Yorkshire wildlife & landscape photographer

Bird photography in Norfolk

November 29, 2016

I had to go to Norwich for a commercial shoot for one of my clients, so I decided to make the journey on a Friday in order that I could stay on after the shoot for some bird photography in Norfolk over the weekend. I stayed with frioends who live not far from Norwich but are well placed for the north Norfolk coast and the many reserves there. We spent Saturday at Salthouse and Cley where the lapland bunting, shorelark and arctic redpoll that had all been present yesterday, had now all gone! However, I managed to get some record shots of snow bunting and stonechat as well as plenty of action with the local turnstones.

On Sunday we hit Titchwell, one of my favourite resrves but the weather was a bit grim and not ideal for photos. Again though, I managed a few images of which I especially enjoyed capturing an obliging Cetti’s warbler in a bit of dappled sunlight that broke through just as the bird performed. There were a few waders on the reserve – godwits, redshank and curlew – and the beach had plenty of dunlin, oystercather and knot. Out at sea there were good numbers of common scoter, eider and merganser but all too far out for the camera. A good weekend with friends and a few images I’m reasonably happy with so, all in all, well worth the trip.

Cettis warbler (Cettia cetti) Norfolk

stonechat black-tailed godwit

by John

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Autumn leaves at Nostell Priory | autumn colour Nostell Priory

November 19, 2016

Autumn leaves at Nostell Priory

A bright, cold morning today so anoother walk photographing autumn leaves at Nostell Priory along with a whole host of birds too. The lower lake had good numbers of goosander and wigeon as well as the usual waterfowl and the local heron performed very well, as did kingfisher. The stars of the show for me were a couple of carrion crows that posed beautifully for me, allowing some great portraits of a normally shy bird. In the specimen trees behind the house, there were big numbers of tits, goldcrest, chaffinch and a few brambling, but no sign of the report firecrest from last week.

by John

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Autumn colours at Nostell Priory NT

November 13, 2016

Autumn colours at Nostell Priory NT and planty of fungus there too

It was a beautiful autumn day today and so I went for a stroll to check out the autumn colours at Nostell Priory NT property just down the road from my house. Despite it being well into November, there was still plenty of colour about, especially by the lower lake. There was a good selection of fungus including fly agaric and shaggy pholiota (pictured below). On the lake, in beautiful light, was a good selection of wildfowl including wigeon, shoveller, tufted ducks and mallards but all just that bit too far away for anything other thna a record shot. There were one or two female gooseander too but again, getting close was difficult. However, I cam upon one bird sleeping on a log, a usual spot to find these birds at this site, and a magaed to get very close. The bird was in such a deep sleep, I was only getting shots of it with its head under its wing until I disturbed it. In a moment of panic she splashed into the water and swam away quickly and gave me an indignamt look over her shoulder for disturbing her. I managed a shot or two of a different bird preening out in the lake. The colour of the trees reflected beautifully in the water making the birds appear to be swimming in pea green soup nut my favourite shot was of the pholiota.

by John

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Siberian accentor at Easington | east coast rarities | Yorkshire wildlife photographer

October 16, 2016

Yorkshire wildlife photographer: Siberian Accentor at Easington

Today I made the pilgrimage over to east Yorkshire to glimpse Siberian accentor at Easington, only the second record for Britain. The first record turned up on Shetland just a few days ago and no-one expected there to be another bird hot on its heels, this time in Yorkshire. Better than that though, a third bird was discovered at Hartlepool headland while we were viewing the Easington bird! The ‘Sibe was feeding intently in a turning circle at the back of some houses and we could only look down on the bird from a small vanatge point and also, it was always against the sun. However, the D500 and Nikon 200-500 combo worked a treat, in manual exposure mode of course, and I was able to get a few record shots for my lecture on Yorkshire’s wildlife. As good as the Siberian accentor was, the goldcrests were equally special in my opinion; these tiny jewel-like birds were everywhere, feeding in the sycamores, thistle patches and low bushes along the approach road to the Sibe. On the way back I stopped and spent half an hour with them trying to capture their aerial skills as they hovered beneath sycamore leaves in search of insects.

