Obstacle Illusion
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The Eemhuis combines a number of existing cultural institutes in the city of Amersfoort: the city library, the exposition center, the heritage archives and a school for dance, music and visual arts. It is located on an urban redevelopment area close to the city center.
Le pilote du jet ski est venu récupérer " son " surfeur et doit trouver LE moment pour passer de l'autre côté des vagues ....
Il a essayé de nombreuses fois avant d' y arriver , au risque d' être renversé !
Et ce n' est qu' une " petite" vague pour eux!
Vagues de la Praia Norte ... Nazaré... Portugal
Au bon endroit au bon moment. Il fallait que je sois très réactif pour prendre cette photo. Cette minuscule limace se déplaçait plus vite qu'on le pense. Juste le temps d'ajuster la netteté.
Right place at the right time. I had to be very quick to take this picture. This tiny slug was moving faster than you think. Just enough time to adjust the sharpness.
Real obstacles don't take you in circles. They can be overcome. Invented ones are like a maze.
Barbara Sher
If you can find a path with no obstacles, it probably doesn't lead anywhere. Frank A. Clark
*happy bokeh wednesday*
“Don't let your mind talk you out of your dreams, trick you into giving up; don't let your mind become the greatest obstacle to success. To get your mind on the right track, the rest will follow.”
― Roy Bennett
Tiger Clough, Rivington, Lancashire
Another casualty from the February storms making the walk to the Tiger Clough waterfall difficult.
Katakali performer, Kumily, Kerala, India, oct 2022
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Eurasian Jay (Garrulus glandarius)
My best photos are here: www.lacerta-bilineata.com/ticino-best-photos-of-southern-...
More TICINO/TESSIN Wildlife Photos (all taken in my garden in Monteggio/Ti, Switzerland): it.lacerta-bilineata.com/ramarro-occidentale-lacerta-bili...
If you're interested, you'll find a more detailed closeup here (it's the 8th photo from the top): www.lacerta-bilineata.com/western-green-lizard-lacerta-bi...
My latest ANIMAL VIDEO (it's very brief but pretty unusual: a tiny wall lizard attacks two young great tits): www.youtube.com/watch?v=FQqkSsyrm7E
THE STORY BEHIND THE PHOTO: MY LONG AND ARDUOUS JOURNEY TO BIRD PHOTOGRAPHY
If you've set yourself the challenge of exclusively shooting the wildlife in your own back yard, you might find - as I did - that bird photography is really, really hard.
It's not that reptiles are easy to photograph either, mind - but at least the ones in my garden stay (for the most part) on the ground, and one can learn how to carefully approach them with a camera. They're also clearly egoists, which from a photographer's point of view is is a great character trait: if a lizard detects a human in its vicinity, it's only interested in saving its own skin, and it won't alarm its buddies.
But birds... oh man. Over the years, my feathered friends and I have developed a lovely routine that now defines our peaceful co-existence. As soon as I as much as open a window (let alone the door), I'm instantly greeted by an eruption of panicky fluttering and hysterical shouts from my garden: "SAVE YOUR WOMEN AND CHILDREN AND FLY FOR YOUR LIVES: THE HAIRLESS, PINK MONSTER IS COMING!!! (Yes, I speak bird, and I know that this is exactly what they are shouting 😉).
Needless to say, with the exception of the redstart I already showed here, all my efforts to get the kind of detailed shots I usually strive for with my nature photography ended in complete failure and utter disillusionment. I was ready to give up on stalking the winged misanthropes in my garden altogether, but then winter came - and changed everything.
One day this past January I observed my neighbor Signora P - a kind, elderly Italian lady - putting something on the low garden wall in front of my house. At first I thought she was just putting some treat there for her cat Romeo; the young tom patrols that wall constantly (it's his favorite spot in the garden, and during the warmer months he usually lurks in the thick foliage next to it to prey on lizards).
But once I detected a lot of movement on that wall through my window, I understood she had put a little pile of bread crumbs there; she was feeding the birds who soon arrived in flocks. This was certainly well-intended on my neighbor's part, but her noble action came with a catch, and I'm afraid quite literally.
