Top ten not bird images from 2019

Birds are not the be all and end all, and I continue to enjoy taking photographs of landscapes and other scenery wherever I end up. Landscape photographers are true artists. Unlike birds you do not just bowl up and try your luck, there appears to a tremendous amount of planning involved, as well as immense amounts of skill to blend all the elements together. It is all about the light, the first rays of the sun lighting up a landscape of rugged beauty. Getting into position can take hours, often in the dark, and as for knowing what to do when you get there.....I cannot hope to get anywhere near that level of proficiency. But I do go to some amazing places, and some of these are so photogenic that you can take something that looks great with just your telephone. 

Monument Valley in the American south-west. The USA is overflowing with unsurpassed landscapes like this. The weather was somewhat against Henry and I, and this shot was taken shortly after a snow storm had passed through and temperatures low enough to make us seriously and sanity-questioningly uncomfortable. The light that morning was very peculiar indeed, with the fresh snow combined with orange rocks creating a living sepia effect. We may not have come away with any coffee table stunners, but we will remember this trip for a very long time!

Photos cannot do Antelope Canyon justice, although there are legion attempts far better than this as any google search will show you. Henry and I visited in February and the place was rammed even with a blizzard going on. Most photos show grains of sand falling pleasingly across a sunbeam. I've chosen to go with flakes of snow.

I can't even really remember where this was other than to say it was somewhere between Las Vegas and Zion National Park just before sunset. What we didn't yet know was that the polar vortex would deliver some of the most violent weather either of us had ever seen, which turned the ochre landscapes of Arizona and Utah white. This photos was of one of the preludes to this band of weather, which gave an ethereal quality to the light as the sun went down.

 

Singapore's Gardens by the Bay, taken from the eastern side during the blue hour. The weather was once again playing tricks, but I successfully dodged the thunder storms that turned the sky black over to the north east. Singapore is a spectacular city, and I really want to go back.

I took this on a walking tour of the city with a colleague, not sure what I balanced the camera on as I didn't have a tripod, but it has come out rather nicely for all that.

This is phone photo, taken whilst driving along the road to Mauna Loa on Hawaii. Shortly after this I heard but could not see my first Omao, the Hawaiian Thrush. Just look at the landscape though, This is not a skilled image, but this transports me back to a red Camaro convertible in glorious weather in a magical place.

Black Sand on Punalu'u Beach, Hawaii. This is actually a colour photograph, I didn't have to tinker with it at all. Birding was my primary purpose of course, but a bit of tourism never goes amiss. Hawaii is a wonderful place, just a bit far away.

The Pacific Ocean, facing west from Hawaii. Over to the right is Maui, but straight out  from Hapuna Beach there is nothing for six thousand miles until you hit Hainan Island near Vietnam. Watching the sun set over the ocean is one of life's great pleasures, were that I lived somewhere where this could be a regular event but alas I am tied to London. 

The only photo from Wanstead in 2019, the incomparable Flats early in the morning. I rarely take my camera out there, so I suspect that this must have been on my phone. The more photos I see from phones the more I wonder why people bother carting massive cameras around the place. Soon I will be too old to carry an enormous camera anyway....

Boston's historic north end early in the morning - I couldn't sleep and got up before the city awoke to a lovely morning. I only had a day, but I ran around like a mad thing and had a thoroughly wonderful time.  On a more serious note, this trip was an absurd indulence and I in all good conscience I should not have gone on it. Fun as it was, it is not on the menu for 2020.

Top ten bird images from 2019

I didn't take as many photos this year as previous years, it appears that I am swinging back to being a birder. That said I have never been just a bird photographer, or at least that is not how I see myself. I am birder who takes photos, and I am equally happy doing that as I am just birding. Sometimes I concentrate on taking pictures, and sometimes I concentrate on seeing how many birds I can see. This year I have simply done more of the latter on my trips away, and less of the former. This makes it a lot easier to filter my output down to just ten, and in fact when I first started typing this post I worried that I might not get there at all!

