Sticky Beak Photography

A creative outlet for Michael Houlden, Portrait Photographer at Houlden Studios Photography

[michaelhoulden]

Looking Back Post 74 Pomegranate Still Life

Okay, so I totally needed a break from the Ecuador trip. I really need to regroup on that one and come up with a plan for how I'm going to finish that set of photographs as I really don't want be posting those photos for another month.

Today I was experimenting and the fruit bowl was subject to my will. I've been learning about various HDR techniques and wanted to see if I could improve on the HDR images I have created in the past. I get pretty frustrated with the HDR programmes as there are so many controls and, honestly, the names of the sliders probably makes sense once you know what they do, but geez louise, I really struggle with them.

To help with that I've been reading an e-book by Scott Bourne and Rich Harrington on HDR and thought I'd try again today. I tried this image with two different programmes - HDR Photomatix and HDR Efex Pro 2. Now, you would think that it should be pretty straight forward to create an HDR image and it should be pretty easy to create similar results regardless of the tool used to do it. Maybe that's possible with a more thorough understanding of the tools, but for me, today, no way. 

I had purchased HDR Photomatix last year and tried it a few times and gave up on it as a) couldn't get my head around all the different processing options and b) whatever I created looked either plain boring or ultra nasty.

I had the same experience with it again today. Might be time to sit down and struggle through some online videos on how to use it.

HDR Efex Pro 2, on the other hand provided this very pleasing result. Still not really what I was thinking of when I went in, but definitely an improvement over the HDR images I have been creating until now.

From a technical point of view I created a 5 image bracket of -2, -1, 0, +1 and +2 EV. I was working on a tripod to get the image set in perfect register, used a polarising filter to kill the glare from the window light to my right and flagged the back ground to kill a refection off the shiny pomegranate that was really distracting.

I'm not going to go into what I did in HDR Efex Pro 2 as that's the secret sauce to the whole thing. Oh alright, I'm not telling you because I don't remember. Still a lot to learn.

[michaelhoulden]

Looking Back Post 73 Marine Iguanas

After leaving Isla Genovesa, we had a long sail around to the western most and youngest island in the Galapagos Archipelago, Isla Fernandina.

Fernandina is a truly wondrous island. Being the youngest of the islands, it has the least vegetation and is very raw. Plenty of exposed lava and no sandy beaches. 

Fernandina is also home to the rather peculiar flightless cormorant. I'll talk more about that creature in another post. Today it's marine iguana time. 

I'll probably share a couple more marine iguanas before I'm done with the Galapagos as they are everywhere in the Galapagos. On Isla Fernandina, however, they were piled up massively, one upon another. We had arrived early in the morning to catch them clustered together for warmth. 

Interesting characters these guys. Being cold blooded they have to rely on external heat sources to warm back up, so after a hard hunting session in the ocean they climb back out to laze in the sun to recover. All the while snorting and spitting out salt snot. Yeah, you gotta be a bit careful around them that you don't get salt spit all over your camera. Kinda funny though. 

And like most of the creatures of the Galapagos, they don't run away, so you get to really take your time with them.

This characteristic of Galapagos Island fauna is both blessing and curse. Blessing because you can really take your time watching them and composing your photograph. Curse because you can really take your time… and spend ALL your landing time in one spot and miss out on what else there is to see. 

Careful observance of time and rationing time is highly recommended. 

[michaelhoulden]

Looking Back Post 72 Waved Albatross

One of the main attractions for the climb up Prince Phillip's Steps to the top of Isla Genovesa are the Storm Petrels. The interesting thing about Storm Petrels in the Galapagos is that they are active during the day rather than being nocturnal as they are in the rest world. 

The thing about photographing Storm Petrels is that a) they are small, b) they are fast fliers and c) they are abundant. Unfortunately, I was attracted to the waved albatross soaring around more than the storm petrels and thus missed my chance to photograph them. Sure, they appear in some of my images. Mostly as a swarm of gnats surrounding an albatross.

Though, truthfully, even if I had been trying to make some images of the storm petrels, they wouldn't have been much to look at as they were too small for the 200mm lens I had with me, even if I could have kept up to them.

Instead, I have this rather cool panning blur image of a waved albatross. Technically, it should probably be a throw-away image, but I just love all the panning lines and the not quite perfect albatross. 

[michaelhoulden]

Looking Back Post 71 Nazca Boobies

After spending the morning in Darwin Bay we climbed Prince Phillip's Steps to the top of Genovesa Island to see the storm petrels. Interesting thing about storm petrels. They are nocturnal. Except in the Galapagos. Without predators, the Galapagos storm petrels have adapted their behaviour. 

