This is the macro lens set-up we will build in this post. Notice the orientation of the brand name THORLABS on the barrel of the lens. As pictured above, this is intentionally backwards from the manufacturer recommendations.
Collared aracari toucans caught in a face-off in Costa Rica.
Photographing toucans in Costa Rica is much like photographing birds that may come to a bird feeder at your home. One difference in Costa Rica is the bird feeders can be tall as a telephone pole. The bird feeder at our lodge required two large stalks of bananas daily to entice the toucans, parrots and other colorful birds common to Costa Rica to pose for photographers.
My very first hummingbird photo in Costa Rica. This is five separate humming bird photos blended together in Photoshop.
I was familiar with many great nature photos taken in Costa Rica, so I jumped at the chance to go for a couple weeks with a good friend of mine on an organized nature photography workshop. We photographed endless hummingbirds, frogs, toucans, bats and vultures. Most of it in a torrent of daily rainstorms. Thank goodness we went in the dry season.
Blue and gold reflections of a downtown Boston building.
Riding around on a typical Hop-On-Hop-Off tourist bus, I did my best to photograph the unique downtown Boston building reflections from the open second level. I’m no stranger to big cities, having lived in downtown Chicago for many years during my working career. However, I do not recall seeing so many varied styles of buildings and unique design and reflections as I saw in Boston.
Brightly colored homes in Newfoundland, Canada
My theory regarding brightly colored homes seems to still hold true. European towns with long, cold winters have the most brightly painted houses. These brightly colored homes were a common sight in St. Johns NL, Newfoundland-Labrador, Canada. Most every home and business in this town followed this tradition. Islands seem to have more subtle pastels.
Nanortalik, Greenland Field of Dreams
Greenland villages are small by any standard. The largest town in Greenland, the largest island on earth, has less than 20,000 inhabitants. Nanortalik has about 1,100 people making it the eleventh largest town on the island. So I was wondering what is the eleventh largest city in the US? If you go strictly by incorporated city limits, it is Austin, Texas. If you include the primary statistical area it is the Miami, Fort Lauderdale area with over six million residents.
Cruising a Greenland fjord
An advantage to a small cruise ship is we could squeeze into smaller ports and fjords where larger ships dare not go. We had a leisurely day cruising up and down this Greenland fjord, launching Zodiac boats for a closer look.
Puffin swimming, presumably looking for fish.
I was excited to see my first ever puffins and photograph them while cruising the islands off the coast of Iceland. I knew my resultant travel photographs would never compete with professional nature photographers who sit on a hillside and wait for the perfect moment to capture a puffin. However, out of the many hundreds of photos taken from the moving, bouncing Zodiac boat, two photos were acceptable to show here.
For some reason, homes in coastal towns are often painted in colorful pastel colors. Weymouth, England is no exception.
Our method of exploration of these coastal towns generally consisted of shopping for something we apparently feel we needed or forgot to pack, like warmer clothes. We then search for a lunch spot in town to sample the local cuisine. Indian food is very good across the UK, so that was often at the top of our list. The local seafood was also good to find. However, please note there is no Dover sole to be found in Dover, England. No matter how good the food is on board, local cuisine away from the ship is a very welcome change.
Colorful Tobermory, Scotland
Colorful Tobermory, Scotland was a fun spot to explore after our failed bird watching expedition to the countryside. The photo above captures about one-third of the town. The arrival of our ship doubled the population of this quaint town for the day. We went into the Mishnish Hotel, the yellow building above, and had some local beverages and a half dozen oysters as part of our shore excursion. Then we ventured a few doors down for some Indian cuisine.