Oriental Magpie-Robin from the Singapore Botanic Gardens in March. I did not take many good photos in Singapore, it was simply too hot and I was knackered. I fell back to yet another of my hobbies, and instead spent the weekend with my head buried in tropical plants, marveling at the extraordinary verdancy of the island. Of the decent photos I did take, I really like this pose. I was on a raised walkway above a pond, and this bird was with its mate seemingly investigating nesting holes in some dead stumps. I predicted it would land on the top of one of these which it almost immediately did. 

This Olive-backed Sunbird was also in the Singapore Botanic Garden early one morning. I spent over an hour amongst these plantings as a small number of birds came and went, and even though they are lightning fast I managed to get a few shots, of which this is the most pleasing for being, at least in my mind, quite artistic because I've stayed back to try and get the whole flower in the frame.

This Cyprus Wheatear was taken on one of several productive early morning birding sessions on Cyprus over Easter. I was on a family holiday but snuck out every morning for a couple of hours as the sun rose before returning for breakfast and a day of sloth. Of course this wasn't a birding holiday at all, but ironically enough it was by far the most productive for bird photography of the whole year. I suppose this is because I was returning to a location that I have been to several times before and knew exactly what I wanted.

Spectacled Warbler. This is another image from Cyprus taken on Cape Greco in the lovely light about one hour after dawn. The cape was about ten minutes from our hotel and I visited nearly every morning. Spectacled Warblers are extremely common, and whilst normally quite skulky I found a bird that had claimed a bush with a perfect singing perch.

Ruppell's Warbler. Yet another from Cape Greco, and a bird I was seriously pleased to find. It was the only one I saw on the trip, mid-April is quite late for them. It was feeding in a series of low bushes, and would spend a nano-second perched on top of each before diving into it. I missed the bird each and every time on the first few bushes so raced ahead a few bushes and crossed my fingers that the same thing would happen again. It did!

Scissor-tailed Flycatcher, Texas. Pure luck this one, the bird was perched on a wire fence and I happened to press the shutter at the precise moment that it flew up. Lucky me. It's not the greatest photo ever, almost every element of it could be better, but it's a bit different and if you squint it looks ok. And look, it's a Scissor-tailed Flycatcher, so pretty much any photo of it would be a thing of beauty.

Bulgaria is carpeted in Black-headed Buntings, singing from what seems like every bush. I took very few decent photos in Bulgaria this year, the trip in 2018 was a lot better.  It was longer, and the weather was better, and I was just more in tune. Sometime it is like that, and I fail to click. Other times it seems to go well almost from the outset. I've said it before and no doubt I'll say it again, but there seems to be correlation between how much bird photography do and how well it goes. And also whether I improve or not. Right now I am on a plateau and beginning to slip backwards. At least I recognise that though! I do already have a trip booked to Bulgaria for 2020, so let's see how that goes.

Red-backed Shrike, Bulgaria. One of the most common and easily seen birds in the country thanks to a thriving insect population. I remembered them as being easier to take photos of that they in fact are, and opportunities were quite limited. Because I couldn't get especially close I aimed to get a whole plant in, a bit like the Sunbird from Singapore. This is a tactic I should try and employ more. It doesn't have the wow factor of every last feather detail, but it actually takes a bit more thought to achieve.

This is the only photo in this year's selection that was taken in a hide. I don't like hides! However it did provide excellent opportunities to photography song birds at very short range. On the morning I was there Tree Sparrows were amongst the very few species that came into feed and bathe, and I like this over the shoulder pose along with the nice perch, even though it just screams "hide".  

I am still going through the many wader photos that I took in Florida in November of this year. So far I like this one, a Piping Plover, at exactly eye level which meant that I got very muddy and also hurt my neck trying to peer through the view-finder at such a low angle. I like to think it was worth it, and at some point in the next few weeks I hope to go through all the photos I took and put together a few galleries.

