Earlier this year it was my privilege to spend three days in Algonquin Provincial Park, photographing moose. It was a fabulous few days as we saw approximately twenty different moose and were able to capture them in great light and from a terrific low vantage point as we were shooting from a boat. Our captain and moose guide extraordinaire was Michael Bertelsen who owns and operates Algonquin Park Photography Tours & Workshops. Michael has been doing tours into Algonquin from his home base in Huntsville for over a dozen years and knows the park like the back of his hand. His vast knowledge of photography, Algonquin Park and its wild inhabitants was invaluable to the success of our trip. Plus Michael is a great guy who is fun to spend time with. Please take time to check out the link above to his website and see the variety of tours he has to offer and then book one; you wont be disappointed! Joining the tour were my great friends Eleanor and Arni as well as my new friend Joyce who accompanied Eleanor. We all had a wonderful time together and I trust we will be able to get together to do the same thing again. You can see Eleanor’s work at EleanorKeeWellman’s Photos and Arni’s at ArniWorks Photography.
Getting to the ideal moose location involved an 18 mile boat ride that began before sunrise, however the best light of the day is just after sunrise so the effort is always worth it. The boat trip was all part of the enjoyment and the wide open vistas in Algonquin Park made for a perfect way to start the day as can be seen in this GoPro video.
The benefit of arriving on location at sunrise was the topic of an earlier blog post which includes some moose images taken during this trip but here is the view that welcomed us.
One of the benefits of photographing moose in June is that the cows have just recently given birth to their calves and its a pleasure to see these young moose starting to get used to the world around them. They stay close to their moms and quickly learn their way around whether on land or in the water.
Some tender moments.
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Follow the leader, wherever she leads!
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A younger cow enjoying the lily pads.
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The Black Flies and Mosquitos were incredibly bad and we wore bug nets almost all the time. The moose were not immune from the flies relentless onslaught. Take a close look around this cow’s head and neck.
I only have eyes for you!
Unfortunately the feelings were not reciprocated 🙂
Although not the prettiest, the Bull Moose is an enormous animal and the most desired to photograph, especially with that classic full rack of antlers on proud display. The bulls lose their racks every fall and thus grow new ones every year. In June (when these images were taken) the annual growth process is still in the early stages so the antlers are small and felt covered. By October they will be massive, however even in June they were impressive.
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The day before our trip to Algonquin Park, my great friend Arni took possession of an incredible new lens just released by Canon. The EF 600 f4 L IS II which is optically leaps and bounds ahead of its predecessors, the Version I Canon supertelephotos. To prove this point Arni had attached his latest version of the 2x teleconverter to the lens, in essence converting the lens to a 1200mm f8 lens! He then graciously allowed me to use his new lens. Now, all of the photographers reading this post will know that using a 1200mm lens, hand-held and while sitting in a boat is ridiculous, as it’s just not possible to take acceptable images with this set up, however Canon’s new lens technology is changing all that. Let me know what you think of these!
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A huge thank you Arni for trusting me with your new lens!
Often times when on a specific type of photography expedition we instinctively apply all of our concentration shooting the intended subject and forgetting to look around and enjoy the whole experience. In this case although the tight shots are exactly what we wanted, it is also important to see the moose in its environment.
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Over the past few months I have started experimenting with video, taking advantage of the video capabilities of the Canon 5D MkIII and the fun to use GoPro video camera. The intent is to capture video of the objects we are photographing after enough still ‘keepers’ are obtained! I hope you enjoy the following two-minute video clip of some of the moose we saw on this trip, all taken with the 5D and edited using Adobe Premiere Pro (part of the CS6 Creative Suite). I have subsequently learned that the video settings I used were not the greatest and it is extremely difficult, if not impossible, to shoot video from a boat without way too much movement of the camera! All that said, video capture is a lot of fun and I’d recommend you give it a go if your DSLR has video capability.
Another thanks to Eleanor, Joyce, Arni and Michael for the great three days we spent in Algonquin Park. It was a blast!
After flying all night from Toronto and arriving in Rome early in the morning, we checked into La Piccola Maison (a perfect place to stay in the heart of the city within walking distance of everything) and then headed for the Colosseum where we spent the rest of the day. Our path to the Colosseum took us right by the Trevi Fountain where we stopped and had our first gelato!
It was quite the feeling to be walking along the Via Dei Fori Imperiali and see the Colosseum coming into view for the first time, certainly the oldest structure we’d ever seen, having begun construction in 72 AD and completed under Titus in 80 AD. Here are our first views of the Colosseum.
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The Colosseum is a huge oval amphitheatre capable of seating 50,000 spectators. It is 615′ long, 510′ wide and stands 157′ tall, having a base that occupies more than six acres. The outer walls were made of travertine stone and no mortar was used in the construction. The stonework was held together with bronze clamps, most of which have been pried and torn out for other uses. This has resulted in the pock marks that remain today as seen below.
