216/365 - Jim - Oh My!

( 400mm ISO 200 Nikon D300 )

We went to the Pittsburgh Zoo today and I was armed with my 70-200mm lens and the 2x teleconverter. It started out rainy and I had some issues with slow shutter blur at ISO 200, but it eventually got nicer out and I had enough sun to shoot at decent speed. It's really hard to hold the lens still when zoomed to 400mm. Especially in lesser than ideal light. This is my Lions, Tigers, and Bears. Oh my! photo that I put together with Picasa. If you would like to view a collection of my zoo photos, click here.

173/365 - Jim - Eastern Gray Squirrel

( f/4.5 200mm 1/250 sec ISO 200 Nikon D300 )

I looked out my back window and saw a couple squirrels running around, so I grabbed my camera and went back to the woods to see if I could shoot them. This one grabbed a piece of corn and posed for me before I scared it off by taking a step toward it. Taking these wildlife photos is pretty fun and makes me itch for the 2x teleconverter even more... or is it just the mosquito bites.

166/365 - Jim - Rocky Raccoon

( f/4 200mm 1/400 sec ISO 200 Nikon D300 )

Matt Smochko (remember him?) and I went for a Photo Walk today. We started at Lake Arthur and ran into this raccoon. He was just laying in the yard and as we photographed him, he got scared and ran to the rocks. Of course we followed him and took over 100 photos each. Then we made our way over to McConnell's Mill since it's just down the road. We went down to a waterfall that comes off the hill and got some nice slow shutter photos. As I got what I thought was THE shot, I turned to show Matt. I heard a tumbling crash that turned out to be his second lens that he had in his hoodie pocket. I reacted faster than I feel is possible for me and grabbed it as it was rolling down a large rock toward the water. The whole thing made us extremely nervous so we left immediately. I got a lot of nice photos, which I could have used for over a week of FotoEveryDay, but I haven't broken the rule yet so I will continue as usual. Here are the other photos.

012/365 - Jim - Lion

( f/4.5 70mm 1/80 sec ISO 200 Nikon D300 )

Theme is wildlife. We went to Living Treasures today so Jameson could pet some animals. There were lots of goats roaming around that you can pet and feed. Mostly all of the animals were behind cages, which made it hard to get a clean image. This was taken through scratched up double panel glass. I had a circular polarizer which cut some of the glare, but it was still pretty low contrast. I increased contrast and applied an effect in Lightroom.