Top ten not bird images from 2018

I am still finding that it is not always about birds. I take a camera almost everywhere I go, despite the weight and effort, and the fact that my phone actually does a pretty decent job for internet-only images. I like the variety, and the skills required are very different. Harder! I consider myself far better at taking photographs of birds, but that is not to say that there is no satisfaction to be had from a nice landscape photo, or a candid street shot. Again, these may not be the best ten photos I've taken this year, nor do I think they're as good as those I took i 2017, but they're the ones that tell the story of the year, and remind me what a lovely time I have had. I am very lucky, long may that continue.

I took this photo in Barbados in April, and the small dot right in the middle is my youngest daughter. It was a magical few days – like me she is a natural aficionado of the Caribbean, instantly attuning to the slow rhythm and relaxed vibe of this part of the world. I gain so much from travel, and I want my kids to understand that the world is an incredible place that extends far beyond their regular boundaries. As such I try and take each of them away for some one-on-one time in a stunning location as often as time and funds allow. We based our short holiday around the beach at Payne’s Bay, and Charlotte spent many happy hours playing with some local kids who were also enjoying the golden sand and warm water.

 Mrs L and I had a mere 24 hours in Tokyo, part of a complicated return journey from Malaysia. Despite the short stay we packed in an incredible amount. In pure landscape terms I think my favourite one is this one of Mount Fuji, taken from our room at the Park Hyatt hotel just before we went for a swim to recover from a frenetic day, an incredible Japanese meal, and then post-dinner drinks and jazz on the very top floor.

This next photo is also from Tokyo. I took a number of photos on the day, and subsequently decided that they worked a lot better in black and white. I have a number of favourites, but this one of the roofs and signs along one of the traditional shopping streets near the Sensoji Shrine is the one that to me brings back the memories of a great day out.

This year marked 20 years since I graduated from university. Makes me feel old. To celebrate and commiserate some of my best friends from back then spent a few days in the ski resort of Zermatt in Switzerland. It was high summer, and each day was spent hiking in totally magnificent scenery. I saw my first Lammergeier, a punch the air moment, but everything was dominated by *the* mountain. The Matterhorn. Epic in scale and grandeur. If ever you want to feel small, this is somewhere you could go.

In October I surprised my Mum on her 70^th birthday in Venice (it is not just my generation that travels in my extended family). Her reaction when I appeared was to burst into tears, but after that initial shock we had a lovely day walking around this most photogenic of cities. I finished the day on the bridge at Academica trying to take a photo of one of Venice’s most famous views. I had none of gear but a not much of an idea, but a bit of trial and error later and I managed this in the blue hour.

Taken from my hotel on Funchal, the capital of Madeira, I find the sky mesmerising. This Atlantic jewel of an island is a favourite destination for a bit of winter sun and a profusion of sub-tropical plants. You can see an Araucaria in this photo, a tree I simply adore for its structure and form, but it is the sky I keep coming back to.

 

This is the Ghubrah bowl in Oman, a vast plain fully encircled by the Al Hajar mountains. Remote viillages dot the edges and it is reached through a narrow canyon on the northern side. The intent was to take photographs of birds but it took so long getting there that  the day had almost run out when we arrived. We took a few hasty photos of the empty solitude of it and then retraced our steps back to the coast.

I travel a lot, but I also spend a lot of time out on Wanstead Flats. It is one of my favourite places in the world. There are many things wrong with how it is managed and how it is used, but at the end of the day it remains a special place. Although the land owner decimated a lot of breeding habitat, and then a large grass fire finished the job, it still has the capacity to enchant and to have it on my doorstep is a huge bonus.

I took this looking towards Mam Tor in the Peak District. I was on a raptor-shooting trip to the Peak district, sorry I meant a family walking holiday in the Peak District, and this is one of my children being awed by the landscape. 

A late addition to my selection this year, this was taken only a few days ago at Glencoe. The steep hill behind this cottage is the famous Buachaille Etive Mor, one of the standout munros in Scotland. I was there for a two day photographic adventure with my son, and whilst the weather was very much against us nearly all the time, we still had a fun time, including wading out into the rivers to try and get images of rapids with the mountain in the background. This cottage just along the road to the foot of the ski centre I think shows the moody nature of the glen.

