I was trying to think of a clever title, but I couldn’t come up with one so you get the obvious instead. A handful of photos of Dolphins taken from various spots in and near Wellington Harbour over the past few weeks. I’ll start with them quite far away as I stood on the shore and then we’ll get a bit closer, keep scrolling. Taking a photo of a Dolphin leaping out of the water is really hard. So I’m very pleased with how the airborne Dolphin shots came out. If you like a Dolphin, hopefully you’ll enjoy these images.
So, they were out by Moa Point, which is where the Airport is when I saw them first.As I said, near the AirportNo, seriously a lot of DolphinsIt’s like a Dolphin scrum.Now let’s get a move on. This next lot of photos were taken from the side of the Cook Strait ferry, the Interislander.Then there were two.You’d do that too if you could, wouldn’t you?Coming at ya’Going back in.You can practically hear it squeaking, whoooooooo Hooooo!!Surf’s up!
I also photograph our beautiful native birds, there will be a bias towards the Tui, because it’s my favourite New Zealand bird. Enough words, now the birds…
Robin, yes we have our own Robin, a couple of different kinds.Bellbird.Kea.Kereru, or New Zealand Pigeon.Reef Heron, quite rare.Shearwater.Royal Spoonbill and Pied StiltTuiTui leaving.Tui, leaving again.New Zealand Falcon.Tui.Giant Petrel.Takahe.Royal Spoonbill.Kotuku, or White Heron.Kotuku.KotukuKaka
I’m going to try to create at least one blog post a month. I’ve been slack, well only in writing blog posts. I’ve been out and about an awful lot and taking a lot of photos. But have been neglecting this bit.
The big news is that I finally have my dream gear. Anyone who takes photography reasonably seriously will know that the right gear is important, they also like to have a lot of gear. The ability to ‘see’Â a photograph is actually more important, all important. But you need the good gear to be as awesome as possible.
So camera gear is really important to keen Photographers. I actually don’t have much though. My thing as you should know by now is ‘minimum gear, maximum impact’. I still need a tripod. As an observation, the WordPress Blog Website sucks a bit of the awesomeness out of the shots, you really do need to click on each photo to see the best quality.
Back to the gear. My needs/wants were quite specific. I needed the ultimate multi-purpose but best quality lens for the landscape and shooting on the move stuff. I also wanted a good quality telephoto lens for wildlife and sports. Finally I really wanted a Full Frame camera. I now have all three. I should still get a tripod though, I have my eye on one. The details on the Camera and lenses if you are interested are:
Camera – Canon 6D
Telephoto Lens –Â Canon EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6L IS USM
General Purpose lens –Â Canon EF 24-70mm f/4L IS
So…What can one do with the good gear? Let’s have a look.
That’s a Kaka. A New Zealand Parrot. It’s a cool characterful bird less well known than our most famous Parrot, the Kea. But look at the clarity and colour.Saint Gerards Monastery above Oriental Bay in Wellington. I don’t think there are any monks there anymore.The Blue bow of a boat. The boat is a cafe, Wellington has a lot of cafe’s.Looking across the sea to the Kaikoura Ranges in the South Island from Island Bay in Wellington. About 230 kilometres away. You’re supposed to also notice the calm reflective rock pools in the foreground.Derelict Piers at Miramar in Wellington. Mostly used by Seagulls.State Highway One approaching Waiouru at 8:00am on a Sunday Morning. I was just passing through. That’s frost on the ground, not snow.Barn, Wairarapa. Needs work.I don’t think the Railway Escarpment Nature Reserve is out there. I could be wrong. I might have been standing on it.Mt Ruapehu, reflected in a puddle to add a little something to a hard mountain to photograph.That’s a Saddleback foraging, shot in quite dark woodland. fast moving bird, in the dark forest. Looks like daytime.I didn’t really want the pink polar fleece clad local in the shot, but it’s her shed. Boat Sheds at Titahi Bay.That’s what the classic Nor’Wester looks like. Just like that.Handheld shot of Wellington from the Interislander Ferry. Taken in the dark, without a tripod. Tripods are useless on the ferry.You should have seen what happened about 5 minutes before I took this photo. Put it this way, this was almost a news story rather than a photograph.Bridge. That’s all you need.That building on the left is a Cafe, in Nelson. This is Tahunanui.Early in Marlborough. There are 5 Alpaca’s just out of shot to the right. They are cute, they are not locals as a general rule so I excluded them as they made the simple photo require too much description. Alpaca’s would not have enhanced this photo.Wellington waterfront. from the ferry. I like lights on the water.This is a boat called Click in Nelson. With snowy mountains over there.The Royal Spoonbill. You don’t see a lot of those about.This is from the top of my street at night. Well early evening to be precise. Had I mentioned I have moved to Wellington?Finally, I did mention sport, this is my nephew, scoring a goal for his soccer team.
I’m in love with my new camera gear. I still need a tripod though