But this isn't a post about storm petrels. Or, at least, it wasn't meant to be. This here is a mating pair of Nazca Boobies. Boobies have a pretty cool mating ritual involving a funny little dance routine. These two were putting on quite a show, but my images don't show it. Regardless, this moment in time during their dance just screams for attention in my archives.

I was half way through the post processing on this when I realised it was a gorgeous image in black and white. Love, love, love how this turned out. I debated retouching the spider on the left booby's breast (is that weird sounding or what? It's like a double breast, or saying the booby's booby! LOL) but then decided to leave it there. It makes me smile. 

Okay, here's an interesting bit of Nazca Booby trivia for you. Nazca Boobies practice siblicide. Yes, murder of siblings. Nazca Boobies lay two eggs a few days apart. The first egg hatches and starts the whole "gimme food" business. A few days to a week later, the second egg hatches and the first baby booby kicks the second out of the nest and refuses to let the parents rescue the reject. Told ya it was interesting! 

Apparently the Masked Booby exhibit this behaviour too, though I have been unable to ascertain if the Blue Footed and Red Footed Boobies do this.

Well, there you go.

[michaelhoulden]

Looking Back Post 70 Darwin Bay, Genovesa Island

Landscape photography in the Galapagos Islands can be a really tough gig. Or, at least, it was a tough gig the first time I went there. Could be that it was simply overwhelming to my photography skills at the time. It will be interesting to see it through my eyes now, these many years later.

Jen and I are each exhibiting artwork in a look gallery this spring. Jen, her landscape art quilts and me, my photography. At our opening last week I was asked about how long it took to develop my skills as a photographer. The unspoken part of that question "current skills as a photographer". I have so much more to learn and develop, I feel as though I have barely scratched the surface.

It was a fair question though. I've had a camera since my Granddad gave me his old Practica film camera when I was a lad. I experimented a bit, but never really got anywhere. Before I knew it, I was a starving student, and had other priorities than film. In about 2000, the quality and affordability curves finally intersected with my income situation and I purchased a digital camera. I never looked back.

But wow, did I produce a lot of crap. I didn't really realise it was crap though. I would call Jen to the computer - check this out, isn't it great. And I could see right away, though, what she thought of it. For years, this happened. And then things started to come together. A little bit. Still mostly crap, but usually when I called Jen to have a look at something she would be impressed. 

From that point, probably about 6 or 7 years ago, my win rate started to improve pretty rapidly. This trip to the Galapagos was at the beginning of "The Curve of Improvement". A workshop 4 years ago with Freeman Patterson was a watershed moment for me. After that point, I really started being able to see. 

Now, I will still take quite a few images of a given subject, but it's because I'm refining the image, getting it just right, because I can see what I want to capture and its just a matter of tweaking it. 

What's my point? Dunno, just telling a tale, I suppose, that for me, it's taken a lot of time and effort to get where I am photographically. People see my photographs and say really nice things, sometimes they even say wow you have a gift. But it's not a gift. It's just the fruits of a lot of work.

I'm both enjoy this trip back through my archives and finding it very frustrating. I look at some of the images I made in the Galapagos and just shake my head and wonder what on earth I was doing shooting like that. Why didn't I do this? Or why didn't I do that? And I have to remind myself that I'm looking at photographs from 5 years ago through my eyes of today.

And then I wonder, if I could do it again, would the images be any different? I would like to think so. I sure hope so. But maybe, I get off the boat and go into crazed bird photographer mode and forget to look around and take in all the other beauty around me. 

That said, and back to the start of this article, I remember the Galapagos landscape as a particularly challenging landscape to photograph. This photograph gives you a bit of an idea, though, of what Genovesa Island looks like and the Galapagos in general. As a geologically young landscape, there isn't a huge variety. The challenge is in seeing the details that make it so unique and highlighting them.

And that, I think, is where a return visit would be different. I see differently now. How fun would that be? And maybe it's a race against time. When we were there 5 years ago, there was talk of further increasing the restrictions on visitors. It's a tough balance for the Galapagos and Ecuador as the Islands are a huge tourism draw. But the ecology is terribly fragile and has been beaten up pretty badly by the past couple centuries of abuse. There's lots of work going into turning things around though.

[michaelhoulden]

Looking Back Day 69 Magnificent Frigate Bird Plumage

Last week I mentioned that the Magnificent Frigatebird's plumage was iridescent. I also promised you a photo of that. 

And you thought it was a black bird. Pretty spectacular colour, eh?