Top ten bird images from 2018

I managed to whittle a long list of 36 down to just ten, and of course now I am anxious that I have not picked the best ten. As if I don't have important things to worry about... On the plus side I have kept more images this year than last, 390 vs 320, so that is a move in the right direction. If you recall this time last year I bemoaned the fact that I had taken fewer decent photos than the previous year. The year prior to that I did exactly the same! Pleasingly I have somehow in 2018 managed to stop the rot, though I am not sure how as I felt I was far less productive. From the top ten there are four from Bulgaria and Romania, three from Costa Rica, and one each from Oman, Florida and Wanstead, which pretty neatly describes my photographic year. Let's start close to home.

I undertook almost no photography in Wanstead this year. In fact that probably goes for the whole of the UK. To those that consistently manage to take decent bird photographs in this country, hats off to you. Living in London does not help, but I have driven enough miles now only to arrive at scenes from hell that you won’t find me contributing to any UK weekly roundups. I want no part of it, bird photography in the south-east of England is a sadly lost cause to me. Maybe if I lived in Scotland things would be different, but here there are simply too many people with cameras converging on the same places and the same birds. I photograph birds for pleasure, not to get into a bun fight or to become embroiled in an internet flame war. This is why the remaining nine of these ten images were taken abroad where peace, quiet and solitude are all still achievable. This Stonechat is the rare exception, and I am still intensely grateful to the local birder who saw me attempting to close the distance and didn’t come over to see what was going on or have a chat. For me it is a facing-away head turn that makes this image, it is one of my favourite poses of all.

This White-collared Manakin was a complete grab shot whilst heading across La Selva OTS in Costa Rica to bird one of their forest trails. Somehow I fluked both the backlighting and the exposure, and it  turned out to be one of my most pleasing images from the trip for its simplicity. It looks like a complete set-up, a nice branch, a dark background, directional lighting etc, but it is nothing of the kind. At the time I was just pleased to have seen it as Bob had seen one earlier!

I don’t think I really knew why Lesser Violetear was so named. Then I took this. Like the photo above there are more than a few elements of fluke about it, sometimes notable images can be just that, but I was delighted as I did not even know this was a thing. Amazing, and on such a tiny bird too. The sharpness of this image also shows what the equipment is capable of resolving – you ask yourself why ALL your images don’t exhibit this level of detail! I knew even nine months ago that this image was going to feature in my year end review.

Costa Rica was a birding trip. I took my camera but did not expect to create the sort of situations that I know contribute to decent photos. Although the birding was full-on there were brief opportunities for photography, most often after lunch when the birding would have been slower. Of course I was slower too, and the light was pretty dreadful, but nonetheless I found some decent situations around the feeders that were generally a feature of all the places we stayed. Most of the time the perches were sub-optimal, but by concentrating on some of the nearby plants you could get a more natural looking image. Of these, this Talamanca Hummingbird stands out.

Mick and I split up and headed across the Omani desert scrub in search of birds. The sun had just risen over Al Hadd and the light was stunning. As ever the question was whether we could find subjects in the short time available in order to make the most of it. Mick did, and discovered that this Desert Wheatear was so photogenic that he had to drive up the road and get me so that I could enjoy it too. Even though I have tons of images of this species I simply cannot resist them. It perched on a rusty bit of dead machinery, the window of an abandoned car, and then this pleasing twig, but never stayed still for long preferring to be on the ground feeding.

The plains of Balgarevo are founded on a rich red soil. This supports many grasses and flowers, so for the most part the available backgrounds are green. However the steppe here is criss-crossed by tracks, and if you can somehow get in a position where you are looking straight down one of these you can ensure the background to your photo captures that deep ochre. Whilst photographing a Tawny Pipit on the ground I sensed the opportunity and shifted myself and my camera a few feet to my right so as to be able to look straight down a tyre rut. Luckily the bird remained there. I have the same photo in green, but much prefer this one.

