Wednesday (11-September-2019) — New Jersey

Backyard Summertime Nature in New Jersey.

To keep the deer out of the wildflower garden next to the house, I have added a 10 foot tall Air Puppet. I have it set to run for 1 minute every 15 minutes all night. Unfortunately, I turned it off too early in the morning, and then didn’t turn it on again until too late in the afternoon. The two videos from my security cameras show the fawns feasting on the wildflowers inside the electric fence.

Daily Electric Energy Used (51.2 kWh) from Sense and Daily Solar Electric Energy Produced (56.1 kWh) from SolSystems and Locus Energy. Clouds in the morning but more sun in the afternoon. I had to turn the Geothermal HVAC system on to cool the house. Overall a net surplus of 4.9 kWh.

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Tuesday (10-September-2019) — New Jersey

Backyard Summertime Nature in New Jersey.

The deer are getting bolder and getting closer to the house. Here a doe is just outside my patio. The buck with a rack of antlers is next to the back wildflower meadow. I am guessing he got his antlers caught in the electric fence and panicked destroying a section of the electric fence. These images were all taken through a window impacting sharpness.


Daily Electric Energy Used (40.5 kWh) from Sense and Daily Solar Electric Energy Produced (38.7 kWh) from SolSystems and Locus Energy. Cloudy much of the day. Starting to warm up outside. Overall a net deficit of 1.8 kWh.


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Ten-Years Ago (10-September-2009) — Alaska

Gone to See North America Road Trip. Day 20: Alaska Railroad – Denali to Anchorage, Alaska. (Day 6: Nikonians ANPAT 9).

We were very fortunate on this trip to see Mount Denali five days in a row. As the tallest mountain in North America, it creates its own weather and often is obscured by clouds for days at a time. The first set of images are of Mount Denali. They were taken while riding the Alaska Railroad train back to Anchorage from the Observation car. I didn’t posted them in the past because they were out of focus and blurry. Photographer error — I used shutter-priority mode  with a high shutter speed (1/1000 or 1/2000 sec) with the ISO set to 100. This resulted in the aperture being being nearly wide open, which meant a narrow range of distances in focus. The 45 mm f/2.8 PC-E lens is a manual focus lens, and I must have moved it off of focusing at infinity. I have reprocessed the images with Capture One Pro and Topaz Focus AI. I am very impressed with how much detail the Topaz Focus AI program was able to recover.

The next set of images are landscape views from the train. The same camera and lens, but set to aperture-priority with the aperture set at f/11, and auto ISO. These images were sharper, and did not need to be reprocessed. In some of the images you see the old telegraph poles. Although the wire had been removed years ago to recover the copper, the glass insulators are still there.

Finally, a time-lapse video (sort of) documenting the group on the train. All images taken with a Nikon D3 camera and 16 mm  fisheye lens. Two minutes in length.


Click on the above image to access my PhotoShelter gallery with the individual images in the following slideshow.



Click on the above image to access my PhotoShelter gallery with the individual images in the following slideshow.


Monday (09-September-2019) — New Jersey

Backyard Summertime Nature in New Jersey.

It had been overcast and cool much of the day. In the late afternoon we finally got some much needed rain. Not enough, but something. The clouds started clearing from the west and I noticed sunlight coming in my bedroom window. When I looked outside I saw a double rainbow. I ran outside with the first camera I found with a wide-angle lens. Three views — a 360 degree panorama, a little planet view, and an inverse little planet/tunnel view.

Rainbow. 360 Pano View. Composite of 46 images taken with a Nikon Df camera and 19 mm f/4 PC-E lens (ISO 100, 19 mm, f/8, 1/80 sec). Raw images processed with Capture One Pro and composite created using AutoPano Giga Pro. (DAVID J MATHRE)
Rainbow. 360 Pano View. Composite of 46 images taken with a Nikon Df camera and 19 mm f/4 PC-E lens (ISO 100, 19 mm, f/8, 1/80 sec). Raw images processed with Capture One Pro and composite created using AutoPano Giga Pro. (DAVID J MATHRE)
Rainbow. Little Planet View. Composite of 46 images taken with a Nikon Df camera and 19 mm f/4 PC-E lens (ISO 100, 19 mm, f/8, 1/80 sec). Raw images processed with Capture One Pro and composite created using AutoPano Giga Pro. (DAVID J MATHRE)
Rainbow. Little Planet View. Composite of 46 images taken with a Nikon Df camera and 19 mm f/4 PC-E lens (ISO 100, 19 mm, f/8, 1/80 sec). Raw images processed with Capture One Pro and composite created using AutoPano Giga Pro. (DAVID J MATHRE)
Rainbow. 360 Tunnel View. Composite of 46 images taken with a Nikon Df camera and 19 mm f/4 PC-E lens (ISO 100, 19 mm, f/8, 1/80 sec). Raw images processed with Capture One Pro and composite created using AutoPano Giga Pro. (DAVID J MATHRE)
Rainbow. 360 Tunnel View. Composite of 46 images taken with a Nikon Df camera and 19 mm f/4 PC-E lens (ISO 100, 19 mm, f/8, 1/80 sec). Raw images processed with Capture One Pro and composite created using AutoPano Giga Pro. (DAVID J MATHRE)

