Getting Back into the Swing

I know I've been away a while; I've been trying to balance things out so I get done what needs doing most, but I've been neglecting all my blogs - and this one most of all. I've also been neglecting my photography, so I'm going to try to stop doing that, mostly because I need good photos for things like Linked-In articles and book covers, but also because I really need to brush up on my art skills.

First things first, though, I'll start with the photographs, and then try for regular sketching. After that, we'll see. Baby steps, right?

Today, I started in the garden. It's autumn in Australia, my favourite time of year, but I was surprised by the sight of one of my rose bushes covered in more flower than I've seen for a couple of years, and decided to start there.

My first few shots were fuzzy, but three yielded this surprising shield (or stink-) bug. I'll be using it as a reference photo for sketching. We'll ignore the fact I'm rusty and was aiming at the roses, okay?

After that, I spotted this bud, all by itself.

That was followed by the discovery of this budding Molongolo grevillea flower - for the first time!

And I decided that the birds visiting my garden needed to get used to seeing me around with a camera. After this afternoon, I have hopes they'll relax enough to let me get closer. First, the magpies came to visit.

And then this rosella came, and surprised me by stopping long enough to visit the seed box, even though I was outside, and then it hopped down to forage in the grass. By far the most relaxed little bird of the afternoon.

Later, this sulphur-crested cockatoo stayed around for a few shots

 ... and the seed.

But the yellow-rumped thornbills were not at all cooperative, so I had to content myself with this lovely array of autumn foliage, instead.

And that's the start of it. Wish me luck.

Daily Photograph - July 2, 2015: Young Scarlet Rosella at Dawn

This morning I had quite a selection of birds, but this is my favourite photograph of the morning.

Daily Photograph - July 1, 2015: Cold Crimson Rosellas

It was officially 0.2 degrees Celsius when I took these shots at 9:45 this morning. These little guys and gals have been coming to the garden for a few weeks now, and they've finally settled down enough to let me within 10 metres. Today, they looked more than a little cold.

CROSS-POST: Sulphur-Crested Cockatoo

Cross-posted from my writer's blog:

The trees in our backyard are very popular with the local birdlife - for which I'm very grateful, although I didn't expect to see these big fellows just outside my backdoor.

And I guess they didn't expect to see me, either.

But this one didn't let the camera clicking interrupt his dinner.

Although, he did keep a good eye on me.

Probably, thinking bad cocky thoughts about paparazzi spoiling lunch.

CROSS-POST: The Australian Galah (Eolophus roseicapillus)

Cross-posted from my writer's blog, these are shots taken in April, our mid-autumn. The leaves hadn't started to turn. Now that it's Spring, they're just starting to shoot again, from bare branches.

Cross-Post:

In addition to the sulphur-crested cockatoos, we had a flock of galahs come to enjoy the fruit on the backyard trees. It makes a change from seeing them grazing on grass seeds.

Of course, not everyone had the hang of landing.

Those trees can be tricky to perch on, don't ya know?

Even when you manage to get set down, there's still the delicate balancing act.

Before the serious business of feeding and grooming can be undertaken.

CROSS-POST: Australian Bird - Crested Pigeon (Ocyphaps lophotes)

From my writer's blog - I should have some more photographs of these soon.

This little guy is about as paranoid as it comes. I'm thinking if I wasn't hanging over a fence to photograph it, it would have been gone. The bird-finder on Birds in Backyards identifies it as a Crested Pigeon.

You can find out more about crested pigeons at the following site:

http://www.birdsinbackyards.net/species/Ocyphaps-lophotes

CROSS-POST: Spur-Wing Plovers (Vanellus miles)

From my writer's blog:

These guys are pretty paranoid and very noisy when disturbed, making a kind of 'kak-kak-kak' sound. As you can see, they're very watchful. These ones don't like having their pictures taken and moved rapidly away from the camera.

You can find out more information about spur-wing plovers at the following sites:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spur-winged_Lapwing
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masked_Lapwing
http://www.mdavid.com.au/birds/maskedlapwings.shtml
http://australianmuseum.net.au/Masked-Lapwing/

Blog Update and Cross-Posting and the new 'Sunday Walk' feature.

