a larger image to view. I love how the water drops are all over the image.
I’m taking a PTO (paid time off) today to catch up on some unfinished projects and I’m going to rewire my project on the Phantom to see if I can get things working. I wrote to several sites seeking advice but received no responses so I’ll watch the video again and take it step by step.
I’m not sure gulls can be considered beautiful but I really like this image of this gull. It is one of my favorite shots from the weekend.
Finally I’ll leave you with this lone Common Grackle. I like their coloration and this was taken with the fading light of the day. I’m not a student of wildlife species or a bird watcher for that matter. But I do enjoy taking images of birds. The only reason I know this guy is a Common Grackle is because my friend Andreas correctly named one that I took last year. I called it a Brewer’s Black Bird. 🙂
That’s it for today. Hope the rewiring project is successful. I’ll let you know tomorrow. Enjoy your wet day and be careful. Thanks for stopping by.
No April fools jokes here. Just the facts and nothing but. 🙂
I’ll show you some images from Sunday’s photo run. Jeanne and I like to drive through the country and see the sights and as always looking for photo opportunities. Sunday was mostly about Ring-Billed Gulls. I can’t remember seeing more of them around the area as we did on Sunday. There were hundreds of them at the Basin, the river, the little park just off Kerper Blvd., even at Mud Lake Park they were plentiful. So what’s a person to do but capture some images of the little guys.
As I have documented several times, I am not a wiz when it comes to electronics. I did manage to install the video transmitter on the Phantom 2 and get the goggles to work but they didn’t covey any information other than a visual representation of what the camera was seeing. In other words no flight data. So in my research and watching hours of YouTube videos from people who do know what they are doing I purchased an “immersion 600Mw 5.8ghz transmitter and a IOSD mini device that provides telemetry from the internal guidance of the Phantom. It displays data like direction, altitude, distance, speed, battery power left, and angle of attack. All very useful information.
After buying all the parts and waiting for two weeks the last part came in yesterday. After dinner I watched the video again and then set about installing the device to my Phantom. Everything seemed to go well. I even took my laptop to the work table and replayed the video in steps so that I didn’t make any mistakes. Got it all soldered and put together at 10:15 p.m. Turned everything on and I got nothing! Just gray screen on the goggles and that’s it. Not even any static. I fiddled with it for another 15 minutes, then dejected and demoralized I put everything up, cleaned up and went to bed. Whine!!
This low quality image of a Cardinal is for my friend Ronnie. Yesterday he asked me if I could get some images of a Cardinal. I’ve only seen a couple so far this year but as it happened we saw this guy Sunday. He was far away and back-lit but maybe this will do until I can get a better shot.
Well that’s it for today. I’ve got to do some research and check some of the forums on the internet and see if I can figure out what the heck I did wrong. More to come I’m sure.
Thanks for stopping by. Enjoy your day and be careful.
First, let me apologize for the lack of quality of this image. Both of the subjects are soft focus and there is a lot of motion blur. I debated the entire week about showing this image because it is not up to my standards. Yes, even I do have some standards. 🙂
Anyway aside from the poor quality it is a an amazing image. Their wings actually did touch. The eagle caught a fish the Heron was stalking and the Heron was pi**ed. This is the only time this has happened to me and I couldn’t let it go without showing you.
So, that’s all I got. My cupboard is bare now so I need to replenish my image library this weekend. We also get to celebrate Gabby’s first birthday tomorrow. 🙂
I pitched my project to one of the people I really need to contribute to the success of the project and her answer was YES! So I’ll be talking about the project more in the coming days but I am really excited about it.
That’s it for today. Enjoy your Friday. Thanks for stopping by and be careful.
I missed the opportunity to wish Ms. Gabriella Grace Rolinga special one year old Birthday yesterday. Jeanne and I did get to see her (via Skype) last evening and wished her a Happy Birthday.
Today’s images are all about the ubiquitous Ring-Billed Gull. They are fun to watch and a little tricky to capture images of because of their constant motion and size. They are plentiful at the 16th Street Basin and along the Mississippi.