Daily Electric Energy Used (36.4 kWh) from Sense and Daily Solar Electric Energy Produced (35.5 kWh) from SolSystems and Locus Energy. Cloudy much of the day. Still cool enough that the windows can be left open and no need to run the Geothermal HVAC. Overall a net deficit of 0.9 kWh.

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Seven-Years Ago (09-September-2012) — English Channel

Gone to see Europe. Semester at Sea. Fall 2012 Semester Voyage on the MV Explorer. Day 17: At Sea, English Channel.

Dawn and Sunrise aboard the Semester at Sea MV Explorer off the Isle of Wight.

Chalk Cliffs on the Isle of Wrght at Dawn. Image taken with a Nikon 1 V1 camera and 30-110 mm VR lens (ISO 800, 30 mm, f/4, 1/60 sec). (David J Mathre)
Chalk Cliffs on the Isle of Wrght at Dawn. Image taken with a Nikon 1 V1 camera and 30-110 mm VR lens (ISO 800, 30 mm, f/4, 1/60 sec). (David J Mathre)
Cargo Ships at Dawn on the English Channel. Image taken with a Leica X2 camera (ISO 200, 24 mm, f/11, 1/60 sec). (David J Mathre)
Cargo Ships at Dawn on the English Channel. Image taken with a Leica X2 camera (ISO 200, 24 mm, f/11, 1/60 sec). (David J Mathre)
Dawn Colors from the deck of the MV Explorer. Image taken with a Nikon 1 V1 camera and 30-110 VR lens (ISO 100, 55 mm, f/8, 1/60 sec) (David J Mathre)
Dawn Colors from the deck of the MV Explorer. Image taken with a Nikon 1 V1 camera and 30-110 VR lens (ISO 100, 55 mm, f/8, 1/60 sec) (David J Mathre)
Sun rising above the clouds from the deck of the MV Explorer. Image taken with a Nikon 1 V1 camera and 30-110 VR lens (ISO 100, 110 mm, f/11, 1/60 sec) (David J Mathre)
Sun rising above the clouds from the deck of the MV Explorer. Image taken with a Nikon 1 V1 camera and 30-110 VR lens (ISO 100, 110 mm, f/11, 1/60 sec) (David J Mathre)
Shadow Photographer. Image taken with a Leica X2 camera (ISO 100, 24 mm, f/4.5, 1/100 sec). (David J Mathre)
Shadow Photographer. Image taken with a Leica X2 camera (ISO 100, 24 mm, f/4.5, 1/100 sec). (David J Mathre)
Sunrise on the English Channel from the aft deck of the MV Explorer. Image taken with a Leica X2 camera (ISO 100, 24 mm, f/5.6, 1/400 sec). (David J Mathre)
Sunrise on the English Channel from the aft deck of the MV Explorer. Image taken with a Leica X2 camera (ISO 100, 24 mm, f/5.6, 1/400 sec). (David J Mathre)
Chalk Cliffs on the Isle of Wrght at Dawn. Image taken with a Nikon 1 V1 camera and 30-110 mm VR lens (ISO 100, 110 mm, f/8, 1/60 sec). (David J Mathre)
Chalk Cliffs on the Isle of Wrght at Dawn. Image taken with a Nikon 1 V1 camera and 30-110 mm VR lens (ISO 100, 110 mm, f/8, 1/60 sec). (David J Mathre)
MV Explorer and Morning Clouds. Image taken with a Leica X2 camera (ISO 100, 24 mm, f/5.6, 1/500 sec). (David J Mathre)
MV Explorer and Morning Clouds. Image taken with a Leica X2 camera (ISO 100, 24 mm, f/5.6, 1/500 sec). (David J Mathre)