weekly RyanB's 52 for 2024 Week 39 Exit

Good pic, I wasn't brave enough to go for the true unkempt look myself :LOL:
 
Week 14 Gobshot

Really struggled with any inspiration for this week but today caught a starling gobbing off on my old tv antenna. Making quite the racket too!

Bit of a poor image, I blame the ancient long glass I was testing out and the massive crop/ high ISO. Still I got one in before midnight!! :D
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Yep - nice gobby Sheppy (As we call them back home)
 
I think you were unlucky with the sky, but the Starling itself looks to be ok.

A quick zoom in on my phone and it looks pretty sharp.

You could cheat the sky if you wanted to…

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Thanks! I never seem to be able to master faking skies but usually they involve treelines, this might actually be doable.
It looks ok to me too. It's definitely a gob shot and the white sky makes it almost a silhouette!!
Yep - nice gobby Sheppy (As we call them back home)
Thanks guys!
 
Unkempt: Spot on, great image
Gob shot: I rather like the perspective which makes a good silhouette
 
Thanks! I never seem to be able to master faking skies but usually they involve treelines, this might actually be doable.


Thanks guys!

I have to be honest, I'm not the biggest fan of a complete replacement, I'd rather try and enhance what's already there. But, from my own experience, when there's so little colour in the sky and no features, there's almost nothing to recover.

You could be subtle about it. This is just using your JPEG from here (not ideal as it's a bit jaggedy).


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Unkempt: Spot on, great image
Gob shot: I rather like the perspective which makes a good silhouette
Thanks Helen!
I have to be honest, I'm not the biggest fan of a complete replacement, I'd rather try and enhance what's already there. But, from my own experience, when there's so little colour in the sky and no features, there's almost nothing to recover.

You could be subtle about it. This is just using your JPEG from here (not ideal as it's a bit jaggedy).
I know what you mean about enhancing rather than replacement, it is my preferred method as well(not just because I'm crap at replacement). I have to say what you've done there is pretty convincing, I'm not sure I would be able to identify it as a replacement if I didn't already know what the original was like.
Many thanks for taking the time to undertake the edit, it's most appreciated.
 
Week 15 Snappers Choice

With all the lovely sun and warm weather bar the last 2 days I had to crack out the macro lens. A bit spoiled for choice really but it had to be the Bee Fly in flight.

1. Bee Fly
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2. Mining Bee
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3. Squash Bug
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4. Holly Blue
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5. Wolf Spider
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Fab shots Ryan - love the Bee fly :)
 
Great set, can see why you picked the bee fly. Great detail in the mining bee, I probably won’t show the wolf spider to my wife.
 
Excellent set of images so makes it hard to choose. I think I'm leaning towards #3 for the off centre compostion, dof and great colour
 
A really great set of images Ryan, would struggle to pick a favourite but I can see why you picked the flying one. How on Earth do you use macro on something that's in motion?!
 
Great set, can see why you picked the bee fly. Great detail in the mining bee, I probably won’t show the wolf spider to my wife.
Excellent set of images so makes it hard to choose. I think I'm leaning towards #3 for the off centre compostion, dof and great colour
A really great set of images Ryan, would struggle to pick a favourite but I can see why you picked the flying one. How on Earth do you use macro on something that's in motion?!
Many thanks all!

@nickbee Very quickly... Really I have the best luck and hit rate using manual focus and a high enough shutter speed to freeze the movement(1/1250 still wasn't fast enough to freeze the wings but I wanted to keep my ISO relatively low). With hover flies and Bee flies they tend to flit from areas but then come back to the same ones so I get the focus about right for an area and then wait for it to come back, I then move the camera rather than focus to get it sharp and fire off as many shots as I can before it's off again (usually only 2-3 shots). This was probably one of the closest one's I have ever managed of a Bee Fly so I was quite chuffed.

Here is one of a drone fly (possibly Eristalis pertinax) I caught the day before. No luck with a head on shot sadly.
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Week 16 Empty

A starling egg I found on our path this morning, probably cleared out by the colony our neighbour has living in her eves.
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Sod half empty a real pessimist see glasses like this.
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Promises, promises...
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Good stuff Ryan. It's the eggscellent egg pic for me :)
 
Nice set but the chosen one definitely has the edge. Such a lovely colour too.
 
Good stuff Ryan. It's the eggscellent egg pic for me :)
Nice little trio for the theme. The egg shell is my favourite.
Nice set but the chosen one definitely has the edge. Such a lovely colour too.
Nice blue egg, best of the bunch for me.
Many thanks all, got lucky that egg almost fell in my lap on Wednesday morning when I was feeling less than inspired for the theme.
 
I decided to try out my new (to me) Pancolar 50mm f1.8 on the largest structure in my general area, a building I love to revisit time and time again.

Ely Cathedral, edited to accentuate the structure of the stone work.
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My fave Catherdral - nice!
 
Nice set. Lovely structure with great details. Think I prefer the 2nd shot with the colour and shadows on the window
 
Great shot and nicely symmetrical. Not easy on a building that size. Your processing has enhanced the detail really well.
 
Nice set. Lovely structure with great details. Think I prefer the 2nd shot with the colour and shadows on the window
Thanks Keith, most appreciated! For clear panes it did reflect the skies colours interestingly.
Great shot and nicely symmetrical. Not easy on a building that size. Your processing has enhanced the detail really well.
Thanks Helen, took some searching to find that perspective. Ely cathedral is really wonky due to one side being built on less than solid foundations. It lost one of its transepts in its entirety at one point so is missing an entire North West section. You can really notice its odd lean from inside when shooting towards the front doors.
 
Been shooting a lot of low altitude planes flying over the garden the last week, some getting ready for Duxford air show and others doing training out of Mildenhall/ Lakenheath. Also while sky watching and listening for the tell tale sound of engines seen a lot of really high altitude commercial jets with contrails which I though would be perfect for a minimal straight shot.

Lots of twin trails but saw this quad today and said this is the one...
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