Yesterday I and several members of our Culture team went to Cedar Rapids and provided lunch for the staff of our new branch. Actually it is a complete make over of our existing bank, but it was a total transformation.
So yesterday was moving day for the staff from the temporary trailer bank to the beautiful new facility that will officially open today. We helped move a few boxes and the provided lots of pizza for the staff and the construction crew who are frantically trying to get things those last things minute things ready for today’s business. We have the opening celebration later in April but they’ll be doing business out of the new building today.
As usual on the way back from Cedar Rapids I was looking for things to capture with my camera. It is such a bleak time of the year for scenery shots. Everything is brown, the trees are bare and what little snow is left is dirty and disgusting.
So it was one of the few times I’ve driven from CR to Maquoketa without a shot. Then I had to go to Cascade yesterday evening for training and normally I’ll see a few deer on the trip. Not a one yesterday. So I was pretty much (well completely) empty-handed yesterday as far photography was concerned. I did take some images of the new facility and I’ll show those one of these days because today is all about the little Ring-Billed Gull. 🙂
Thanks for stopping by. Enjoy your day and be careful.
I’m sorry. I still have a lot of images from two weekends ago at the 16th Basin and since (other than yesterday) I haven’t done much still photography I’m going to show you some more eagles and herons.
Interesting day yesterday filled with frank and stimulating conversation with a variety of individuals. Gave me much to think about and reflect on. At some point I will share the content of those conversations but for now just know that they were thought-provoking and very enjoyable.
I have decided on a project that I am going to work on in the coming year. It has taken me almost three months to finally figure this one out. I can tell you that it is going to be an ambitious project to say the least but one that if I can do it correctly may yield some of my most satisfying work yet. I have some people to talk with and some permissions to get but I think those will be readily available.
Then there is the small matter of learning and mastering a new skill that I do not yet have but that is a small matter. 🙂
Anyway this new project should take about six months to a year to complete and involves video, flying, still photography, extensive video editing, interviewing, research, and a bunch of other skills. But it promises to be fun and enjoyable so I’m ready to get started. Once I have all the details and permissions finalized I’ll share with you what the project is. In my mind right now it will not be as difficult as the 365 project was.
So that’s it for today. A lot of ambiguity I know but I’ve got to have a hook to keep you coming back. I hope you enjoyed the wildlife images today. I do love to photograph eagles. I understand from my friend Andreas that many species of wildlife have migrated into the area of late so it’s time to get out and see what I can find.
Thanks for stopping by. Enjoy your midweek hump day and be careful.
A couple of my friends asked me what happened over the weekend because not only was there no blog on Saturday or Sunday but none yesterday either. Well as much as I hate to admit it I never touched a camera the entire weekend. That is with the exception of the Phantom’s camera.
As you may recall one of my laments about the FPV (first person view) set up on the Phantom requires me looking at my iPhone (very small and hard to see in the sunlight) or a 7 inch monitor, which is also somewhat hard to see in bright sunlight. Enter a product called Fat Shark Goggles, which in essence puts two small TV screens in a pair of goggles and then you can see exactly what your camera is seeing.
So Saturday I spent most of the day reading material about how to install the transmitter on the Phantom and use the Phantom’s own power supply as opposed to having a secondary battery power supply. Between reading, watching videos, making diagrams and doing the actual wiring it took me most of Saturday to accomplish. Mix in there 4 flights to test the equipment and a visit from Angie, Josh and Gabby and that pretty much took up the whole day.
Then Sunday was reserved for a couple of well-earned naps, some more flight tests and finally a night flight around the neighborhood. So I’ve got probably 15 Gb of video of the Phantom taking off from our back concrete slab, rising to a height of 300 – 500 feet, a couple of 360 degree turns and then a landing. I don’t think you want to see that over and over again. So come Monday morning I didn’t have anything worth showing.
