Great Lakes region, USA. May 2026
My new (to me) lens came in the mail today and had to take it out. What better first bird than a cedar waxwing? The first I've seen this year too. I'm loving this new lens. Much sharper, more responsive, and longer reach.
The new lens is the Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 100-400mm f/5-6.3 IS
And a gif I made of one taking a sip.
Great Lakes region, USA. May 2026.
I was doing some birding down by the river and this little one poked out to say hello. I love these thirteen-lined ground squirrels. Their coat is so pretty.
Great Lakes region, USA. May 2026.
I've been collecting these guys over the past few weeks. Here are some of my better shots.
Look at those crests. Awooga!
cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/46269033
Great Lakes region, USA. April 2026.
I'll often see this hen pecking away in our neighbor's yard. She's usually accompanied by her handsome black roo, but he wasn't around. She is very friendly and curious, he's not so much.
Great Lakes region, USA. May 2026.
I almost got mauled by these gorgeous birds. I was paddling next to a thicket of cattails and apparently next to a swan nest. They emerged with a quickness and a hiss to let me know they were pissed. I immediately backed up to flee the area, but they kept charging. They're kind of terrifyingly large, ha. My heart was racing.
Great Lakes region, USA. May 2026.
It's been a few weeks since I last went kayaking. It's good to see the painted population is still doing well here. I saw plenty of beautiful turtles.
Always a pleasure to see a wild cottontail, even if they're never happy to see me. No chance to get any really good photos.
Yes exactly, shots are cached in the buffer and stored permanently when the shutter button is completely depressed. The specific mode I used is reliant on quick autofocus. The lens determines how quick the autofocus capabilities are. If I used a mode with static focus I could shoot 120fps.
Great Lakes region, USA. May 2026.
A species of wolf spider that's common here. These little arachnids are quick crawlers. They hang out on rocks and ambush their prey, closing quite the distance swiftly, webs not required. I didn't stick around to find any feeding, another time.
I used a pre-shot feature to get this, if you know what that is. With my budget lens it only allows me 25fps. If I had a better lens I could get 50fps.
My great blue friend would like a word.
I wish I had more area for the blue jay to move into on the left side of the frame. I could have more frames of the jay to add to this photo. IIRC the jay was positioned more in the middle of my viewfinder and flew the path in the photo. I should have placed the jay in the lower right hand corner of my viewfinder so I had more photos of it to add here.
I've been getting really into nature photography over the last 9 months. I love being immersed in nature on the hunt for anything cool doing anything cool.
Personally I think robins are much worse morning call birds. Those beautiful orange fuckers are the first to start chirping.
Great Lakes region, USA. May 2026.
Another composite attempt. Not as good as my first, but I still like it. I didn't give the jay enough frame to move into.
No goslings here yet. I've got my eye out though.
Garbage human. I hope karma catches him.
cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/46902553
Great Lakes region, USA. May 2025.
I was too lazy to switch to my macro lens, but my 75-300mm cheapo can do nicely sometimes. I wasn't able to get the azure color of the upper wings, but I did get a nice proboscis shot.
Great Lakes region, USA. May 2025.
I was too lazy to switch to my macro lens, but my 75-300mm cheapo can do nicely sometimes. I wasn't able to get the azure color of the upper wings, but I did get a nice proboscis shot.
Great Lakes region, USA. May 2026.
Some recent posts here inspired me to try my hand at a composite photo. After much trial and error I kinda figured out how to do this in GIMP and I'm really happy how this turned out. Thank you all for the inspiration. I plan to make many more like this.
Any tips would be greatly appreciated. I don't really know GIMP all that well. I barely know Darktable.
They always remind me of gophers. They like to burrow too.