Lost his dentures ...

Stuff

I finished up this blog post on Monday late afternoon, still sitting in my car working off the inverter. My plan to keep the large fridge/freezer running failed — the inverter was not powerful enough — so we are trying plan B. I plugged in the small stand-alone freezer in the laundry room. If that works, we can make ice and use that ice to keep stuff in the freezer of the unit in the kitchen cold. I should know before I hit the sack tonight.

It was relatively cool on Monday with decent cloud cover for much of the day. It is gonna be a lot hotter today with sun and blue skies; 89 a high for today, 91 tomorrow. But I am betting that the outdoor thermometer reads a lot higher than that 🙂

Please understand that I have been totally blessed with regards to Irma. My prayers and best wishes go out to the many who have been way worse off than me.

Jim and I spent about 2 1/2 hours on Monday cutting up the tree that landed on and (almost) just missed my pool cage. 🙂 What fun. I have back muscles hurting that I did not even know I had. After our second session I enjoyed a 48 length swim. The pool was down to a delightful 82 degrees.

Jim got some great news on his home in Melbourne: no damage, family safe in the house with power and all utilities (except for call phone service).

Best News?

I have signed up oodles of folks for the 2018 UK Puffins and Gannet IPT with the cost-sharing Bempton Cliffs Pre-trip that includes 100% free instruction and for the July/August 2019 Galapagos Photo-Cruise of a Lifetime, the world’s best Galapagos photo trip. By far. If you would like advance info on either trip please shoot me an e-mail.

The Streak

Today marks forty-eight days in a row with a new educational blog post. This one took about 90 minutes to prepare. With all of my upcoming free time (or not …), the plan right now is to break the current record streak of (I think) four hundred eighty something … Good health and good internet connections willing.

Everybody’s Doing It…

Everybody’s buying and selling used gear on the BAA Used Gear Page. Sales recently have been through the roof. Selling your used (or like-new) photo gear through the BAA Blog or via a BAA Online Bulletin is a great idea. We charge only a 5% commission. One of the more popular used gear for sale sites charged a minimum of 20%. Plus assorted fees! Yikes. They recently folded. And eBay fees are now in the 13% range. The minimum item price here is $500 (or less for a $25 fee). If you are interested please e-mail with the words Items for Sale Info Request cut and pasted into the Subject line :). Stuff that is priced fairly–I offer free pricing advice, usually sells in no time flat. In the past few months, we have sold just about everything in sight. Do know that prices on some items like the EOS-1D Mark IV, the old Canon 500mm, the EOS-7D, and the original 400mm IS DO lens have been dropping steadily. Even the prices on the new 600 II and the 200-400 with Internal Extender have been plummeting. You can see all current listings by clicking here or by clicking on the Used Photo Gear tab on the right side of the yellow-orange menu bar at the top of each blog post.

Booking.Com

I could not secure the lodging that I needed for last year’s UK Puffins and Gannets IPT in Dunbar, Scotland, so I went from Hotels.Com to Booking.Com and was pleasantly surprised. I found the rooms that I needed with ease at a hotel that was not even on Hotels.Com, and it was a nice hotel that I had seen in person. And the rates were great. If you’d like to give Booking.Com a shot, click here and you will earn a $25 reward.

Thanks to the many who have already tried and used this great service.

Revamped

I recently updated the IPT page. If you doubt that I am really slowing down, click here to see the meager IPT schedule. Right now there are only two US-based IPTs on the schedule. Best news is I now have two folks registered for the Fort DeSoto IPT so that will run. Do consider joining us if you would like to learn from the best.

Photographers Wanted

If you would like to learn to become a much better bird photographer, consider joining me on either the Fort DeSoto IPT in late September or the San Diego IPT in January, 2018. With four folks signed up, DeSoto will offer practically private instruction. And you can tack on the In-the-Field/Meet-up Workshop Session on the morning of Tuesday September 26, 2017 for free. Scroll down for details. Click here for complete IPT info and the current but abbreviated schedule.

Gear Questions and Advice

Too many folks attending BAA IPTs and dozens of folks whom I see in the field, and on BPN, are–out of ignorance–using the wrong gear especially when it comes to tripods and more especially, tripod heads… Please know that I am always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail.

Please Don’t Forget …

As always–and many folks have been doing a really great job for a long time now–please remember to use the BAA B&H links for your major and minor gear purchases. For best results, use one of our many product-specific links; after clicking on one of those you can continue shopping with all subsequent purchases invisibly tracked to BAA. Your doing so is always greatly appreciated. Please remember: web orders only. And please remember also that if you are shopping for items that we carry in the BAA Online Store (as noted in red at the close of this post below) we would of course appreciate your business.

This image was created on the 2017 Galapagos IPT on our second Darwin Bay landing with the hand held Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM lens (at 100mm) and my favorite funny cactus face photography camera body, the Canon EOS 5D Mark IV. ISO 800. Evaluative metering +1 1/3 stops as framed: 1/250 sec. at f/11 in Manual mode. AWB. LensAlign/FocusTune micro-adjustment: -2 at W. I selected an AF point that was two to the right and one row up from the center AF point/AI Servo/Expand/Shutter button AF as framed. The selected AF point was active at the moment of exposure and was placed just below the cactus’s “eye.” Prickly Pear Cactus pad, Genovesa (Tower Island), Galapagos, Ecuador.

Lost his dentures …

When I saw this prickly pear cactus pad on the ground I could not stop laughing. Even though I was surrounded by Red-footed Booby nests with chicks in low bushes, frigatebird nests with fluffy white chicks at knees level, lots of Swallow-tailed Gulls, and the cutest ever fledgling Nazca Booby with a too cute top-knot, I spent ten minutes photographing this funny cactus face.

Feel free to leave a clever title or caption.

Image Design Question

Would you have cropped this image and/or angled the subject in the frame any differently? Please do leave your suggestions.

If In Doubt …

If in doubt about using the BAA B&H affiliate link correctly, you can always start your search by clicking here. Please note that the tracking is invisible. Web orders only. Please, however, remember to shoot me your receipt via e-mail.

Please Remember to use my Affiliate Links and to Visit the New BAA Online Store 🙂

To show your appreciation for my continuing efforts here, we ask, as always, that you get in the habit of using my B&H affiliate links on the right side of the blog for all of your photo and electronics purchases. Please check the availability of all photographic accessories in the New BIRDS AS ART Online Store, especially the Mongoose M3.6 tripod head, Wimberley lens plates, Delkin flash cards and accessories, and LensCoat stuff.

As always, we sell only what I have used, have tested, and can depend on. We will not sell you junk. We know what you need to make creating great images easy and fun. And please remember that I am always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail.

I would of course appreciate your using our B&H affiliate links for all of your major gear, video, and electronic purchases. For the photographic stuff mentioned in the paragraph above, and for everything else in the new store, we, meaning BAA, would of course greatly appreciate your business. Here is a huge thank you to the many who have been using our links on a regular basis and those who will be visiting the New BIRDS AS ART Online Store as well.

Amazon.com

Those who prefer to support BAA by shopping with Amazon may use the logo link above.

Amazon Canada

Many kind folks from north of the border, eh, have e-mailed stating that they would love to help us out by using one of our affiliate links but that living in Canada and doing so presents numerous problems. Now, they can help us out by using our Amazon Canada affiliate link by starting their searches by clicking here.

Facebook

Be sure to like and follow BAA on Facebook by clicking on the logo link upper right. Tanks a stack.

Typos

In all blog posts and Bulletins, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors. Just be right :).