From here, we dropped down to Kilnsey where we picked up Pallas’s warbler (not photographable), dusky warbler, Radde’s warbler, woodcock, shorelark, bearded tit and even a couple of late swallows! There were birds being reported from everywhere: Little bunting, another dusky warbler, firecrest and yellow-browed warbler to name but a few. Rarely has there been such a fall of eastern migrants as there has been this past few days. This was one of those birding days that will be remembered for many a year.

dusky warbler

Dusky Warbler

by John

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Nikon 200-500VR f/5,6 lens – a game changing lens? | Nikon 200-500 VR review | field test Nikon 200-500VR

October 9, 2016

Nikon 200-500 VR f/5.6 game changing lens?

Is the Nikon 200-500 VR f/5.6 a game changing lens? For me I think the answer is becoming a resounding YES! My workhorse nature photography lens over the past 20trs has been the incredible Nikor 500mm f/4 lens which, in recent tears, I updated to a VR version. The lens is incredible sharp, super fast focussing and handles both the 1.4x and 2x convertors with ease (the latter has to be the MKIII version!). I’ve taken the 500mm all over the world and most recently, in 2016, on several trips to Spain where I rented photographic hides which are set up to accomodate the growing ranks of amateur nature photographers that have a wide variety of lenses, not all of which have 500mm lenses. This often meant that the subjects were a bit close and became big in the frame and the fixed focal length of the 500mm, even on full frame sensors, can mean the subject is tight in the frame.

As a professional commercial photographer shooting a lot of portraits, my workhorse lens in that sphere is my 70-200mm zoom. I rarely leaves my D4/D810 and I really appreciate the ability to zoom to change composition. Often, I have discussed with my photo buddies the dream of having a decent zoom for working in the hides. Nikon does have a 200-400mm f/4 VR lens but it is very expensive and is also big, almost the same size as a 500mm lens. As I often travel with budget airlines, size and weight is becoming more important to me and so the thought of a smaller, lightweight zoom has always been appealing. Sigma and Tamron both offer 150-500mm superzooms and I see these being touted around by many people, especially birdwatchers who also want a record shot of the bird they’ve just seen. However, I’d rather give up photography than use a Sigma lens and, though I admire Tamron, the reviews weren’t always great. Enter Nikon with their Nikor 200-500 Vr f/5.6 offering – a direct assault on the Tamron and Sigma lenses. Priced at £1100 and with the release of the Nikon D500 APS-C camera, I decided to have a dabble. Would it be a game changer and a replacement for my 500VR lens? Only time will tell, but today, I had an amazing outing with it and my opinion is beginning to form!

There has just been a period of easterly winds in mid-October and that can only mean one thing – migrants a plenty on the east coast. With rarities being reported quicker than burgers sold at a McDonalds’ drive thru, I decided to head to Bemton Cliffs on the east coast to see wht I could find. The weather conditions were perfect with light easterly winds and bright sunshine. The coastal hedges were litterally dripping with tired migrant bords. Chiffchaffs and goldcrest were the dominant species but there were also redwing, bluethroat, brambling, robins and blackbirds all to be had. I took only the D500, Nikkor 200-500VR and the 1.4TC-E MKIII and mounted the whole rig on a cheap monopod. The set up is very lightweight and manouverable and this is the first thing I noticed, no tripod required or back breaking lenses over the shoulder! This combination also notches up an amazing 1050mm equivalent at the long end and the AF at f/8 is very quick. Given that the zoom range is effectively 420-1050, this is an incredibly versatile set-up. I think if you need much more than 1000mm, you’re too far from the subject for anything other than a record shot. I used this combination all day and, boy, did it work well.

A couple of things to note: the wetaher was very bright and sunny so AF was not a problem and, also, I shot mostly at f/11 because I think the lens is much sharper when slightly stopped down but that may just be my copy (which I bought used for £995 from Dale Photographic). There were so many birds in the bushes, finding a subject was easy, especially if you wanted to photograph goldcrest or chiffchaff! I shot around 1500 images at 2500ISO to get me shutter speeds of 1/2000 and above. I did this purely because the goldcrests do not sit still and a shutter speed of, say 1/500, might freeze the body, but the bird’s head will be blurred: they are like little sowing machines! I’ve presented a selection of images here, most of which are straight out of the camera with only minor contrast tweaks and some have a slight crop for compositional purposes. I am really impressed with the sharpness and detail of this lens and on the D500 it’s just an amazing set-up for the nature photographer. I need to try it in low light to see if the AF speed and sharpness hold up, but based on today’s performance, I reckon this is a game changing lens for me and the selling of the 500mm just became one step closer! Stay tuned for the next brief appraisal…..

by John

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