[michaelhoulden]

Looking Back Day 68 Sleeping Booby

Bird behaviour today. And a short post as it's getting really late after having spent most of the evening editing and uploading an instructional film for Quilts by Jen.

You might think this red footed booby is just leaning over. Well, it is, but there is a mighty fine reason for it.

It's hot. Crazy, stinking hot. And the Booby has figured out that resting/sleeping with his head hanging down low keeps him cool. Really. Getting hot out, don't feel like flying and feeding. Hang your head. Cool off.

Not sure that works for us though.

Interestingly, the magnificent frigatebirds do the same thing when its hot.

So, yeah. Just chillin'. 

[michaelhoulden]

Looking Back Day Day 67 Two Sea Lions

To say that there are sea lions in the Galapagos is like saying there are children at Disney World. Now, I haven't been to Disney World, but I have it on reasonably good authority that there are a few kids running around the place.

Same in the Galapagos with Sea Lions. Everywhere. Absolutely everywhere. And, you sort of have to be careful, a little bit. Mostly, they are pretty docile. You can get right up close and personal with them most of the time.

An exception though. Give the bulls a bit of space. Especially the big ones. Not unlike cattle bulls. They tend to be a bit crusty. Oh, and when you're snorkelling? They are closer than they appear. Oops. Yeah, had a close call one day.

The pups are crazy playful, but that's a post for another day. 

Like all creatures in the Galapagos. No touching. Though it can be awfully tempting. We visited one beach where we were literally stepping between sea lions to walk along the beach. Touching the pups is deadly to the pups. Not directly mind you, but by touching them your scent transfers to the pup and then mum doesn't recognise her pup and won't let it nurse.

Interesting tidbit, the pups find mum by calling and listening for her calls back. Mum identifies her pup by scent. When there are a lot of sea lions on the beach, it can be quite entertaining to watch cow and cub trying to find one another.

Anyway, this was my first decent sea lion photograph. I love how both mum and her pup are arching together. I do wish I had taken just a single step to the left to create that much needed separation between them. And as for getting close? Sea lions are not small creatures and this was taken at about 80mm. Up close and personal. 

Can't get it perfect on the first visit though, eh? Always the next time to get it right.

[michaelhoulden]

Looking Back Day 66 Red Footed Booby Chicks

Aren't they adorable? I just want to pick them up and cuddle them. All soft and fuzzy. Cuter than chicken chicks, for sure.

And once again, it bears stating, you don't need a bazooka lens to photograph these guys. They are happy to stand there and pose. Let you get nice and close. Well, as close as the trail and the guides allow, anyway.

Earlier explorers feasted on boobies because they were so easy to catch. Walk up and grab them. Dinner served. Having visited the Galapagos in modern times, ravaged by early explores and feral pests (rats, goats, etc) I can't even begin to image the scene which greeted the early arrivals. Must have been awe-inspiring, though I wonder if they had much appreciation for how special it was beyond simply a place to load up the holds with giant tortoise.

[michaelhoulden]

Looking Back Day 65 Red Footed Booby

Hands down, no questions asked, my favourite bird of the Galapagos Islands is the Red Footed Booby.

Look at those feet! I mean, REALLY!, LOOK at those feet. They are RED. and not just sort of red, but RED RED! And their blue beak, too. Super cool characters. 

These images show the two varieties. Brown morph and white morph. Both gorgeous. But wait'll you see the chicks. Crazy cute. But I'm holding them back for another post. 

The Boobies make stick nests in the trees, like the one above, and male and female take turns on the egg for about 45-50 days and they will be monogamous over several seasons but not lifetime. When they aren't on the nest, they are out fishing and what spectacular moves as they dive down from crazy high straight into the ocean at wicked speeds.

The Booby is typically only around land during mating season and they are out and about the rest of the year. Yet another species reason to time your Galapagos visit with spring mating season.

In the Galapagos, the red footed booby is only seen on Genovesa (Tower) Island. This meant we had just this one day to photograph these beauties. That kind of photographic stress is pretty common with a Galapagos tour. Every island has it's unique species. An incredibly fascinating place. Without spoiling future posts, it is fascinating to see adaptations of plants to survive animals and the subsequent animal adaptation to deal with the plant adaptation. Which is the chicken, which is the egg?

Genovesa is one of the more isolated islands in the archipelago, and also one of the older islands. Older? Heh, yeah. The Galapagos are an ever forming and decaying island chain, not unlike Hawaii. The islands in the west are the youngest, those in the east are the oldest. This results in a remarkable variation in flora and fauna as the older islands have had life longer, more time to erode, more time to adapt, more time to support plant life. 

