Lucha Libre

Last week, my good friend John came to me with an idea and was looking for my help. So after I listened to his idea, I jumped at the idea to do something fun.

The idea was he was going to dress up for Halloween for his job, and he got a few others to join in. The goal was to dress up as Mexican Wrestlers, or otherwise known as "Lucha Libre", and he was going as the defending world champion, and will be defending his belt against a young gun. They even have an MC to announce the match which is to take place in downtown Clearwater Halloween morning.

So I went to work In Adobe Photoshop, and designed the official "Fight Poster" that will be posted all around downtown Clearwater, and should be a big hit around town, since nobody has any idea what the heck it all means!

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Click Here To View The Lucha Libre Poster

Changing Of The Guard

When we used to live up north on the Great Lakes in Cleveland, Ohio, we used to have a fairly nice backyard, and we designed it to be bird and animal friendly. Among our daily visitors was Deer, Ducks, Cardinals, Blue Jays, Wrens, Finches, Woodpeckers, Nuthatches, Sparrows, Squirrels, Raccoons, Possum, Skunks, Butterflies, Humingbirds and many others.

We were sad to leave our little friends, but little did we know when we moved into our home in Florida, we would be right in the middle of a territory patrolled by two large birds of prey. To be honest, we never thought in our wildest dreams we would be visited by these large and majestic birds, and during the daylight hours, a family of Red Shouldered Hawks are on the prowl and we see them almost daily. When night falls, the second shift takes over, and a family of Barred Owls pays a visit, although we don't see them every night, we often hear them.

It is such an amazing sight to witness these large birds of prey so close, and they seem to not mind when I snap a few photos of them, sometimes within a few feet of them on the pole in our backyard. So very cool.

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Change Of Plans

Now that October is here, it is the time of year when the American Bald Eagles start to nest. I headed back to the Country Club Golf Course in Seminole, for the mated pair that have been there for the past several years has returned, and has begun to fix-up their nest.

I spent a couple of hours on the course looking for the Eagles, but they were no where to be found, although there are signs of their presence, since nesting material was scatted down below their nest. So, since I wasn't going to get lucky today, I turned my attention to some of the other wildlife around the 18th hole at a pond that was teeming with birds. I was able to get some Mallard Ducks, American Coots, Anhingas, Cormorants, Mockingbirds, and my favorite, a Belted Kingfisher.

Later in the evening, we went to Honeymoon Island to walk the trails, and we found the elusive male Great Horned Owl, as well a real surprise, an rare and endangered Peregrine Falcon back on the Osprey Trail. We stayed well after dark to watch and listen as Daddy Great Horned Owl woke up, and hooted well into the night.

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Why Did The Chicken Cross The Road?

It's been a while since we took a walk up the street to see if we could find anything around the several ponds, so just before sunset, we headed out the door to see what we could find.

As we were walking across the parking lot in front of Hollywood Video, out from the bushes pops two Roosters and a Hen, and ran across the parking lot into the woods. Gotta say, that was totally unexpected and funny all at the same time.

We made our way to the ponds, and just as we got there, the Wood Stork we see every so often took flight, and flew to the snags across the street beside the bank. I snapped several shots of him as he sat in the warm glow of the sunset, as well as a couple of Black Vultures that flew back for the night.

(Click on the thumbnails for a larger photo)

Happy B-Day

Early in the morning I saw a Sky Writer buzzing around and apparently someone had a birthday today in Clearwater. Not sure who Pat is, but this was a creative and unique (and probably expensive) way to send someone a Happy Birthday message to say the least.

The Power Of RAW

I have taught numerous on location workshops, but this one was my favorite. I met up with Jerry from right here in Tampa Bay, and we started at the crack of dawn in downtown St. Petersburg for an exiting day of shooting. Jerry had just one request: To take his photography to the next level with some very unique and creative ways to make his photos stand above the crowd.

We spent the entire morning walking around St. Petersburg shooting some very interesting and unique subjects that we found, and after several hundred shots, we made our way of to The Hurricane Restaurant in Pass-A-Grille for lunch, and to really begin to work on his photography skills, but not behind the camera, but using the power of Adobe Camera RAW and Adobe Photoshop.

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Learn More About Our On Location Workshop In Tampa Bay
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After a couple of hours, I quickly showed Jerry how to take an ordinary image and turn it into something totally unique, and even how to take a shot that most people would toss in the trash and work that image into a piece of art. Jerry was totally amazed at how simple it is to process his images, and said it best with "I had a super time and you are an excellent teacher. Your passion shows through your work and your teaching."

