Bird Photography-How to get Started

This is the subject for Thursday’s meeting. Our presenter is Allen Kurth. He is a past president of the Fontenelle Forest Photo Club. I should mention that Allan has several awards for his photography. I hope to see all of our members on Thursday.

Photo Contest

Here is a site that has a over 130 contest listings from beginners to professionals. It is called Photo Contest Insider . Our club’s photo contest is just around the corner. Start working on your selections now. This will allow more time to get that perfect picture for submission.

Display photos needed

Judy Dye would like to get photos for forest and library displays. Upcoming subjects for future displays;

• Toads and Frogs
• Reflections
• Anything Pink
• Rocks

Photo should be “8 X 10” or “11 X 14” size and unframed. There should be no boarders around the photo. Place your name, the location where photo was taken, and optionally the camera and lens used on the back of your photo.

Bird Photography

Here is a short video about photographing small birds. It is about 14 1/2 minute video. The first 5 minutes is about apps that are useful when planning a shoot. The rest of the video is about settings, techniques, and what to wear…etc. This will hopefully complement our guest speaker’s presentation.

Dana Meyer designed the sign.
Manager of Marketing and Events
dmeyer@fontenelleforest.org

Tim Wright

Timmy’s Treehouse printed the sign for the club at no cost to the club. Thank you Tim. Below is info for Tim’s business. Let’s give him our patronage.

Timmy’s Treehouse Print Studio

13595 Giles Road, Suite C 

Omaha NE 68138

Tele: 402.770.0065

Website:  https://www.timmystreehouse.com

Also on Facebook at Timmy’s Treehouse Print Studio

Hours:  Variable, call first or can place orders on-line

I want to thank Tim Wight, Dana Meyer and Donna Gray for their efforts to make the sign. Donna states the photo of sign does not do it justice. She will bring it to the February meeting.

February 20, 2020 meeting change

Our original speaker for the February meeting is unable to present a program.

Allen Kurth

Allen has agreed to be our speaker for the February 20, 2020 photo club meeting. Allen has been a past president of the club. He is an excellent photographer. He has won quite a few ribbons from our past photo contests. His presentation is “Bird Photography – How To Get Started”

Submit your artwork for consideration in Community. Submissions open tomorrow!

We are proud to present Community, a Baright Gallery Artist Series exhibit celebrating the artworks of the Fontenelle Forest Community. Community is a non-juried, salon-style exhibit that celebrates the creativity of our members, neighbors, staff, volunteers and friends. This show is a portrait of a vibrant, diverse, and multifaceted ecosystem of makers featuring artists of any age and working in any medium, style theme or concept.

The exhibit will be on view in our gallery from April 4 to July 7, 2020. An opening reception will take place on April 4, 2020. Visit fontenelleforest.org for requirements and to submit your artwork for consideration to be included in this exhibit. Submissions will be accepted January 27 – March 2. The Baright Gallery Artist Series is sponsored by Mutual of Omaha.

Audubon Society of Omaha website has been updated with details for the February 13 ASO General Meeting to be held at Fontenelle Forest.  ASO and Fontenelle Forest Raptor Recovery are co-hosting a viewing of FRAGMENTS, a documentary by Alex Wiles on the epidemic of lead poisoning in raptors. A panel discussion including several local experts will follow. A raptor expert will have two rehabilitated bald eagles on site.

Pre-register

Everyone who wants to attend must register, and a link to the registration page is included on our website, as well as on our Facebook page.  

Registration page

The website is omahaaudubon.com

“Fragments” Trailer

Alex Wiles

On February 13 at 7:00 PM at the forest, the Audubon Society is having a meeting. Their guest presenter is going to be Alex Wiles. “Fragments” is the title of his program. All are welcome to attend.

Alex’s website

I hope to coral Alex to be one of our presenters next year

Treasury

We have over $1800 in the bank. We had expenses for the brochure and Christmas pot luck.

Dues

Enough said!

Photo Displays

Judy gave us a list of upcoming subjects

• Toad and Frogs
• Reflections
• Anything Pink
• Rocks

These are subject to the photographer’s interpretations. Remember NO BOARDERS around your 8 X 10 or 11 X 14 prints.

Astro Photography

Please check out previous post providing links and videos from Ken Smith’s outstanding presentation on photographing Milky Way and Star Trails.

Gallery Instructions

I am still pondering how to explain and instruct on how to use gallery. For now any photo you wish to have in the gallery under your own named page, submit it to me. Try to keep the size of your submitted photos to 2000 pixels on the longest side.

Under the Microscope

This is a page in the Gallery for member’s to choose a photo they would like to have critiqued. Other people would comment on your photo, giving you helpful comments on what they think would make the photo better. I will submit a photo of mine to start the ball rolling.

Member Forum

I have removed our Member’s Forum page. It was agreed to get rid of it. Due to reasons discussed at our January meeting.

Gallery

I added a Gallery page with sub-pages for our members to highlight their photos. The portfolio and home page sections require me to scale a member’s photo for display. With Gallery I post your picture(s) as received with no modification by me. This also allows anyone to comment on your photos. Michele Curran is our first member to submit photos. And we already have a comment about her picture of the sandhill crane. Within the Gallery page is a “Under The Microscope” page. The concept originated from a long ago meeting when we would break up in groups. Each of us would bring a photo so our group members could constructively critique our photo. If you are willing to accept thoughts on how to improve your photography, please submit a photo to be placed in this page. We have some very good picture takers in our club. I am sure they would like to help us take better pictures.

This is purely an option for our members to take advantage of another way of displaying your photos. Not everyone has a portfolio. I want everyone to show off their work.

I was asked to place instructions on the home page on how to utilize the Gallery and how to submit photos. I will research on ways to do this. There is already a lot of things on the home page and I am afraid it might just add to the clutter. It may be better to attach a sub-page in the gallery with instructions.

Where We Meet

This is another addition on the home page. It is a google map location page of the forest for the public to see where we meet.

Avatars

These are those little goofy pictures next to your name when you log on or make comments on the website. I found a way to change this image to any other image if you want to change. If you wish to have a picture of you as your avatar, send me a small file size .jpg of yourself to me and we can make the change. JPG could also be another cartoonish character, your cat, dog or whatever you want.