Close-up on Crab Apple Blossoms (Dry Brush Filter)

Thinking back to May, here's a close-up on some crab apple blossoms. Thanks for stopping by!

Crab Apple Blossoms (Dry Brush Filter)

May is one of my favorite times of year, as that's when the crab apple blossoms come out. Now, in the autumn of the year, the crab apples (also pretty to look at) are falling off of the trees. But, my favorite part is the blossoms with their deep pinkish - purplish - reddish colors. Thanks for stopping by!

Golden, Dead Grass in the Early Spring

As I continued looking through my old photos from earlier in the year (actually, I was cleaning out my old SD cards,) this one caught my attention. As I was processing it through Photomatix for HDR (and in some of my other programs to bring back some of the color,) I wondered if perhaps I hadn't already processed this photo (or one like it) before, earlier in the year (March) shortly after it was taken. I'm taking the photos off of the cards (so that I can reuse them.) Eventually, I'll merge these photos together with the ones that I have on my hard drives. If I've shared this photo before, oops! The edits are fresh; it would be funny to compare how these edits turned out in comparison to the ones that I had done before. Thanks for stopping by!

Recollections of a Late Winter / Early Spring Day

As I was looking back through some of my older photos, I found this image from late March. It was a "later winter / early spring" day, as the first day of spring here is usually calculated around March 20. What I especially liked about this particular picture was the sun with its rays in starburst fashion. The colors of the blue sky and the clouds remind me of the stone-washed jeans that used to be in fashion when I was younger. I can't say that I recollect too much about this particular day, other than that I was probably eager for the spring colors to start arriving. Thanks for stopping by!

Rabbit Reprised: Rabbit Near a Dark Tree

It's not often that you can use the words "ominous" and "foreboding" in the same sentence as "bunny," but I think that there is something ominous and foreboding in this bunny picture. The picture, shot in the shadows, presents a dark background behind the bunny which is eating the grass, unaware of what might be lurking in the background. (Actually, there wasn't anything lurking in the background, but, from the darkness of the background of the picture, you might think that something ominous and foreboding was lurking in the background.) Thanks for stopping by!

Rabbit in the Grass (Dry Brush Filter)

Yes, this would have been a much more interesting picture if I had been able to title it, "Rabbit in a Tree," but... it just didn't work out that way. (My daughter still liked this picture...) Thanks for stopping by!

Eastern Phoebe on a Branch (Dry Brush Filter)

The Eastern Phoebe is a pretty little bird that visited our backyard this past summer. It's been a while since we've last seen them; I suppose they'll be around again next summer. Thanks for stopping by!

Female House Finch Looking in the Grass (Dry Brush Filter)

Whenever I see house finches, the males and females are usually together, making it easy to identify them as house finches (because of the red male, which is easy to identify, as opposed to the brown female, which looks like any number of other indistinct brown birds.) I think this is a female house finch, but I could be mistaken.

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American Robin in the Grass (Dry Brush Filter)

This robin is more mature than the one posted a couple of days ago. I love the deep reddish brown color in this bird, together with the yellowness (is that a word???) of its beak. Thanks for stopping by!

Female House Finch Hiding in the Green Grass (Dry Brush Filter)

The way that this picture turned out, the house finch blends right in, and the green grass rather stands out. I guess that's the way that camouflage works. Thanks for stopping by!

Juvenile Robin in the Grass (Dry Brush Filter)

In this picture, from several months ago, a juvenile robin was looking through the grass (probably for worms.) Thanks for stopping by!

Butterfly-palooza Day 21: Julia Reprised (Dry Brush Filter)

I wanted to call this one "the reprisal of the Julia butterfly," but it turns out that "reprise" was a little more of what I was going for. Rather than a vengeant butterfly seeking to exact justice, instead, we have a repeat -- another picture of a Julia butterfly. Thanks for stopping by!

Day 20 of Butterfly-palooza!

To speak technically, I'm not sure exactly how long a "palooza" is supposed to last, or whether - upon paloozing for a while, it eventually turns into something else altogether (maybe a "palotsa"?)

While attempting to identify this butterfly, I found a stock photo with the butterfly in a nearly identical pose. I opened a page to see what it was and found the photo being used for a generic purpose (butterfly stages of life). It looked like that photo had been used a lot, so it probably wasn't going to be very useful to me in figuring out what this butterfly is.

Maybe I should buy a book. (Maybe I should have bought the identification chart from the butterfly house???) Thanks for stopping by!

Day 19 of Butterfly-palooza: Another Julia (Dry Brush Filter)

Here is another photo of a Julia Butterfly on a yellow flower. It's such a pretty butterfly, especially with its green eyes. Thanks for stopping by!

