The Wakodahatchee Wetlands in Delray Beach, Florida provide an up-close experience with birds of many species. On a rainy January day, wood storks, anhingas, and great blue herons caught my attention during the rain and after. The Wood Storks Not far along the boardwalk, visitors encounter a tree full of wood storks. These giant, prehistoric looking creatures were building nests, flying from tree to tree and returning with […]
Author Archives: lloydbloom
The Wet Birds of Wakodahatchee
Posted in _Photo Blog, Birds, Wildlife
Tagged anhinga, bird, great blue heron, wildlife, wood stork
A Hike to Manoa Falls, Oahu 2018
This week, I hiked to Manoa Falls, north of Waikiki, a much-touted tourist destination for waterfall enthusiasts. Like many of Oahu’s natural sites, the falls is reached by driving deep into a residential area that backs on mountainous hillside. From there, a .8 mile hike takes you up about 800 feet to the 90-foot waterfall and its small pool. I hiked to Manoa Falls during mid-day when the […]
Posted in _Travel Journal, Landscape
Tagged black and white, Hawaii, hike, Oahu, Waikiki, waterfall
Watkins Glen – The Gorge, Not the Raceway
Watkins Glen, NY, at the southern tip of Seneca Lake, has been known to auto racing fans as a premier NASCAR racing track, having originally opened in 1948 as a Formula 1 track. I know nothing about that, as my interest lies in a much, much older attraction, the 400-foot deep gorge cut by Glen Creek, starting some 12,000 years ago. Lauded by Mark Twain in […]
Posted in _Photo Blog, Landscape
Tagged CCC, Civilian Conservation Corp, falls, gorge, New York, sandstone, shale, waterfall, Watkins Glen
Ropey Pahoehoe on a Tree? In a cemetery?
It was my third trip to Elmwood Cemetery. I had packed my gear and was just about to get in my car when I looked up at the tree I was parked next to. Ropey pahoehoe (pa-hoey-hoey) lava immediately came to mind (although, I confess that I had forgotten its name and had to look it up here). Though running late, I unpacked my gear […]
Posted in _Photo Blog, Abstract
Tagged a'a, cemetery, Hawaii, lava, ropey pahoehoe, tree, volcano
Oahu, Hawaii 2017
We had a much different trip to Hawaii this year, with an agenda less focused (for me) on photography. We brought friends with us and enjoyed the opportunity to show them around Oahu. That, coupled with an unusual amount of rain and my sleeping in more, meant I had to make my photo moments count. Oahu North Shore As with every trip, I try to […]
Posted in _Travel Journal, Landscape, Seascape, Surfing
Tagged cemetery, crater, gravestone, Hawaii, Oahu, ocean, Pacific Ocean, roots, sailboat, storm, sunset, surfing, tombstone, tree, tree roots, Waikiki
West Michigan Lighthouses and Sand Dunes
I had a busy photographic summer, starting with a June trip to the West Michigan town of Ludington, MI with members of the A2 Shutterbugs Meetup and then ending with a September trip to South Haven, MI with a new friend from that first meetup. The goal of the first trip was lighthouses and sand dunes; for the second, the South Haven light. I can’t […]
Posted in _Travel Journal, Landscape, Seascape
Tagged beach, dune, Lake Michigan, lighthouse, long exposure, Michigan, shore, West Michigan
Sandhill Cranes at Kensington Metropark
Last weekend, my friend Raaj and I ventured to Kensington Metropark in southeast Michigan. Our goal was to see what we could photograph in overcast, drizzly conditions. When I entered the park, a pair of relatively tame sandhill cranes stood off the side of the road. What an exciting surprise! I had never been so close to these birds in my other endeavors, and would have stopped to […]
Posted in _Photo Blog, Birds, Wildlife
Tagged beak, bird, bird preening, bird profile, crane, red, sandhill crane, wildlife
Elmwood Cemetery: Introducing the Grave Guardians