So, I notice I've been away from here for quite a time. Between a full-time university degree and a full-time job, something had to slip. Unfortunately, my drawing was one of those things to take the hit. I managed to maintain my photography, and my library of reference photos has steadily grown, but I haven't been so good about putting them up here. I'll make up for that.

As things are a tad busy, right now, with a research essay, a 5-minute speech, a listening test and a vocabulary test due in the next three weeks, I'll start by cross-posting the photographic entries I've maintained on my writer's blog. As things ease off, I'll go back to some of the GIMP usage blog entries I have lined up, and I'll get back into the sketching - probably starting with some bird, spider and insect sketches.

In the meantime, I took a walk yesterday morning, and this time, I took my camera with me. I have a dual-language picture book in mind. The text is written, but I need some specific photographs for illustrations. Some of yesterday's shots will do just fine. Here's a sample of what I saw:

I experimented with auto-focus, but the deal with that is that it doesn't always focus on what you want:

This white-faced heron, had a lovely backdrop. Next, I saw a cattle egret:

But he was soon upstaged by the heron, flying past.

Of course, I followed, and discovered that the problem of photographing in nature is that nature can get in the way... not to mention unforseen bits of litter.

This cormorant was just plain hard to position on screen and was right at the edge of what the close-up could handle.

Further down, Mother Duck wasn't too happy to see me.

And the magpie was too preoccupied with food to give me a better angle.

The spur-wing plovers kept right on flying, complaining all the while.

The dusky moorhen was very camera-shy, and made life extremely difficult. Definitely camera shy. This little guy or gal will feature in a later blog.

I also saw two pairs of Eastern lorikeets, but they were even less cooperative than the moorhens.

I saw another magpie, who didn't mind the camera.

And some peewees, who flew off when they saw it.

And the king parrots... I think... were so uncooperative, that this was the best shot I could get of the six that were flying around in the morning sun.

My quest for sulphur-crested cockatoos was derailed by a passing balloon, looking for someplace to land. I rather hoped it would come down where I could take a few shots of the landing, but it was not to be. Here's my first shot of its descent.

I went home a little disappointed, but took some comfort from the top-knot pigeons that came to visit.

I should also add, that by 'Sunday Walk', I don't mean a walk on Sunday... not all the time. I mean that Sunday is the day I will upload a post of photos taken while on a walk from that week. I hope that's okay.

Australian Birds Cross-Post from Writing Blog: The Aussie Galah (Eolophus roseicapillus)

In addition to the sulphur-crested cockatoos, we had a flock of galahs come to enjoy the fruit on the backyard trees. It makes a change from seeing them grazing on grass seeds.

Of course, not everyone had the hang of landing.

Those trees can be tricky to perch on, don't ya know?

Even when you manage to get set down, there's still the delicate balancing act.

Before the serious business of feeding and grooming can be undertaken.

Australian Birds Cross-Post: Australian White Ibis: Threskiornis molucca

It's amazing what comes wandering up to the back fence. These guys were quite happily foraging for insects until I started taking photographs, and then they became rapidly shy.

Australian Birds: Juvenile Crimson Rosellas (Platycercus elegans)

I went through a couple of months where the main birds that visited my backyard were crimson rosellas. This coincided with the trees fruiting, so I probably shouldn't be surprised. This pair hadn't yet exchanged their green 'baby' plumage for the more colourful red and blue of an adult, and probably wouldn't for another two years. I hope they stick around so I can see that. I had quite a hard time identifying them because of it. As you can see, the green is very handy for camouflaging them against the grass.

The first shot caught them unawares

and caused them a bit of concern, 

but they decided food was more important.

Definitely more important.

They kept eating, but they kept a very good eye on the camera. I stayed just inside my back door, and they tolerated me photographing them.

When they both bobbed down to collect more to eat, they became very hard to see.

They took one more very assessing look, and then they decided they'd had enough and flew away.

They've been back since, I'm glad to say.