Walk Within The Mangroves (1)

D700 60mm ISO200 f/5.6 1/640

I like to visit a location at different hours to take advantage of the various lights. So this morning, I had an early walk. The sky was just beautiful with the sun brightening softly the side of the clouds. I abandoned the 3/3 rule and placed the horizon in the center of the picture to take advantage of the reflection...

While more and more people seem to enjoy fishing, catching crabs or just riding their bike to Khatib Bongsu, some tend not to understand that plastics do not decompose in the nature and that they will find their garbage exactly were left them when they come back, if the wind has not blown them into the water... A shame really.

In fact and on the above picture, I had to photoshop out a plastic bottle that was floating within the composition. At full resolution, I could guess the brand of the drink...

White-Breasted Waterhen

D700 500mm +1.7 teleconverter ISO200 f/6.7 1/320 flash tripod

A relatively common but very shy bird. I saw a couple with their all black chicks. Seeing is unfortunately not photographing... I missed them... Maybe next time!

Blue Sky

D700 70-300mm @ 70 ISO200 f/14 1/250

A "simple click" while passing by.

Little Spiderhunter

D700 500mm +1.7 teleconverter ISO400 f/10 1/320 flash -1.3EV tripod

Purple-Throated Sunbird

D700 500mm +1.7 teleconverter ISO200 f/9 1/320 flash -1.3EV tripod

This is an Asoka tree that is extremely popular with photographers! For a first time there, I was surprised to count 6 large lenses targeting a the feeding birds! and this was on a week day morning... While patiently waiting for the sunbirds to perform, I was wondering about the ratio of photographers to birds during the week-ends!

Spider Lily

D700 50mm ISO400 f/1.4 1/1000

A flower and a play on the depth of field.

Malayan Colugo (3)

D700 500mm ISO400 f/7.1 +1.0EV 1/80 Tripod

"Soooo Cuuuuute" was the first comment I got for this shot. I tend to agree!

The difficulty in taking these last three pictures was the low level of light. This meant that the shutter speed had to be low for a 500mm lens (the VR II stabilization system of the lens is just excellent) and the depth of field was unfortunately limited.