Yesterday on my lunch break I grabbed a bite and then off to the duck pond. There were not as many birds there yesterday as there has been last week. Only 3 swans and maybe 30 – 50 geese. The two geese in the first image were sort of stranded in a small open pool of water surrounded by ice from the morning’s cold temperature. The second image is of a lone swan (perhaps nesting) I hope. I am excited to see if we get some more cygnets again this year as I will enjoy photographing their development.
Finally just a pair of swans intermingled with some geese. Life at the pond was peaceful and relaxed yesterday. I think most of the territorial disputes have been settled for the time being.
As soon as warm weather arrives I’m going to attempt a fly over of the duck pond. I think it will make an interesting video.
So that’s it for today. I hope you enjoy your Tuesday. Thanks for stopping by and be careful.
Today is the first day of Spring – 2014. Yesterday morning I awoke to a fresh layer of snow, about an inch, which made the morning commute enjoyable. By the time I got South of the airport it was like it never happened.
Fun day yesterday. Jeanne got back from her Mother’s somewhere around 10:00 a.m. and then she, Angie and the kids came to Maquoketa to have lunch with me. We all decided to have breakfast and it was fun to watch Josh eat his pancake and eggs. He devoured them in a very short time. Angie said he loves anything that he can put syrup on. 🙂
I’ll finish up the week with some more swan images. You remember earlier in the week I showed you the territorial dispute between two male swans. After the skirmish the victorious male swan flew over his domain as if to survey all that he was master of. The next image is of him setting up for a landing. Full flaps as he creates a massive amount of lift with those huge wings and lets him settle onto the water softly.
When I got home last evening the winds were calm. There was plenty of sunlight left and the temperature was a balmy 46 degrees. So after greeting my bride I grabbed Phantom – 2 and took it out to the back patio for a quick flight. I wanted to show you the 4 minute video but didn’t start editing it until this morning and of course that means not enough time to get it finished. Maybe tomorrow.
Back with his mate the male swan did a number of puffing his chest and beating his wings just to show her how much of a man he was. I’m sure she was duly impressed. 🙂
That’s it for today. I still have several hundred images of eagles, herons, swans, and ducks but I’m going to take a break from them and look for other subject matter. Too much of even a good thing is not necessarily good and doesn’t help you to grow. So maybe I can find something interesting this weekend. If the weather is nice I’d like to practice some more flying techniques other than just going up to a high point, turning around a couple of times and then back down. Next week (weather permitting) I would like to do a slow fly over the duck pond. I think that would make a great video.
Thanks for stopping by. Enjoy your TGI Friday and be careful.
I only have one image for you today but it is one of my best from the last couple of outings at the Basin. If you have followed this blog for very long you know of my love and interest in eagles. I could watch and photograph them every day and not get tired of it.
Yesterday I had a great experience. Over the years I have worked with many company representatives, some of whom did a good job and others, well not so good. One of my favorite representative, Bryan got promoted up the corporate ladder and I haven’t seen him in over a year. He is one of those guys that you can tell has a vision of life and a passion for doing things the right way and I always felt he helped inspire me to do better work.
Last week he called and wanted to know if I could have lunch with him. So yesterday we had lunch and spent about 70 minutes just catching up on what each of us has been doing. I am so happy for him and his new role in his company. You can just tell by listening to him and watching the way he works that this is not a job for him it is his way of living. He is a marathoner, well-rounded athlete, and a great family man. It was pure pleasure to visit with him again.
Later in the afternoon I went to DeWitt to visit another friend of mine, Mick. Mick was in a terrible accident a few months ago, which left him paralyzed from his waist down. He is back in the hospital since January and has to have more surgery and other procedures done and will spend another month or two in the hospital. Through it all he has had an optimistic outlook and has retained his sense of humor. As I talked with him and listened to what he has already endured and what he as yet to endure it reminded me of a saying that goes… Write down your biggest problem or obstacle and pin it to a wall. Ask 20 people to do the same and the odds are you’ll take your problems back over the others on the wall.
So a really great day. I got to share a small part of the lives of two great people and I am much better off today as a result of it.
Thank you for checking out the blog today. I hope you have a great day. Be careful
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