ChrisA

New Forest Fantasy

Pardon the pun, but here are some more Topaz Glow effect images.  Most of these are colour infrared images with Topaz Glow used upon them.   Some of the effects are extreme – and others more subtle.  As I start to use the plugin, I note the sliders to adjust a preset are useful, but most importantly I find playing with the blend mode and strength makes a big difference. The

Lower Test - Topaz Glow

Today I had a further look at the Topaz Glow plugin after reading a quick tutorial on the TopazLabs Blog. This time I tried a more radical effect on a shot taken last weekend at the Lower Test HWT reserve.  This one is using the preset – Natural Neon III.  The blend mode I changed from the default to Hard Light. The result The original   This next shot is

Electrify

TopazLabs.com have released a new plugin called Glow.  Being a user of some of their other plugins, especially Denoise & Adjust, I thought I would give it a quick play this evening.   I tried it on a couple wildlife shots without any really pleasing effect, however this shot of trees in winter sunlight produced some nice results. This is the original starting image. The following images are all just straight

Anderwood Colour Infrared

With the beginning of November, and a reasonable day – a stroll around the New Forest’s Anderwood Site is a pleasant walk.  Taking along a converted Digital Infrared Camera added to the fun.  The Cameras filter as mentioned before is a Canon 20D with an Enhanced Colour Infrared Filter (equivalent to 665nm Filter). The trees and foliage provided interesting and varied scenary, with the leaves reflecting some of the light

Garston Wood IR Landscape in Pink

Garston Wood RSPB site is a great place for spring flowers – especially Bluebells and Wild Garlic, and I have take lots of shots there, both as landscapes and closeup / macro shots of the flowers etc.  This spring I also took a converted infrared camera along. The camera has a filter equivalent to 665nm Filter and is often refereed to as an Enhanced Infrared Filter, letting more colour through

Dunnock

On Sunday 26th of January, I took a hopeful visit to Hampshire WWT Blashford Lakes Nature Reserve near Ringwood.  I say hopeful as the weather in the morning was truly appalling.  However the weather did improve in the later afternoon, and had a great time wondering round the reserve. Needless to say, I had my camera with me, with a 300mm F4 lens and 1.4 Converter attached to it.  I

Starling Murmuration (7) - The A Bomb

These are a selection of the Starling Murmuration videos and images that I have been taking recently at Blashford Lakes Nature Reserve, nr Ringwood during December 2013. Images I call this one, the  A-Bomb The Bird…   Videos The first two are highlights of the best video I took over the 2013 murmuration event. In all I had taken over 2.5 hours of footage over various days.     All

Great White Egret

Yesterday I went to Blashford Lakes with my brother on a bright sunny winters day.  It does sort of sum up the trial and tribulations of an amateur bird photographer, as well as the final high.   Went in the first hide – the birds were on the far bank -miles away….went to the what I call the Bittern hide (South Ivy Lake I think it is) – it was

ISO-3200-Adjusted-100%

Up until recently I would never normally shoot shots of wildlife above ISO 400.  Preferring that ISO as a maximum that I would get away with.  On my 50D I would occasionally go to 640 at a push, but found them fairly noisy, so kept 400 as my normal max.  However with some recent posts on the forums and especially some on the Pixalo.com, I decided to try out higher