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Bird photography with a 35mm lens!

I don’t have a telephoto lens, but I’ve always wanted to explore bird photography. Luckily I have a backyard with a bird feeder that gets a lot of traffic…and a tripod. So I set up my Fuji XT-2 with the 35mm lens on a tripod about 2 feet away from the bird feeder. The Fujifilm Android app lets me look through the viewfinder remotely and snap photos (as well as edit settings like ISO and shutter speed) so it worked out great!

Tags: bird, fuji xt-2, fujinon 35mmf/2 WR, photography, wildlife

Lake Gaston, August 2019

A trip with friends to Lake Gaston yielded a beautifully dark and clear sky, despite predictions of bad weather. Once again I used my Fuji Xt-2 and 35mm f/2WR for these photos.

Here’s a 70 minute timelapse of the Milky Way. 298 Exposures, 13 seconds, ISO 12800. Jupiter is the bright object just to the right of the Milky Way.

Here’s a stack of 15 images from the above set, including a meteor.

And here’s another 13 image stack, looking straight up at the Zenith, also including a lucky meteor.

Tags: Astrophotography, fuji xt-2, fujinon 35mmf/2 WR, milky way, time lapse, timelapse

New Year, New Gear

I recently sold my Canon 5dii dslr for a much smaller, lighter, better kit. I went with the Fuji X-t2 with the 18-55mm kit lens, and the Fujinon 35mm f/2WR lens. I couldn’t be happier with this decision. For my needs (quick portraits of my family, hiking lansdcape photography, etc) it’s just ideal. All of the photos below were taken with this new camera.

I went to the York River Star Party near Williamsburg, VA. Tested the new setup and was very happy with the results. The built in intervalometer, crazy good ISO, and so many more features of this camera make log exposures and time lapses a breeze.

18mm, ISO10,000, f/2.8, 13s. Note the Andromeda galaxy top left

We went for a Hike It Baby hike on new years day, so I had a nice opportunity to play with the Fujinon 35mm f/2.8WR lens. Photos taken at the Chesapeake Arboretum

Tags: Astrophotography, flower, fuji xt-2, fujinon 35mmf/2 WR, snake

Icelandic Honeymoon Aurora

For our honeymoon, my wife Leah and I went to Iceland. We spent a few days in Reykjavik, then drove along the south coast to Hof. The photos below were taken at Jökulsárlón, a glacial lagoon. All photos were taken with my Canon 5d and the Canon 16mm-35mm f/2.8L lens.

Here’s a timelapse of 185 frames. 10 seconds each, ISO 2500 f/3.5. Unfortunately my camera struggled with the cold, so there was significant horizontal banding at the start.

I tried taking a panorama and it didn’t work as expected. The aurora move too quick, so I added in the vertical bar.

Tags: 5d mark II, Astrophotography, aurora, iceland, time lapse, timelapse

Dock Sunset – The last one

Our time living on this beautiful property in Norfolk is coming to an end. Last night we braved the bugs to enjoy one of our last sunsets on the dock, and I took a few photos. All of these were taken with my Canon 5dII and Canon 24-70f/2.8L lens. Each one is a 6-shot HDR stack.