Summertime Nature in New Jersey. Sourland Mountain Preserve.
The Sourland Mountain Preserve/Reserve is a local park in Somerset New Jersey. It is near where I live, so I often get to take photowalks to capture what is in season. I haven’t visited recently due to work and all of the rain we have been getting. Based on previous years, this should be a good time for butterflies and dragonflies. I had a chance to to a quick visit on the way home. I took the Nikon D700 camera and 28-300 mm VR that I often have with me in the car. In a little over 1 hour I was able to get images of Yellow and Black Swallowtail Butterflies, Hummingbird Clearwing Moths, a Praying Mantis eating a Hummingbird Clearwing Moth, A carnivorous insect (later identified as a Robber-Fly) that looks like a Dragonfly, but only has one pair of wings, and an orange Caterpillar. This is definitely a good time to visit, and I plan to return tomorrow with a macro lens and bigger telephoto lens.
I need to thank Hans for fixing the photoblog/website after the problems encountered after the security update. There are still some minor issues, but for the most part it appear that everything is working other than thumbnail images for new posts. If you notice any additional problems, let me know.
The other good thing today is that the Drobo Disk array that I ordered last Sunday arrived. I do wish that the Drobo folks had giving me a heads up on the shipping and expected delivery time (standard practice for Amazon, B&H, and most other online retailers). I was lucky to be home to sign for the delivery. The FedEx guy must have wondered why I was sweating so much, since I just got back from the Sourland Mountain Preserve. The delivery was JIT since I am running out of hard disk storage space. I have been using a combination of Western Digital 1 and 2 TB MyBook storage devices, but have run out of USB and FireWire connections to my computer. The Drobo 800i was easy to set up (with eight 2 TB Western Digital drives) format, and connect to my computer. I am now in the process of transferring the images from my previous storage drives to the Drobo disk array. This will probably take a few days. Once done, I’ll use the previous storage devices as additional off-site backup storage. Until this is complete and I have a chance to update my LightRoom database to the new image locations, I may be a bit slow with new posts.
Black Swallowtail Butterfly on Thistle Bloom. Image taken with a Nikon D700 and 28-300 mm VR lens (ISO 200, 300 mm, f/5.6, 1/500 sec). Raw image processed with Capture One Pro 6, Nik Define, and Photoshop CS5. (David J Mathre)Yellow Swallowtail Butterfly on Thistle Bloom. Image taken with a Nikon D700 and 28-300 mm VR lens (ISO 200, 300 mm, f/5.6, 1/2000 sec). Raw image processed with Capture One Pro 6, Nik Define, and Photoshop CS5. (David J Mathre)Butterfly on Thistle Bloom. Image taken with a Nikon D700 and 28-300 mm VR lens (ISO 200, 300 mm, f/5.6, 1/640 sec). Raw image processed with Capture One Pro 6, Nik Define, and Photoshop CS5. (David J Mathre)Black Swallowtail Butterfly on Thistle Bloom. Image taken with a Nikon D700 and 28-300 mm VR lens (ISO 200, 300 mm, f/5.6, 1/400 sec). Raw image processed with Capture One Pro 6, Nik Define, and Photoshop CS5. (David J Mathre)Hummingbird Clearwing Moth on Thistle Bloom. Image taken with a Nikon D700 and 28-300 mm VR lens (ISO 200, 300 mm, f/5.6, 1/1000 sec). Raw image processed with Capture One Pro 6, Nik Define, and Photoshop CS5. (David J Mathre)Hummingbird Clearwing Moth on Thistle Bloom. Image taken with a Nikon D700 and 28-300 mm VR lens (ISO 200, 300 mm, f/5.6, 1/800 sec). Raw image processed with Capture One Pro 6, Nik Define, and Photoshop CS5. (David J Mathre)Hummingbird Clearwing Moth on Thistle Bloom. Image taken with a Nikon D700 and 28-300 mm VR lens (ISO 200, 300 mm, f/5.6, 1/2000 sec). Raw image processed with Capture One Pro 6, Nik Define, and Photoshop CS5. (David J Mathre)Praying Mantis Eating Hummingbird Clearwing Moth. Image taken with a Nikon D700 and 28-300 mm VR lens (ISO 200, 300 mm, f/5.6, 1/800 sec). Raw image processed with Capture One Pro 6, Nik Define, and Photoshop CS5. (David J Mathre)Robber-Fly This insect only has one pair of wings. Image taken with a Nikon D700 and 28-300 mm VR lens (ISO 200, 300 mm, f/5.6, 1/640 sec). Raw image processed with Capture One Pro 6, Nik Define, and Photoshop CS5. (David J Mathre)Robber-Fly Eating Black Wasp. Image taken with a Nikon D700 and 28-300 mm VR lens (ISO 200, 300 mm, f/5.6, 1/640 sec). Raw image processed with Capture One Pro 6, Nik Define, and Photoshop CS5. (David J Mathre)Insect in a Queen Anne’s Lace Flower Image taken with a Nikon D700 + 28-300 mm VR lens (ISO 200, 300 mm, f/5.6, 1/2500 sec). Raw image processed with Capture One Pro, Nik Define 2, and Photoshop CS5. (David J Mathre)
Snack Time. This doe was minding her own business mowing my lawn when all of a sudden these two fawns ran up from both sides looking for some milk. I guess that they are not completely weaned yet, even though they went back to eating grass as soon as they were done.