I had a Collared Pratincole image in my mind before I travelled. If I am honest this is not quite it but I worked very hard for this and came away pleased. I would like the background to be more blown, and the bird to be sharper, but overall I can't complain too much. On the day my fieldcraft was lousy and the birds were not very cooperative. And the mosquitoes were unbelievable! 

Like the last two images this was also taken on my trip to Romania and Bulgaria with Mick, and was shot from the car window opposite a Syrian Woodpecker nest hole we had been given information on. The tree was on one side of a driveway, and the grey background is the wall of the house. We positioned the car on the other side of the road and staked it out. Sure enough the bird came in, albeit that it was very very nervous, eventually coming to the hole with a huge grub. It had been described to us as an abandoned house, so we were very surprised when shortly afterwards somebody rolled up and reversed their car into the drive! The bird scarpered, and so that one brief moment with the grub turned out to be the only one. Looking at the images on the back of the camera we knew we had done well!

Back in 2012 I spent four days on a whirlwind tour of eastern Bulgaria with a few friends. It was not a photography trip and whilst I managed a few record shots time was not on my side. For this repeat visit six years later photography was the sole reason for travelling. Sites previously visited were earmarked for more time, and one of those was Lake Durankulak which is just south of the Romanian border. This is a well-known site for Paddyfield Warbler and so on the first available morning we went there for first light. It was golden, absolutely perfect, but also blowing a stiff breeze. This caused the monopod-mounted lens – particularly the large hood - to act like a sail and swing wildly back and forth on the single point of pivot. Add to that the reeds going in all directions, and the general reluctance of the birds to ascend and sing in these conditions, as well as all the usual problems of trying to get close enough to a small bird and you can see why I have included this in my top ten!

 I had wasted the morning light on day one of my recent Florida trip, and was not expecting a midday grab shot of this Tricoloured Heron to have any promise whatsoever. However when tightly cropped to get rid of distracting elements it’s actually rather nice. A feature of almost all the birds in Florida is that they are incredibly tame and with today’s megapixels even the very centre of a frame can generate an image that is easily good enough for the web.

Top ten not bird images from 2017

So here are my final ten images from 2017, none of them featuring birds! I tried to combine the two but it was an impossible task  - the styles are very different and I like the process that goes into both. Birds will always be my first love, that feeling of satisfaction from getting a clean and sharp image of a bird with just the right amount of head angle, just the right light and so on, is very hard to beat. It happens so infrequently that when you do get it right you feel like jumping for joy, but landscapes and portraits (which I find very difficult) require a different mindset and different technique and can be equally rewarding. Most of these are taken at the very beginning or very end of the day. As ever it is all about the light.

I took this from the observatory in Greenwich Park at the very start of the year on a bitterly cold and clear evening. Henry and I were experimenting with filters and exposures, and this is a 54 second exposure at f8 with a 1000x neutral density filter on the lens. This is just the central portion of the lens, at 35mm on a full-frame body. I like it so much that I use it as my desktop background across both of my monitors - I've sized it to precisely the required resolution of 3840 x 1200.

A magical January morning on Wanstead Flats, this is full frame at 16mm just after dawn. I am hoping to take many more like this in 2018 as no two mornings are ever the same. This, for me, is why photography means painting with light.

We went to Hong Kong and Vietnam en famille in February to celebrate my Dad's 70th birthday. He sadly didn't make it out there as he had a serious accident, but we all went anyway and toasted him in his absence during a fantastic meal overlooking the harbour. This photo was taken during the central part of the trip in Hoi An, Vietnam. This is a vibrant town whose specialty is silk lanterns and tailoring, and this is my favourite representation of the the place. 

Mount Haleakala at sunset, a memorable experience on the highest point of Maui, way above the clouds. Photographs can in no way do this justice of course, but by looking at this one I can transport myself back and be entranced all over again. I realise that I am very lucky, but work hard play hard. 

Despite all the places I've been to this year, half of my favourite shots are actually from close to home and this is another from Wanstead Flats. This is from a chilly morning in January and has a bit of human interest, a couple of people out on a morning stroll. You can see their breath in the cold air!

