May 31, 2014

Butterflies

Awesome start to the weekend.

Last night I attended a class at Crown Camera. Rob Santry, a butterfly expert and uber talented butterfly photographer (world reknown), taught the class. Boy does he know his stuff.

He told us last night that a new butterfly has been discovered in the United States and it is just a mile or two up the River Trail from us. It is so new it hasn't been named yet! It can only be found on the last two miles of the Sacramento River Trail down river from Keswick dam!

Stalking Butterflies on the trail!
He told us how to photograph butterflies, aperture, speed, knee pads.....yup, knee pads! He also advises elbow pads if you are up in the Trinity Alps or Sierras because of the rock and granite. Then he showed us some wonderful slides of the pictures he has taken. Wow!

We headed out to French Gulch this morning to stalk the little pretties and take our own photos. There were at least 30 people, not counting Crown Camera staff, Frank, Theresa and Dwayne.

Butterfly Photography demands a little groundwork!
Most of the photographers were using a macro lens. I declined a macro as I was there to photograph people. Taking pictures of people taking pictures! That's me.
It started off slow. Lots of butterflies but they just wanted to fly, the weren't much on landing. One of the instructors poured water from the creek on the ground to form a puddle.  Then the butterflies landed, here and there. Nothing to write home about, or for that matter, nothing to write in your blog about.
Frank Tona and Theresa Wood from Crwon Camera

We stalked and hiked and wandered. One of the instructors wandered up the road and came running back....Eureka! A new hatch this morning! We hit the mother lode of butterflies. I saw 13 varieties this morning but a small group of rabid photographers hiked up a trail and found several more varieties including one that is rarely seen, let alone photographed. The rabid shooters got it, those of us not into poison oak, mountain lions and heat stroke missed out....and that's okay!

I even scored a good shot!




Butterfly chat session

Who knew they were such party animals!


Ninja Photographer! She came prepared for anything!


2 comments:

  1. I love love love butterflies! I never outgrew that! I am just a crazy 30 year old lady chasing them through the bushes!

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