Potteric Car Nature Reserve

This Crow was having a great time throwing leaves up into the air, presumably hunting food among the leaves, and watched by a Robin. Great to see Roe Deer close as most birds/animals were at a distance. Other cameos to give the feel of the area. 

Paxton Pits

The mist cleared at Paxton on Saturday to give some wonderful reflections with the absence of wind. Cormorants, Herons, Coot and Moorhens were all getting on with building nests and setting up territories etc

 

Early Morning Paxton Pits

One of those special moments when you arrive on a scene just as the lighting conditions are perfect - a mist had settled over one of the lakes at Paxton as the sun rose high enough to illuminate the scene and what better subject than a Great Crested Grebe in full display plumage. The Tufted Ducks played their part while flying Mallard and Cormorant added to the scene.

Paxton Stalk Balls and Scarlet Elf Cups

Winter Stalk Balls, Tulostoma brumale, are most commonly found on the coast in sand dunes etc but there is a good population at Paxton Pits on the gravel areas. Along with Pixie Cup lichens and Scarlet Elf Cup fungi they make wonderful macro subjects. As previous post, pairs of images - Raws processed with DxO Pure3Raw and  stacked in Zerene stacker in the computer next to in-camera stacks.

Focus-stacked Mosses, Lichens and Flies

We have traded in our Olympus OM-D EM-1 mark ii for another 2nd hand EM-1 mark iii as it has a few very useful features including dedicated exposure compensation and the ability to do an in-camera stack of 15 rather than 9 images. Here a few in-camera stacks of mosses and lichens in our churchyard and a couple of flies. The last image is stacked in the computer with Zerene stacker from the 15 RAW images processed with DxO PureRaw3; this gives a lot more detail than the in-camera jpeg and is obviously the best method for a quality images but the in-camera stacks are excellent for a quick image