The interior floor of the Colosseum measures 287 x 180′. The floor was a wooden floor covered by up to a foot of sand. Our tour guide relayed the morbid information that the sand was required to absorb the blood shed in Colosseum events, both of wild animals and humans. It is recorded that 9,000 wild beasts were killed in the inaugural event in 80AD. Below the wooden Colosseum floor is the two-story area known as the hypogeum, which is shown next. The East end of the floor has been re-created, leaving most of the hypogeum visible.
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Until last year access to the hypogeum was not possible, however by purchasing special tickets you are now able to join a guided tour of the hypogeum as well as go up to the third level of the Colosseum, neither of which are possible with the general admission ticket. Although it more than doubled the cost of visiting the Colosseum it was an amazing experience to go down below the floor level into the hypogeum. Unfortunately the images you will see can not come even remotely close to portraying the feeling you get while standing there walking along the same pathways that countless Christians walked as they headed to the elevators used to push them up onto the arena floor where they were killed for sporting spectacle before 50,000 people.
(Aside: A couple of things to note regarding the above photograph, the first being the lack of mortar and the use of keystones in the arches of the walkway to provide the necessary structural integrity. Secondly this shot was taken as an ‘in-camera’ three shot HDR, meaning that with one press of the shutter, the camera takes three images, one at the metered exposure, one (in this case) three stops underexposed and another three stops overexposed. The camera then combines the three images into one new image and deletes the three originals. This HDR (High Dynamic Range) technique has been in use for years however the processing was always done on the computer using Photoshop and taking a lot of time. With today’s new cameras it can be done in a few seconds right in the camera.)
The next image shows the outer wall of the hypogeum and along the pathway you can see travertine slabs which are bases for a complex elevator system that was used to move wild animals, people, and large stage props, from the hypogeum up onto the arena floor. It is thought that the elevators were moved by rope and pulley systems that were manned and operated by slaves who either lived in the hypogeum or were brought in through tunnels to work the elevators.
A close up of an elevator shaft support, this one is #8 of eighty found in the Colosseum.
It’s hard to believe this walkway is almost two thousand years old.
The Colosseum was known for its ability to quickly get spectators into and out of the building, in fact there are eighty arches leading into the amphitheatre, seventy-six for regular people and four large arches for the elite. Below is the East arch, through which the Senators entered and headed to their private seating area, which is shown in the second image below. Each white marble slab is the base for a senator’s chair and many of these slabs have the various senator’s names engraved on them. You can also see the senator’s seating area and the East arch in the fourth and fifth images in this blog post.
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Here is one of the much smaller 76 entrance arches used by the commoners.
The climb to the third level of the Colosseum provided a wonderful birds eye view of the amphitheatre.
Another view from the stairwell between the second and third levels.
The last gladiatorial fights were circa 435 and the last recorded animal hunts around 523. By the end of the sixth century a church was incorporated into the Colosseum and a cross erected for the first time. Since then the Colosseum has been used in many different ways and certainly makes for interesting reading if you are so inclined.
Our first day in Rome was terrific and spending a few hours in the Colosseum was an experience like none other. We even took time to pose like the tourists we were!
One final shot of the Colosseum.
All of the images taken in this post were with the Canon 5D Mk III and either 16-35 or 24-105mm lenses. Larger size versions of the images in this post can be seen in the Rome gallery.
Thanks for taking time to look through these images of the Roman Colosseum and as always your comments are much appreciated.
Last fall Deb and I celebrated our thirtieth wedding anniversary touring though as much of Europe as we could possibly cover in seventeen days. It was a fabulous trip that saw us accumulate over 4,500 km on our rental car and see so many fabulous sights that had it not been for photographing as much of it as possible we surely couldn’t remember everything! Over the upcoming weeks we will try to post some of the highlights of our trip on the blog and will also post the images in the travel section of the website gallery.
We began our trip in Rome and spent our first afternoon in Italy touring the Colosseum, which was a truly amazing experience. The emotions you feel as you are guided through the hypogeum (underground levels of the Colosseum) are indescribable as you recall in a way that is not possible by reading a book, or studying in school, the events that occurred in the very place you are standing some two thousand years ago.
The next blog post will include more of an informative photographic description of the Colosseum and its history however for now I would like to post a few images of the Colosseum taken at night. They are posted in chronological order so you can see the sky darkening in each image.
Night photography is a lot of fun and as long as you have the correct equipment and know a little of the technical fundamentals it’s not very hard to get some interesting pictures. The most important piece of gear for night photography is a good tripod. It is impossible to hand hold a camera in the low light of the evening and get a good sharp image as the exposures required are just too long. From a technical perspective you may find the following helpful; try to take night shots while there is still blue in the sky as once the sky is black all detail is lost and the edges of the subject are lost in the darkness; use a low ISO (200 or less) to help reduce the noise in the image which is always more noticeable in the dark colours that dominate night photography; use a small aperture (f/22) for great depth of field so everything remains in sharp focus throughout the image. A small aperture also creates the starburst effect on light sources that many people enjoy seeing.
It is impossible to shoot the Colosseum without people milling about however you try your best to wait until there are no people in the foreground. In this case having a bride and groom in the picture adds to the appeal of the image.
