Razorbill Last Call in Golden Light

Everyone joins my Deluxe Atlantic Puffins (and so much more) workshops for the Puffins, but the Razorbills are so beautiful and elegant. Often called the Penguins of the North, Razorbills are only found in the Atlantic Ocean.

Razorbill Last Call in Golden Light (Alca torda, Petit Pingouin, RAZO) from my Deluxe Puffins Galore Lighthouse Island Workshop Adventure. Mingan Archipelago National Park Reserve, Quebec, Canada. Image Copyright ©Christopher Dodds. Sony Alpha 1 Mirrorless camera & Sony FE 600mm f/4 G Master OSS Lens with Sony 1.4X teleconverter (@840mm) ISO 1,600, f/5.6 @ 1/4,000s Manual exposure. Full Frame Image.

Common Murre (bridled) calling in flight

The opportunities were endless during the early morning boat cruise below the cliffs of BONAVENTURE ISLAND during my recent GANNETS GALORE and so much more workshop.

I love the white spectacles on this bridled common Murre. The key to success while working at 20,000 ISO is to pay particular attention to two things:

1. Ensure you have exposed the image correctly and pushed the whites all the way to the right of the histogram; correcting a poorly exposed image will always result in much more noise than getting it right in the camera.

2. Try to work full-frame; the more you crop an image, the more you magnify any noise that there may be.

Sea Wolf Howling or Grey Seal Calling

A Grey Seal (AKA Sea Wolf) howled under Bonaventure Island's cliffs in Percé, Quebec, Canada. I am returning to Percé to host my annual Gannets Galore (and so much more) workshop. Super excited to get back to one of my favourite places on Earth! Getting out in the 28-foot Zodiac Hurricane for four hours each morning is an absolute highlight - hearing the seals howl is pure magic to my ears - smile!

Bald Eagle Call of the Wild

Another Alaskan Eagle from my Eagles Galore Workshop in March. The predawn colours in the sky were an amazing pallet of pastels - and the Eagles were singing their morning chorus. What could be better?

Sandhill Crane Predawn Call

Here is another Sandhill Crane from my Better than Bosque workshop last December 7. It was dark, the air was cold, but still and we listened to the chorus of Sandhill Cranes waking for a good long while before they started to fly out. The dark overcast conditions were perfect for low contrast out-of-focus backgrounds. The key when working at high ISOs like 16,000 is to expose the image perfectly and try your best to capture full-frame images that don’t require cropping (or much cropping).

Join me in New Mexico from Dec. 5-9 for my Best of Bosque Workshop Adventure.

☞

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE OR SIGN-UP

Join me in New Mexico from Dec. 5-9 for my Best of Bosque Workshop Adventure. ☞ CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE OR SIGN-UP

Razorbill calling in last light

Razorbills simply fascinate me. Newfoundland hunters called Razorbills “tinkers,” the local pronunciation of “thinkers.” They were given this name because during courtship displays, males hold their bills vertically, appearing to contemplate the heavens.

Bald Eagles fighting over fish

A Bald Eagle reaching for a fish from another Bald Eagle. Fishing over and stealing fish is quite common because the Eagles are quite lazy and would rather steal fish from another Eagle or Osprey. This is from the middle of a 55 frame sequence that I kept from this chase - smile.

Bald Eagle Singing

ki-ki-ki-ki-ki-ki-ker is as close as I can describe the song of the Bald Eagle. Always sends shivers down my spine. and I never tire of it.

The biggest mistake most people make when trying to photograph singing birds is not using a fast enough shutter speed; those mandibles don’t stop moving!

The second biggest mistake is framing the image too tight. Eagles usually move their head while calling; often, but not always, stretching out toward the sky, so be ready to rotate your camera to vertical.

Colostethus panamensis (Panama Poison Dart Frog), Panama Amphibian Rescue & Conservation Project

Panama Poison Dart Frog Male Calling (Colostethus panamensis). Provincia de Colón, Panama. Image Copyright ©Christopher Dodds  www.chrisdoddsphoto.com All Rights Reserved. Canon EOS-1Ds MKIII, Sigma 150mm F2.8 Macro, Wimberley F2 Macro Flash Bracket, Canon 580 EX II Flash with LumiQuest Softbox III Hand-held. ISO 400, F16 @ 1/160s Manual mode. Full Frame.

Photographing so many species of frogs and toads during a recent trip to Panama has been a real eye opener in so many ways. Seeing first hand how many of the amphibians that I photographed are either listed as endangered, or well on their way there, is not only disturbing, it's life changing.
Listed by the IUCN Red List as a species of least concern (2004), the Colostethus panamensis (Panama Poison Dart Frog) has since become a high priority rescue species for The Panama Amphibian Rescue and Conservation Project.
There is a silent killer wiping out the world's frogs that everyone needs to hear about. Amphibian chytrid fungus (Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis) is a lethal fungus spreading across Central America and wiping out entire populations of frogs. The Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis is so deadly that it kills about half of all amphibian species and reduces overall populations by about 80% after it’s arrival in any given place. One third of the known 5,743 amphibian species in the world are at risk of being wiped out! On a world scale, since 1980, 122 species of amphibian species have gone extinct, compared with five bird species and no mammals in the same period. Be sure to click on the Panama Amphibian Rescue & Conservation Project badge below to learn more and see how you can help.