Butterfly-palooza Day 18: Return of the Monarch (Dry Brush Filter)

Ok, so the title here is clearly an homage to Lord of the Rings, however, the picture has nothing to do with the Tolkien series except that this is (at least) the second Monarch Butterfly photo that I've posted in my Butterfly-palooza series. (Notice how I managed to get in both Star Wars and LOTR? Nice, huh?) I'll leave any further parallels beyond that to the poets, who - I'm sure can come up with something. Thanks for stopping by!

Butterfly-palooza Day 17: Zebra Longwing Butterfly (Dry Brush Filter)

I was going to name this post "Black and White Butterfly," when I thought, "Surely, I can do better than that!" So, I googled the image for similar images, only to have every butterfly under the sun pop up in the results. Next, I text searched for "black and white butterfly," only to have the image results laugh back at me: Did I want a black-and-white photograph of a butterfly? Or maybe some black-and-white butterfly coloring pages? However, there in the results was an option for black-and-white butterfly species. Bingo! Well, sort of. I found a similar butterfly to this one in the results, but someone only said that their butterfly was tropical and was located at some butterfly tourist place. Not a lot of help for identification. Finally, I stumbled on to something that called some butterflies "zebra" - and that's where I struck gold. Among the zebra butterflies, I found the Zebra Longwing, which matched the butterfly in my picture. Thanks for stopping by!

Butterfly-palooza Day 16: Return of the Blue Clipper (Dry Brush Filter)

"Return of the Blue Clipper" sounds like something in the Star Wars franchise, and actually, the Blue Clipper did not return so much as I returned to the Blue Clipper. However, "Return of Me Taking Pictures of the Blue Clipper" did not quite have the same ring to it, hence: "Return of the Blue Clipper". Thanks for stopping by!

Day 15 Butterfly-palooza: Black Butterfly with Yellow and Red Stripes (Dry Brush Filter)

Butterfly-palooza continues with this photo of a black butteryfly with red and yellow stripes (I can feel the lepidopterists out there cringing at my description of this butterfly... maybe before I HDR-ed it the colors were a little bit more pink and white...) drinking nectar from an orange flower. Thanks for stopping by!

Black/Blue HDR Butterfly: Butterfly Palooza Day 14 (Dry Brush Filter)

I'm still battling whatever it is that I caught for a cold; yuck! Well, here's a butterfly picture that makes me feel a little better, or, at least, it feels good to get it posted. Thanks for stopping by!

Red Flower, Yellow Butterfly: Butterfly-palooza Day 13 (Dry Brush Filter)

I really wanted this photo to work out. Looking at it in post-processing, there was a lot (a lot!) of noise. I think what had happened was that the butterfly was moving so quickly, I had set my ISO to ISO-200 and had also darkened the exposure setting in order to take a faster picture for a crisper image. That being accomplished, as I tried to brighten the image back up again in post... lots of noise. What I did then for the image below was to crank up the Digital Noise Removal tool from Paintshop, which shaved off some of the fine details, but... what are you going to do? Thanks for stopping by!

Butterfly-palooza Day 12

I've been ill for the past several days, but the butterfly photo show goes on!

Here's a comparison of the slightly less processed version of the photo (first) and the version that was run through Photomatix and Elements (second):

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Butterfly-palooza Day 11 (Dry Brush Filter, on a flower)

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Butterfly-palooza Day 10: Monarch Butterfly

While I was scoping out the butterflies at The Original Butterfly House on Mackinac Island, I happened upon this monarch, chilling on a leaf. Thanks for stopping by!

Butterfly-palooza Day 9 (Dry Brush Filter)

This butterfly was just a little bit blurry, so I ran him through the dry brush filter several times... I think he still might be blurry. Thanks for stopping by!

The Dark Butterfly (Dry Brush Filter)

There was something about this dark butterfly, as I was editing the picture, that reminded me of Batman. Maybe it's the similarity to the Batman insignia. Maybe it's the torn part of its left wing. Maybe it's just the color black. Whatever it was, The Dark Butterfly here reminded me of Batman. Thanks for stopping by!

Pretty Yellow Flowers in the Butterfly House (Dry Brush Filter)

I took a break from taking pictures of the butterflies to take pictures of these flowers. These flowers, quite small, were pretty with their yellow and white petals. I like the near-mirror effect, or the visual similar to a water/mirror with the flower on the top and the flower on the bottom. (I think maybe you call it something like... balance.) Thanks for stopping by!

Butterfly-palooza Day 7

Here's another from my Mackinac Island The Original Butterfly House Butterfly-palooza series. Hopefully my internet issues are resolved by now (this was pre-posted from several days ago). Thanks for stopping by!

Butterfly-palooza Day 6

Here's another photo posted ahead from my internet outage day. Thanks for stopping by!

Butterfly-palooza Day 5

Still having internet issues, so I'm going to upload a few days' worth of photos while I have the chance. Thanks for stopping by!

Butterfly-palooza Day 4

With internet troubles on the homefront, today's post is just a quick post. Thanks for stopping by!