When I took a stroll through my garden the next day I discovered a suspicious amount of feathers on the ground next to the wall. Romeo had apparently switched from his low-calorie summer diet (lizard) to more energy-rich meals consisting of "fowl" (it was winter after all, so from a nutritionist's point of view this made sense).
I would find fresh traces of Romeo's victims (mostly feathers, but also the odd wing) in my garden over the following days; so my first intuition that my neighbor was feeding her cat hadn't been that far off after all, as Romeo was now clearly being "served" fresh birds on a daily basis. And although the hungry visitors seemed to be aware of the danger and became slightly more prudent, they just couldn't resist the tasty snacks Signora P put on that wall - and neither could Romeo.
It was obvious that I had to act, but talking to my neighbor - who is as stubborn as she is kind - would have been futile, I knew that much. I pondered the matter long and hard - until a light bulb went off in my head. The idea was genius. If successful, what I had in mind would not only increase the birds' chances of surviving Romeo's appetite, but also greatly benefit my own photographic endeavors.
I started to enact my master plan the very next day by buying a giant bag of bird feed (consisting mainly of sunflower seeds) from the store. Then I dragged a huge piece of a tree trunk (approx. 120 cm in height) that we normally chop firewood on from the shed out into the garden and emptied almost half of the bag's content on top of it. Signora P's buffet for birds (and cats) was about to get some serious competition 😊.
My reasoning was as follows: not only would the birds be lured away from the fatally low garden wall to a place where they were safe from the cat - there was nothing around that tree trunk that provided cover for a predator, and the birds had a nice 360° view around it at all times - but I was also able to photograph them while hiding in the shed.
However, in order for my plan to work there was one little extra measure I had to take, and it was one that risked lowering my own life expectancy considerably once the owner of the property - my mom - discovered it. You see, our shed is completely windowless, so if I wanted to use it as a blind, I had no choice but to cut a hole into one of its wooden walls... which I promptly did (I figured all's fair in love - and photography 😉).
Granted, I have absolutely zero carpentering skills, and it showed. That hole was an ugly mess: the shed's wall seemed to have had an encounter with Jack Nicholson's ax-wielding lunatic character from the film 'The Shining'. Needless to say, I was incredibly proud of my work (I mean, come on: there now was a hole where before there wasn't a hole, and it was big enough for the lens of my camera to peek through, so it was mission accomplished as far as I was concerned).
Now all I had to do was wait for the birds to discover the tree trunk. In the meantime I started to mentally prepare myself for the inevitable confrontation with my mom and go through possible explanations for that splintering hole in the wall (it was either gonna be a rabid woodpecker attack or an emergency rescue mission with a feeding tube for a little kid that had accidentally locked himself inside the shed - both seemed valid options, though I slightly preferred the locked-in kid due to the involved drama and heroism 😉).
A whole day went by, and not a single bird visited the sunflower seeds. I had expected that it might take a few hours until the first of the ever curious great tits or blue tits would show up, but given how tiny my garden is, an entire day seemed excessive. Then another day came and went: the birds kept flocking to the bread crumbs on the wall, and my tree trunk kept collecting dust. To add injury to insult, a few fresh feathers on the ground were proof that Romeo was still feasting.
It was incredibly frustrating: I provided my winged guests with a much better view - plus a higher chance of surviving the cuisine - than Signora P's place; I risked (almost) certain death at the hands of my own mother (OK, the act of vandalism on the shed I had committed for my own benefit, but still), yet the birds kept ignoring me.
Then, after three days, just before sunset, I spotted a single blue tit on the tree trunk picking away at the sunflower seeds.
When I got up the next morning I immediately realized that the loud noise that accompanies each and every tit activity had shifted from the wall to the shed. At last the dam had broken: there was a flurry of movement around the tree trunk, and I counted at least 5 different species of birds feasting on the sunflower seeds.
From day 4 onward my plan worked beautifully: the birds now indeed mostly ignored Romeo's "snack wall" and kept to the tree trunk. And yes, I was able to play peeping tom from behind the shed's wall and photograph them!! 😊
Thus, dear readers, I finally managed to produce some acceptable bird photos, and I had even saved my feathered friends from a deadly foe in the process. All through winter and spring I took advantage of my new bird hide, and in late May I started mixing some cherries with the sunflower seeds. The idea was to attract a Eurasian jay (Garrulus glandarius), and as you can see, it worked!
