California Sea Otter 24

California Sea Otter 24

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We had a great second day out on the water photographing sea otters. It was very warm and sunny here today. I am pretty particular about the images I am after, and with the clear skies, I am very focused on shooting the otters in the latest most golden light that I can. The sun is going down behind some sand dunes about 20 minutes before sunset, but the light has been turning a nice orange before the otters go into the shade. Here is one of my favorite sea otter photos from today. The whole RAW to DNG conversion before importing the files into Aperture is very time consuming, so hopefully Apple comes out with an update soon. I am very pleased with the quality of the image files that I am getting out of my new Canon 50D. Please visit more of my Sea Otter Photography.

California Sea Lion 2

California Sea Lion 2

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I went down to the Monterey Harbor breakwater again this morning for another sunrise shoot. I tried shooting more of the entire animal rather than the tight portraits that I shot yesterday. Fortunately, I found a sealion that was not sleeping on the rocks with his face the wrong direction. I spent about an hour observing this big male, even though the golden light was only good for about the first 15 minutes.

I am pretty impressed with the Canon 50D so far. The files seem to be more than enough for my needs. I am hand holding most of these images with my 400 f4 DO IS lens, so I think that my non-sharp images have to do with me and the image stabilizer moving around. It is too bad that I can not look at the RAW files yet in Aperture, but I am using the Adobe DNG converter as a work around for importing and viewing them.

California Sea Otter 3

California Sea Otter 3

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This was my first day going out on the water with Elkhorn Slough Safaris. I will be going out for the next 3 days to shoot in the golden late afternoon light. A photographer friend from San Diego drove up and one of my workshop clients has flown in to join me. We had a pretty good first day on the water. This is my favorite image from this afternoon’s shoot. Please visit more of my Sea Otter Photography.

California Sea Lion 6

California Sea Lion 6

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I do not often have access to the internet during my trips, so I thought that it would be kind of fun to post some images from my short adventure down to Monterey this week. The main purpose of my trip is to photograph sea otters at Elkhorn Slough the next few days, but I got up this morning to try and photograph the California sealions that rest on the breakwater at the entrance to the harbor. The sunrise light was pretty nice, but it was hard to find a sealion that was faced the right direction. It is pretty amazing to be able to watch these animals from only a few feet away. The sealions are always growling and barking and each other just like this image.

These are my first images taken with my new Canon 50D. The files look pretty good. I figured out that Aperture does not yet support the new files, though. I did some Google searches and discovered that I need to covert my RAW files into DNG files until Apple comes out with the update for the new camera. Hopefully, that will not be too far in the future.