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Luxury Seating

We rounded up another gang of hockey fans and rented out a suite at the St. Pete Times Forum to take in the Tampa Bay Lightning vs. Atlanta Thrashers game last night. We had another great night of enjoying the suite and even though the hometown team lost, it was a fun time had by all.

	1	2	3	T
ATLANTA THRASHERS	1	0	0	1
TAMPA BAY LIGHTNING	0	0	0	0

As a side note, I want to personally thank the former captain of the Tampa Bay Lightning, Dave Andreychuk, for taking the time to stop to sign our tickets when we passed him on the suite level of the Forum.

Portland Maine Workshop

The last five days I was in Portland, Maine with Bryan Peterson, Kathleen Clemons and Ron Goldman from the Perfect Picture School of Photography. It was another unbelievable workshop, from the lighthouse in Portland, Maine, to the White Mountain National Forest in New Hampshire to photograph the beautiful fall colors that was simply breathtaking.

We had a full workshop that covered the Art of Seeing as well as 'difficult exposures': filling the frame, horizontal versus vertical, size and scale, color, pattern, line and texture, symbolisms, freezing action and implying motion opportunities, the importance of lens choice and point of view, macro work, and the proper use of the polarizing and graduated neutral density filters.

I was able to snap a few photographs during the workshop, and will be posting them up in the next few days once the jet lag wears off.

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UPDATE: I finished processing the images I was able to snap while teaching the workshop, and you can view the images here:

• Portland, Maine Workshop Gallery

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DeSoto Action

Over the weekend, we wanted to go back to Fort DeSoto and check out the action, and see if any of the young birds we saw in the spring was returning now that it is later in the year. Plus, with migration season beginning, you never know what you may spot, so the anticipation was great.

We arrived just past low tide, and headed back to our spot where we spent many weekends in the spring to hope to catch some shots. As usual, shorebirds were plenty, and once again we were visited by a very friendly Reddish Egret who was dancing out in the waters. I took up a spot along the shore, and stayed low to get the little ones used to my presence, and once they saw I was no threat, went about their business. Some slept, some was feeding, some took a bath and others just walked right by me only a few feet away. If one is patient and careful, it is amazing what you can capture since they all go about their business, making for some very intimate shots of their daily routine.

One of the cooler things I found was for my first time to spot a Belted Kingfisher sitting in an old dead tree amongst the mangroves. I wadded out into the water towards the mangroves, ever so slowly, and even though I wished I had gotten closer to get more of the Kingfisher in the frame, I was still very happy to see one, much less get a photo.

Just before the sun set over the Gulf of Mexico, three Roseate Spoonbills flew in, and from the looks of them, one was an adult and the other two looked like this years babies, for they were a little smaller then the adult, and seemed to get along with the Reddish Egret, for they all spent time together fishing for food.

As we were leaving, hundreds and hundreds of Terns were fishing out in the surf, and we also spotted a Great Blue Heron out in the surf, and I was able to get a nice shot of him in the warm colors of a gorgeous sunset at Fort DeSoto.

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Three Hour Tour

Last week, we were invited to go on a three hour tour on our friend Alex's 24-foot sea cruiser boat from Clearwater Beach and make our way over to Caladesi Island. Not wanting to pass up an opportunity to see our beach from a whole new perspective, we met Alex at the dock around 1pm to begin our journey. Along for the ride was Alex's son and his daughter and her friend, and we had a blast.

We cruised along the Intercoastal Waterways around Downtown Clearwater, pass Sand Key and Clearwater Beach, and out into the Gulf of Mexico to our final destination at Caladesi Island where back in 1993 a No Name Storm closed the pass between Clearwater Beach and Caladesi Island. The boat ride was totally exciting, for we were able to go under bridges and out to sea and look back and see what the coastline looks like from the Gulf of Mexico.

We anchored at Caladesi Island and swam towards the beach, and walked to where the the two islands are now joined, and walked behind the sand dunes to a huge lagoon and tidal flats, and the life in this area was everywhere, since this is a nature preserve and protected. The tidal flats were teeming with fish, crabs, worms and the highlight of the afternoon was finding numerous Horseshoe Crab babies, most measuring only about the size of a quarter walking around in the tidal pools.

After walking around for a while, we went back in the Gulf of Mexico, pass the sandbars and swam around for a while, sometimes right in the middle of large schools of Silversides and Yellow Tails. It was getting late, so we swam back to the boat, and made our way back home, and was without a doubt one of the coolest things we have done in a long time.

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