It took me almost three weeks and more than a few tricks to capture that clever fella, but given how long I've been rambling here already, that's a story for another day. As for my mom, she still doesn't know about the hole in the wall, so please don't snitch! 😉.
I hope you like the photo and wish you all a wonderful weekend! Many greetings from Switzerland, and as always: let me know what you think in the comments 🙏 😊 ❤!
P.S. if anyone has their own funny tale about the obstacles we photographers are prepared to overcome for a desired photo, please write it in the comments: I love such stories 😊
Smoke from Forest fires in distant lands shrouds the sun causing very orange skies at sunset.
The wheat harvest ends the growing season for another year
BNSF vehicle train V TACLPC1 24F punches through the solid basalt hole known as Drano Tunnel (Tunnel #2) near Cook, WA, in the Columbia River Gorge. Drano Tunnel is the first of five tunnels the train will pass thorugh in the next 3 miles as it and parallel Washington Route 14 navigate the narrow confines of land crammed between the northern bank of the Columbia River and numerous rock formations, lakes, and steep slopes. CREX 1206 is working rear-end DPU duty, shoving hard to get the autoracks rolling at track speed after holding for Amtrak on the fast-paced and heavily utilized Fallbridge Subdivision.
It is a long time since I have been able to visit this wood. So lovely to see the greenery. This path has a tree trunk across. It is a path often used by horses. I expect the riders love it.
This small gator was in my path on a walk, I thought maybe a bad idea to walk past it. Better to take a photo and leave instead. It was small, but I didn't like the way it was looking at me!
A typical Scottish Highland scene, with the natural granite rocks helping to direct and slow the flow of the water course as it races towards the sea.
Sometimes my excessive zeal would lead me astray.
-Wounded by Love, The Life and the Wisdom of Saint Porphyrios
One of the hundreds of shipping hazards found of the Cornish coast, making it one of the most dangerous places in the UK for ship navigation. This one sits just off Trevose Head on the northern coastline of the county.
Leafhopper (family Cicadellidae)
The first of this species I have seen this year. About 3 mm in length.
You feel so small, lifeless and overwhelmed and you’re working hard to push through the painful obstacles you face, take time to rest and keep looking for light.
A Mandatory abandoned guard tower in the middle of a dry wheat field, Built during 1939 built by the locals Kibbutz and help from the Ha-Hagana to protect the local population from an barbarian tribes in the northern of Mandatory Palestine (now Israel) near Kibbutz Nir-David
"מגדל ג'ורג'", על שם ג'ורג' קזמה, בעל האדמות, שהקק"ל רכשו ממנו את הקרקע והקימו עליה - בין היתר - את קיבוץ מסילות. המגדל נבנה ע"י הקיבוצניקים, בסיוע של ההגנה, ב-1939. הוא אמור היה לשכן שומרים שיגנו על החקלאים של מסילות מפני הטרדות של פלחים ושודדים ערבים, על סמך ניסיון שנרכש בעת ההתגוננות בתקופת המאורעות. לא רחוק משם יש מגדל נוסף, ליד ניר דוד (תל עמל) שנקרא מגדל השלושה,
taken with DJI Mavi Pro
you ca buy this photo as a print on my shop
www.etsy.com/listing/4394589926/abandoned-building-in-the...
or a digital file for self print
www.etsy.com/listing/4394591072/abandoned-building-in-the...
[T]he soul of every person, no matter when he lived or what degree of holiness he acquired, whether he attained to the very heights of perfection or whether he was but entering upon the road of righteousness, whether an adult or an infant is united with God through grace, and entertains the Holy Spirit as his Guest. True, this union can be more or less perfect, it can admit of degrees which vary ad infinitum, but the mystical union is everywhere and always essentially the same.
-Barthelemy Froget, The Indwelling of the Holy Spirit in the Souls of the Just According to the Teaching of St. Thomas Aquinas (New York: Paulist Press, 1921), 118.