Olde Oaks

Old and gnarly, standing tall after over 300 years on this earth. The snow falling softly with the sun rising over the trees.

Landscape photography usually requires good scouting and good timing due to the nature of finding good light. Sometimes luck favors as well and the conditions are beautiful. Like on this instance, where for the photographer the weather was rather miserable, but I believe the end result is rather beautiful.

Amids the pandemic it was refreshing to be outdoors in a peaceful quiet spot and enjoying the beauty of Finnish nature.

Waiting for the rain to stop

After a whole day of rain, it is refreshing to walk in the nearest forest and just enjoy the nature slowly waking up after a long winter season. Finally it is spring.

Photo taken with a 50+ year old macro lens from Pentax ,attached to my favorite walkabout camera ,the Fujifilm Xpro1.

 

 

Winter minimalism

This winter has been, perhaps busier than ever. I have had a few rare opportunities to photograph, with my day work taking so much time and most importantly, energy. Photography has been in part a therapy away from that. But that therapy requires only taking photos, it does not require or indeed always necessitate the sharing of said photos. The little activeness on that part has been on the easy to use platform that is instagram, not on wordpress.

Female Bearded reedling (Viiksitimali) in February.

 

And to counterpart it, the male Bearded Reedling a true Angry bird if there ever was one.

These little birds are very fun to photograph and observe and it was a great pleasure to be able to do it this winter as it requires a bit off a special weather.

 

 

 

Bridges of Midsummer

Kuvailua G5X:n tapaan

Luonnossa liikkumisesta tykkäävänä, ensimmäiset räpsyt G5X:n kanssa tuli minulle luontaisesti otettavaksi ulkosalla. Kevät ja kaiken kattava vihreys luonnollisesti inspiroi etsimään sopivaa metsäistä aluetta ja kaunis keväinen valo loi mukavan tunnelman. Sekään ei haitannut, että lämpötila oli kovinkin kesäinen!

Pokkariksi isokokoinen kenno tarjoaa valovoimaisen optiikan kanssa mahdollisuuden myös syväterävyyden hallintaan. Tausta pehmeneekin nätisti ja yksityiskohdat saa halutessaan irti taustasta.

Kuvanvakaaja pelaa siinä määrin hyvin, että ylläolevan kuvan on voinut ottaa ilman jalustaa. Veden saaminen pehmeäksi vaatii pitkää valotusaikaa, joka taasen yleensä pilaa kaiken terävyyden muualla kuvassa kun käsi tärisee. Kyseinen kuva on otettu 1 sekunnin valotuksella, joka ainakin itselle ilman vakaajaa olisi täysin mahdotonta saada terävänä.

Vastavalon suhteen optiikka pelaa myös erittäin mukavasti, ilman sen suurempia ihmeellisyyksiä. Kuvaa ei ole muuten korjailtu kuin värejä säädetty oman silmän mukaisisiksi. Etsin myös mahdollisti kuvauksen siten, että myös näki mitä yrittää kuvata, takaruudulta kuvatessa tällaisessa tilanteessa useimmiten ei näkisi juuri mitään.

Muutaman illan kävelyjen tuloksena alkoi syntyä kuva kamerasta, jota on ilo kuljettaa mukana ulkona liikkuessa ja joka täyttää peruskäyttötarpeen erittäin hyvin.

Jatkuu…

Water, giver of life

Water is essential to us humans, and indeed to life itself on this blue orb that we call earth.

As spring has come, water is in its moving normal form once more after being all iced up. As a nature lover spring is a wonderful time to be outdoors, as leaves are springing out of trees, birds are singing everywhere and nature itself seems to be reborn after the harsh cold winter time.

 

 

Snakes and Gulls or the nature awakening

With the weather warming up all sorts of critters are moving and seen now.

Finland has only three snake species of which this fellow is the only variety that is poisonous. The Viper is rather shy though and will move away from people given the chance. However sometimes they bite people, usually when they feel they are cornered. Or if you step on them as my mum nearly did with this one. But, she was wearing boots and no harm done. The venom is not really deadly, but given the right circumstances can be so a visit to the hospital would have been needed.

This bird was on the lookout for a mate,and as these things go, he was showcasing how brilliantly beautiful he is and how excellent in flying he is. Not so different from us humans eh?

Some species of gulls live through the year in the coastal areas, others like these migrate for the summer. Also showcasing his flying skills and seemingly enjoying a lovely wind giving lift.

Otters

Found in streams and ponds, otters are playful little critters who are once again more popular after the growth of their population here in Finland. Have seen these in a couple of different streams this winter. Pretty fur meant they were hunted before and thus the population fell too low and was very rare to see one in the wild at times.

Bohemian waxwing

Winter has arrrived here in Helsinki. The first snow has drifted gently down and as the temperature has not risen back to the positive side of the scale some of the snow has actually stayed around.

Bohemian waxwings are a lovely species of birds which can now be seen around in small or big hosts of birds. They eat the berries still in trees.