Back to Genovesa, being isolated means it is a fair hike out to it and back thus it is skipped by the shorter tours. It's also a small island and a very important breeding colony for a number of birds so it also has significant restrictions in the number of visitors allowed - only small boats receive landing permits. If you are thinking about a Galapagos tour, it's important to research and consider these restrictions so you can choose a tour operator which meets the needs of your visit.

Visiting Genovesa is a two part adventure. In the morning we walked the low route, in the afternoon we hiked up to the top of the caldera via Prince Phillips Steps. But more on that later.

[michaelhoulden]

Looking Back Day 64 Sea Lions and Frigatebirds

Not the greatest image picture quality wise and I had to perform some significant surgery to get it presentable and show my point for today. I mentioned earlier in my Frigatebird posts that they were circling overhead in the hundreds. This image gives you an idea of the number of birds around the place. You'll probably need to click on the photo to view the larger image and be able to see all the frigatebirds.

Mostly frigatebirds, but there's a heap of boobies flying about there too. Remember, these are large birds, 2.3m wingspans. That's a lot of bird in the air. No crashes and not an air traffic controller to be seen. Ha. 

Oh, and a couple of sea lions just hanging out on the beach. Lucky lions, beach all to themselves. Just have to put up with some tourists. Again, not hard to get images like this. 55mm on the lens, those sea lions are right there in front of us.

That's all. Just wanted to show the airborne chaos of Tower Island.

[michaelhoulden]

Looking Back Day 63 Photographing Magnificent Frigatebirds

People are often sceptical about whether the Galapagos is really all that. Or maybe they just aren't able to comprehend just how unconcerned the wildlife is with our presence. Or that you really can just walk right up to them.

But, yeah. It is all that. And you can just walk right up. You don't need a bazooka lens to photograph the birds and other wildlife. You don't have to hurry. Just take your time. They aren't going anywhere.

What's stopping you from being a fool and messing it all up? Well trained guides who love their islands. The guy in the foreground? He was our guide. He made sure we stayed to the designated walkways, didn't walk in sensitive areas (like turtle nests on beaches), stayed behind the out-of-bounds markers. Even made sure we didn't use flash or reflectors which can disturb the wildlife.

All while doing these things, our guide provided a literally non-stop oration on Galapagos history, wildlife behaviour, traits, markings, characteristics, threats to survival, you name it this guy knew it - human history, physical geography, botany, flora and fauna, land and sea. Absolutely amazing information and he just kept going and going. For 10 days, non-stop information. We didn't need a guide book, or wikipedia, nada.

So, this image is here to show you. Yes. Galapagos is all that. Can you count all the frigatebirds there? 5 or 6 right in front of us. Another 6 in the shrubs to our right and the image doesn't really show it, but on this day there were hundreds of frigatebirds flying about overhead. Mesmerising.

Oh and a nice white lava beach.

Paradise. In fact, our guide would wake us all up each morning over the ship's intercom with a softly spoken "Good morning everybody. Enjoy another day in paradise known as the Galapagos Islands". Truly. 

[michaelhoulden]

Looking Back Day 62 Nesting Magnificent Frigatebirds

The Magnificent Frigatebirds (yes, magnificent is part of the species name, not just an appropriate adjective) are found in abundance amongst the Galapagos Islands. I thoroughly enjoyed observing the behaviour of this wonderful creature.

Not a small bird, by any means, with a wing span on males up to 2.3m. And pretty easy to spot when the males are strutting their stuff during the mating season. Our tour was well timed with mating season and we were fortunate to watch the rituals of the frigatebirds, boobies and waved albatross. More on them later. This post is for the magnificent frigatebrids.

Getting back to their size, they have the largest wingspan to weight ratio of all birds which allows them to stay aloft for long periods of time, weeks even. Curiously, they can't take off from flat ground (jump off a cliff anyone?), can't swim - despite being a member of the pelican family, only lay one egg and have one of the longest parenting sessions of the bird family. Indeed, they nurse their young for nearly a year and as a result, it is unusual for the frigatebird to nest in consecutive years.

Mostly, these birds are hunters, nabbing food from the surface of the water with their beaks - turtles, fish, marine iguanas and the like. Mostly. True to their namesake (frigate), they do a little raiding and harassing of other birds like the boobies. They will chase them and harass them and wear them down until they give up their food.

Fascinating to watch. The boobies diving for food. The frigatebirds soaring about waiting for an opportunity to pick a midair fight and score some chow.

