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Greetings,
Even though I’m mired in a seemingly never ending list of home projects, I wanted to make time to keep you all up to date on, um, those projects. Ok, I’ll admit it, this newsletter sometimes (only sometimes?) tends to be about home projects more than nature photography.
Actually, this newsletter is going to lead off with photography! Surprise!
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Sitka whales bubble-net feeding
I was recently in Sitka to photograph the annual spectacle that is Humpback whales bubble-net feeding on herring.
Captain Gary put his hydrophone in the water to listen in on what the whales were saying under water. You can gauge when they might rise to feed by their vocalizations. That was eerie and fascinating. But what was really impressive were the sounds made above water. There were the usual blasts from blow holes, but in addition there were loud, long and deep sounds. Sometimes a whale would sound like a freight train.
Seeing large groups of whales rising out of the water and making the sounds they make rivals seeing the auroras for the most amazing thing I’ve witnessed in nature.
See some pictures and read more about the trip on my blog…
If you’re interested in next year’s trip to photograph the whales bubble-net feeding, drop me a line.
And if you want to go in August for whales, otters, seals, puffins, landscapes, and maybe even bears, I still have space available. More information on that here.
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News from the Palouse
I was happy to read that Washington State Parks has yet again delayed their repair of the Steptoe Butte Road. Now it’s slated to begin in March of 2024. We’ll see.
What that means is that if you were planning on visiting the Palouse this spring or summer, you’ll still have access to Steptoe Butte and its astounding views.
Steptoe Butte is an iconic location in the Palouse, but it’s by no means the only location. It’s not even my favorite. Sure, it’s the best location for aerial views (other than from a helicopter), but it always seems the same.
Some of my favorite Palouse images have come from places I found by just driving around. I visit these places year after year and each time they can be different because of crop rotation, or a barn roof collapsing.
But it’s good news that the road to Steptoe is open. I always like going up there and if you’ve never been to the Palouse, you’ll be impressed by the view. And if it’s a breezing morning, you’ll be impressed by how cold it can be for the middle of June!
I still have a few spaces available for my June 19-24 workshop. But we’re coming up to the hotel cutoff. The hotel we stay at in Colfax sells out every night in June, so if you’re even thinking about coming along for the workshop, let me know so I can be sure you have a room to stay in.
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Topaz Photo AI now on sale for $40 off
And since we’re on the subject of photographing whales at high ISO from a moving boat, Topaz Photo AI worked wonders for taming any noise.
When photographing action like the whales, I use the auto ISO feature on my cameras to keep my shutter speeds high enough. That can introduce some noise and Photo AI does a great job of cleaning that up. It can even help if your lens, somehow (I have no idea how*), managed to focus on the water just in front of the whales instead of on the whales, making for a picture that’s almost tack sharp but just not quite. The sharpening aspect of Photo AI can come to the rescue.
Above is a section of an image that was shot at ISO 2500 and 1/1000 second shutter speed at f/5.3. On the left, you can see the noise and slight blur. On the right, the noise is gone and the image is sharp.
Anyway, from now through April 21st, Photo AI is $40. Follow this link to take advantage of that. (And if you do, I get a small commission!)
*Could be that in all the excitement I kept my thumb on the focus button too long.
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Other workshops
 Cliff Zenor and I still have room in our three workshops planned for later this year. Those would be Colorado Fall Color, October 1-6, Bosque del Apache, November 29-December 3, and White Sands National Park, December 5-9. Visit my Workshops site for more information and to sign up.
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Project updates
While in Sitka I did manage to try out one of the new Maven filters I got. Just the polarizer so far. It's a polarizer. And it works. For just this one use, magnetic filters don't really offer an advantage. I still had to screw on the adapter. But this wasn't a landscape photography trip where I'd want to move the filter from one lens to another. I just had one lens with me on this walk in town so I had to screw the adapter on first.
But I am really looking forward to landscape trips where I can just put the adapters on my lenses once and no more screwing around after that!
Our new wood stove is now scheduled to be installed in a little over a week. I’m working on making a hearth pad for it. Hopefully, I’ll get that done in time.
The good news is that it’s still winter here, despite what the calendar says. That means we may actually get some good use out of the stove before summer arrives!
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