Milking Time Twin Fawns and Doe. Image taken with a Nikon D3s and 400 mm f/2.8G II lens (ISO 500, 400 mm, f/2.8, 1/400 sec). (David J Mathre)Milking Time Twin Fawns and Doe. Image taken with a Nikon D3s and 400 mm f/2.8G II lens (ISO 450, 400 mm, f/2.8, 1/400 sec). (David J Mathre)Milking Time Twin Fawns and Doe. Image taken with a Nikon D3s and 400 mm f/2.8G II lens (ISO 500, 400 mm, f/2.8, 1/400 sec). (David J Mathre)Milking Time Fawn and Doe. Image taken with a Nikon D3s and 400 mm f/2.8G II lens (ISO 720, 400 mm, f/2.8, 1/400 sec). (David J Mathre)
The Site is Undergoing Updates. Following security updates, some features of the site were disabled and other features are not working correctly. We are working to resolve the issues and bring the site back with all features restored.
Backyard Summertime Clouds and Landscape in New Jersey.
After the Storm. It has been raining a lot since last Saturday night. The storm system is finally leaving. I hoped to get a rainbow, but had to settle for a landscape view from my backyard. But then again, it is not often I can take a landscape image with weather/clouds from my backyard. The image was taken with a Leica X1. The first version of the image is the “out of the camera” JPG. The next two were the Leica X1 version of RAW (Adobe DNG) that were processed with Capture One Pro 6 and Photoshop CS5. The main difference between these two images was the white balance). The final image was converted to B&W using Nik Silver Efex Pro.
Let me know which you like best.
Storm Departing — Backyard Summer Landscape. Image taken with a Leica X1 (ISO 100, 24 mm, f/5.6. 1/800 sec). Out of the camera JPG.Storm Departing — Backyard Summer Landscape. Image taken with a Leica X1 (ISO 100, 24 mm, f/5.6. 1/800 sec). Raw image processed with Capture One Pro, Nik Define, and Photoshop CS5. Converted to BW with Nik Silver Efex Pro 2.Storm Departing — Backyard Summer Landscape. Image taken with a Leica X1 (ISO 100, 24 mm, f/5.6. 1/800 sec). Raw image processed with Capture One Pro, Nik Define, and Photoshop CS5. Converted to BW with Nik Silver Efex Pro 2.Storm Departing — Backyard Summer Landscape. Image taken with a Leica X1 (ISO 100, 24 mm, f/5.6. 1/800 sec). Raw image processed with Capture One Pro, Nik Define, and Photoshop CS5. Converted to BW with Nik Silver Efex Pro 2.
The Fawn and the Horse Fly. There was a fawn trying to rest in my back yard this evening. However, it was being incessantly harassed by a large horse fly. Finally, the fawn gave up and tried to run away.
Fawn and the Horse Fly. Image taken with a Nikon D3s camera and 400 mm f/2.8G II lens (ISO 200, 400 mm, f/2.8, 1/400 sec).Fawn and the Horse Fly. Image taken with a Nikon D3s camera and 400 mm f/2.8G II lens (ISO 200, 400 mm, f/2.8, 1/500 sec).Fawn and the Horse Fly. Image taken with a Nikon D3s camera and 400 mm f/2.8G II lens (ISO 200, 400 mm, f/2.8, 1/1000 sec).Fawn and the Horse Fly. Image taken with a Nikon D3s camera and 400 mm f/2.8G II lens (ISO 200, 400 mm, f/2.8, 1/6400 sec).Fawn and the Horse Fly. Image taken with a Nikon D3s camera and 400 mm f/2.8G II lens (ISO 200, 400 mm, f/2.8, 1/500 sec).Fawn and the Horse Fly. Image taken with a Nikon D3s camera and 400 mm f/2.8G II lens (ISO 200, 400 mm, f/2.8, 1/1000 sec).
Posts From This Day in the Past.
15-August-2009: I picked up “White Ram”, my Roadtrek RS Adventurous RV at Campers Barn in Kingston, New York.
Perseid Meteor Shower. Conditions for viewing the Perseid Meteors this year were not good. The moon was full with relatively high humidity and some clouds. I set two cameras up to take images overnight, and got maybe three images of meteors. I’ve made a time-lapse movie from the two image sets.
As a side note, I am running out of hard disk space. I could get another WD My Book external drive, but have run out of USB and Firewire ports on my computer. I’m thinking about a Dobro disk array. What ever I do, I also need to maintain an off-site backup copy. I worry about some of the cloud options, both due to cost and the fact that ATT limits me to 5 GB/month of broadband internet access.
Perseid Meteor and Bright Full Moon. Summer Night in New Jersey. Image taken with a Nikon D3 and 16 mm f/2.8 fisheye lens (ISO 400, 16 mm, f/2.8, 25 sec).Perseid Meteor. Summer Night in New Jersey. Image taken with a Nikon D3s and 24 mm f/3.5 PC-E lens (ISO 800, 24 mm, f/4, 29 sec).