Most night images are taken in landscape orientation however experiment with a vertical perspective as well, especially if you can incorporate something of interest in the foreground. In this case the large cobblestones which have probably been there for almost two thousand years….you cant help but wonder who has walked on those very stones.
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The next image is not in keeping with the others however is a reminder that it’s always good to experiment with different perspectives of the same subject when taking shots at night, even if it means changing lenses to zero in on a specific area that interests you. The next image has also been processed differently in an attempt to portray the age of the building.
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The next image was also designed to include the couple on the left and although they are very blurry because of the twenty-second exposure, they do add to the image.
By now the sky is almost devoid of blue so its time to pack up or in this case move to another location and shoot images that don’t rely on the background to be effective. When the sky becomes black make sure you always have a foreground object that provides plenty of interest compositionally; the flower bed in the next image and the streaming lights from the traffic in the last.
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All of the images in this post were taken using a Canon 5D Mk III on a Gitzo 1542T tripod using a 16-35mm or 24-105mm lens. If you have any questions regarding the taking of these images please leave a comment and I’ll be glad to respond. In the mean time, dust off that old tripod and start practicing night photography and I know you will be pleased withy the results.
It has been far too long since my last blog post and I apologize for the tardiness, however there will be lots of material coming over the next few months.
Presently Deb and I are enjoying a vacation celebrating our thirtieth wedding anniversary. Its been a fabulous thirty years and the time has flown by but that’s what happens when you are married to your best friend! We arrived in Rome just over two days ago and are now enjoying our first of two nights in Venice. In the morning we are meeting up with Marco Secchi for a photographic tour of Venice. We can’t wait as Marco shows us the sights of Venice from a professional photographers standpoint, and as a photographer who grew up and lives in Venice he is uniquely qualified to do so.
Although we won’t be able to post any DSLR shots while on vacation, Deb and I have been also snapping away with our iPhone’s and they really do remarkably well. I have already posted some of the images taken so far onto the Scott Martin Photography Facebook page and if you haven’t already done so, please ‘like’ this page and check out some of the images from Europe. There are some images of the Colosseum and St. Peter’s Square in the Vatican.
Deb & I spent a wonderful three days at the Mohonk Mountain House near New Paltz, New York which is about 85 miles due north of New York City. We were there over the Victoria Day Weekend along with about twelve other Chiropractors and their spouses to attend a coaching seminar with TLC 4 Superteams. TLC is one of the premier training organizations for chiropractors and it is a privilege to be one of their coaches; helping other chiropractors provide superb care for their patients.
The Mohonk Mountain House is the #2 Ranked resort spa in the United States and it is well worth the trip if you are looking for a quiet place to get a way for a few days. The 266 room Victorian style lodge was built in 1869 and I believe has remained in the same family since that time. It has entertained presidents, celebrities and normal people like us over the years and offers a multitude of outdoor adventure activities as well as a world class spa to pamper you afterwards.
We didn’t have a lot of time for photography but thought you may enjoy a few snap shots taken around the grounds.
The main lodge taken from across Lake Mohonk
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There were many gazebos and porches around the property which were perfect for reading and just relaxing and enjoying the view.
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Looking out from the other side of the lodge provided a great view of the Catskills Mountains
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The view from the room.
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All of these shots were taken with the 5D Mk III and either 16-35 or 24-105 lenses.
This past year it has been a bit of a challenge to photograph owls and this has led much travel however each mile has been a pleasure, especially in the case of the Burrowing Owl who wisely chooses to live in Florida! Last month we went with our son and daughter in law to photograph Burrowing Owls in Hollywood, Florida which is a suburb of Fort Lauderdale. We visited about six burrows and saw about half a dozen different birds.
Burrowing Owls are small birds approximately 9″ tall with a wing span of about 24″ and have characteristically long legs giving them a unique appearance. They are a relatively common owl found throughout North and South America however as they tend to favour the western parts of the Americas we don’t see them in Ontario. As their name indicates, these small owls live underground, a rarity for animals that fly! Non-migratory Burrowing Owls will occupy the same burrow for many years and spend most of their time very close to the burrow, taking flight to catch bugs and insects or avoid being preyed upon by snakes or even cats. There is not much dimorphism between the sexes however the males tend to be slightly longer and leaner and often lighter in colour which is thought to be due the bleaching effect of the sun on the males who are typically outside of the burrow more than the female.
A good-looking couple!
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Just to show that Burrowing Owls really do burrow their own homes, even if it means throwing sand on their partner!
But don’t worry he felt bad and immediately and meticulously removed all the sand 🙂
The Burrowing Owl is constantly scanning the environment for threats and responds immediately when one is detected. When I looked around after seeing this expression there was one hawk flying overhead, at least three hundred yards away. Owls are unique in that each of their pupils respond independently to incident light and you can see the different pupil sizes in the following image.
We had an enjoyable time watching the Burrowing Owls as they are quite active through the day although they do most of their hunting between dusk and dawn. The next time you are visiting the sunshine state, you might just want to go looking for a burrow; you will be glad you did!
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