This image was taken the day after the one above - I was eager for more! Cold and crisp conditions make for interesting photography, and I always find it amazing how it is possible to create so many different pleasing images in a short space of time when the environment is with you.

Another morning of spectacular light on Wanstead Flats but at the opposite end of the year. I took all sorts of photos over the course of a couple of days, and this zoomed-in view of sunlight shining through the autumn leaves is the one I liked best. You can see the full series here.

In October I took my eldest daughter Kate on a horse-riding holiday. Normally none of the kids like having their photograph taken and make stupid faces or turn away. However the horses won the day here and just before dinner I was allowed to take a few as she wandered around the paddocks saying good night to them.

Ah Bologna! I have wanted to go here for ages, and particularly to climb the Asinelli Tower which affords an amazing view of the city from close to 100m above. The stairs were endless but me and my dodgy knees and ankles made it up and this is one of the results - 16mm full frame straight down! Henry and I had a great half hour up here mucking around and followed the descent with an epic lunch at the Osteria dell'Orsa. Try the ragu!

Top ten bird images from 2017

This time last year I was bemoaning the fact I had taken fewer decent photos than in 2015. I'm afraid to say that the same thing has happened again, and I don't think that it is because I am becoming more selective. Still, it was hard to pick just ten, there are so many that I like very much. Most of them have likely been featured on this blog before so they may not be a surprise, and they may not also be the "best" objectively. But they're the ones I've enjoyed planning and taking most. I've also got a top 10 non-birds planned, as I took a surprising number of non-avian subjects in 2017.

Cyprus Wheatear, April 2017. I did a trip with one of my daughters purely for relaxational purposes but managed to find time to visit some Cyprus Pied Wheatears whilst Kate ran off and played on the rocks - quality parenting. Talking of rocks, I used my favoured rock technique, where I first of all spend some time watching where the birds like to perch, and then placing an attractive rock on top of the perch. Nine times out of ten the bird perches on the rock atop the perch, and the scene is set.

This isn't the greatest photo I've ever taken, but I was particularly pleased to get a 'nothing' background on this Black-headed Wagtail in Greece. In my opinion this is the best flavour of flava, so to speak.

From the same location (i.e. within a few metres!) as the Wagtail shot above, this was taken out of the car window during a hugely enjoyable session around Lake Kerkini in Greece. This particular Whinchat was crushingly beautiful, and the head turn here which just shows a bit of that peachy orange breast is essentially, in my eyes, perfect.

Another score for Lake Kerkini, I lined up and framed this lone high reed in the hope that the Great Reed Warbler would ascend and sing from the very top. It did. I left happy.

Arctic Tern sex. Another car shot, they do sometimes make the best hides. I slept beside the Tern colony in the hope of getting photos like this in the early morning. Luckily the happy couple obliged. This is one of a long series of similar images but I think it is the one that I prefer.

I've probably said all there is to say about this already - a photo created out of pure luck and little else. This is the fourth in a sequence of five all taken in a split second alongside a tiny ditch in Iceland that was positively teeming with Red-necked Phalaropes. So many in fact that it was hard to isolate a single bird and I was concentrating on that rather then attempting this specific shot. I couldn't believe it when I looked at the camera. Well worth getting rather wet for as I basically had to lie in the same ditch to get to the right level.

This "periscope" image is also from Iceland and one that I had preconceived in my head. On my previous visits I never had the light that I wanted for this shot - this is always somewhat of a lottery in Iceland.

This was a simply stunning bird and whilst this image is not as I would wish it to be (no camera when we found it!) I've included it here because it was just one of those great patch moments.

I've got closer photos and I've got better photos, but this is a top ten of images that mean something and I was delighted to get this on day two of my recent South Africa trip. The bird is sharp and in typical habitat - I'm just going with it.

I've got full frames of the entire bird with the tail and everything, but I most liked this one for the framing and the inquisitive expression that the placement of the flowers seems to put on the bird's face.