So, I've left the obvious for last, what do you think of that gular pouch on the male? And they fly with that inflated too! Just a mating thing, mind you. Impress the ladies with how big, bright red it is. I included the second image today because whilst the first image is a great behaviour image, pops with his wing around mum and all, his pouch wasn't at full puff. I wanted to show you just how massive it gets. The black spots? Feathers.

I have another image or two of these birds to share when I come across them. One showing off the magnificent iridescence of the back feathers and, I think, there's one later in the trip of a couple frigatebirds having an aerial battle. 

Til tomorrow...

[michaelhoulden]

Looking Back Day 61 Galapagos Sunset

After getting our first experience on land in the magical Galapagos Islands, our cruise circled this massive outcrops. I'd love to tell you the name of this feature, but I don't have that. Sorry.

We circled for quite a while actually, as the frigate birds and boobies were very active, swirling, swooping and diving into the ocean. A magical aerial ballet of birds. 

I was in awe of our guides, calling out the different species of boobies as they dove straight down into the water from 100s of metres in the air. Absolutely fabulous.

There's really no sense of scale in this image. You'll have to believe me that these cliffs were very impressive. 

I stayed on deck for a few minutes longer after dinner was called and our ship had pulled away from the islands. I'm glad I did. This is one of my favourite landscape images from the trip to Galapagos Islands and it was taken on day one. 

Enjoy. 

[michaelhoulden]

Looking Back Day 60 - First Life in Galapagos

I'm back.

Did ya miss me?

If you're reading this in the published book, you won't have noticed a thing. Unless I decide to leave 30 pages blank between this post and the last one.

Sorry folks. I got off track and totally burnt out with all the Cubeecraft I was trying to fold, photograph and blog. Anyway, I fell off the blogging wagon.

I'm back on, but the cubee thing? Not so much. Though I did make one with my nephew a couple weeks ago. Well, I say "with" but…

Back to today's photo. Time to move out to the Galapagos for a couple weeks. I hadn't appreciated how far offshore the Islands were. Way far off shore as it turns out. About 1000 km.

Day one on the Islands and we were right into the local fauna. These little lizards were all over the place. Mostly cooperative. Fun to photograph. Do I remember what species this one is? Nope, not a chance.

Actually, I have to admit I did myself a bit of a disservice on this trip. The trip was a photo trip and as such it was a cruiser filled with photographers focused more on photographing than listening to the awesome guides. Sigh. Well, Jen listened to the guides and I photographed. They really were awesome guides. 

The fauna is really awesome on the Galapagos Islands. Totally unconcerned with out presence. Plentiful like you wouldn't believe. And mostly cooperative from a photography point of view.

Oh, and lots of lava rock. 

The physical geography of the Islands is pretty cool, too. As you go west, there is less and less flora on account of the islands getting younger.

Stay tuned. Lots more coming from where this one came from.

[michaelhoulden]

Looking Back Day 59 Church at Cotacachi

Just in case you thought the colour in Ecuador is limited to the fabrics and art, check out this church. By making the churches bright and colourful, don't you think this makes them an inviting and happy place to go?

Why are all the churches and cathedrals in the first world such grey, dreary and drab places to worship? What's up with that? I'll admit, I'm not a big fan of organised religion and I'm not going to get into that here. But seriously, if the Lord's love is supposed to bring happiness and peace and joy into the lives of the faithful, why are the houses of worship such miserable looking places? 

Anyway, I loved how beautiful the exterior of this church was. How clean and colourful it is. 

Composition is a bit of a failure with the palm tree on the left block the spire, but overall, not a bad image.

[michaelhoulden]

Looking Back Day 58 Cotacachi Statue

Okay, so I might have fibbed yesterday. Clearly I am not quite ready to move on to the images from the Galápagos. Nor am I quite finished with colour.

We stopped in Cotacachi for a break on our way back to Quito from Otavalo. Cotacachi is a leather specialisation town. By the time we arrived here we were full from all the market activity in Otavalo, so we didn't spend too much time in the shops. I did find a couple nice leather jackets, but opted out.

As wandered around and found our way to the town square, I spotted this very colourful statue of Mary(?) and an equally colourful mural behind it.

The colours never stop being amazing in Ecuador, I must say.

I wish I could explain the rebar frame around the statue, but there it is, like some sort of half-baked protective cage.

While I enjoy this image and the composition, I wish I had chosen a wider aperture to reduce the depth of field a little. There's just not enough foreground / background separation here to immediately identify the statue as being separate from the mural. 

Man, that's some serious colour though, eh?