I visited Elmwood Cemetery this past weekend with a couple of friends. While there, one of them was excited to learn that Bear Bryant’s grave was in the cemetery. Who wouldn’t want to take a picture of a famous football coach’s tombstone (Bear would have been 103 – he was born on 9/11/1913). The website gave precise coordinates, down to three decimal places – pretty cool! He […]
Posted in _Photo Blog, Landscape, Sculpture
Tagged b&w, black and white, cemetery, grave, grave guardian, grave stone, gravesite, graveyard, tomb
Summer Carnival in Ann Arbor
Ann Arbor’s summer carnival has come and gone for the year. It’s been 15 or so years since I last went with my daughter – or should I say, the last year she went with me. That had something to do with my favorite ride, the scrambler. I love(d) the G-forces as the circle-within-a-circle centrifugal force combined to slide us hard to the outside of […]
Posted in _Photo Blog, Abstract
Tagged carnival, carnival ride, fair, ferris wheel, festival, light painting, light trails, long exposure, night, super nova, tilt-a-whirl, time exposure, zipper
The Magic of Morning Light
Andy, a colleague of mine, asked me my favorite time of day to take photos. Without hesitation, I said “give me morning light”. Wait a minute! I hate getting up early in the morning! But when I do pull myself out of bed, I find tremendous opportunities to capture images warmed by the low morning sun. The same holds true of low evening sun. Yet, […]
Posted in _Technique, Camera Tests
Tagged b&w, black and white, building, chimney, color, dilapidated building, low sun, morning, sunrise, sunset, warmth
Street Photography on St. Patrick’s Day
Let me start by saying that street photography is not my thing, at least not when it comes to bringing people I don’t know into pictures. I love to photograph architecture and street details, but when it comes to featuring strangers in my photographs, I am not comfortable unless their faces aren’t showing (as at right). That’s why I joined an A2 Shutterbugs meetup hosted […]
Birds of Prey – Howell (MI) Nature Center
The Howell Nature Center in lower Michigan rescues injured birds of prey and other wild animals and invites the public to meet them. Today, I had the opportunity to photograph their birds. The Nature Center offers an array of wildlife education programs and today’s photo shoot was my introduction to their services. Nature Center staff did a terrific job of explaining the background of the birds, how they […]
Sandhill Cranes Nesting in Michigan
It had been five years since I first photographed sandhill cranes returning in the evening to their nesting site in Mud Lake Marsh. This was at the Phyllis Haehnle Memorial Sanctuary near Jackson, Michigan, a Michigan Audubon Society preserve. That was my first real exposure to photographing birds in the wild … if you exclude seagulls. Getting Started This year, National Photography Workshops in Ann Arbor arranged […]
Posted in _Photo Blog, Birds, Landscape
Tagged 500mm, bird, bird in flight, cranes, lake, marsh, morning, sandhill cranes, sunrise, telephoto lens, wildlife sancutary
Fall Color After All
Last week, I carped that this has been a bad year for shooting fall color. But, quite by accident I found that the reality was I was looking in the wrong places. I don’t mean to say that I found a grove of wonderfully-tinted trees at peak color – it’s getting pretty late for that. Instead, while trying out a new lens, I learned that I […]
Posted in _Photo Blog, Landscape
Tagged autumn, blue, fall, fall color, Fog, impressionism, leaves, orange, painterly, pond, reflection, rippled water, ripples, river, tree, water
Finding Fall Leaves
I found it a bit challenging for shooting fall leaves in Ann Arbor this year. Maybe it was me, but peak color waited for a frost that never came, and then the colors peaked at different times, followed by wind that blew leaves off of trees much more quickly than in past years. Here we are in November and we haven’t had a hard frost, and our days […]
Posted in _Photo Blog, Flora, Landscape, Uncategorized
Tagged autumn, fall, fall color, leaf, leaves, tree