Back From Africa and some bird photos

Well I had a long, fun and productive trip to Africa, coming home with many reference photos (though completing zero art) and memories.  But I am HAPPY to be home (at least for a couple of weeks...LOL).

We saw LOTS of animals in SA! An incomplete list off of the top of my head includes Elephants, Impala, Springbok, Steenbok, Bushbuck, Greater Kudu, Common Duiker, Bush Duiker, Klipspringer, Eland, Blesbok, Gemsbok, Waterbuck, Blue Wildebeest, Black Wildebeest, Red Hartebeest, Burchell's Zebra, Mountain Zebra, White Rhino, African Buffalo, Warthogs, Bush Pigs, Hippos, Giraffes, Lions, Leopards, Side Striped Jackal, Black Backed Jackal, African Civet, Honey Badger, Spotted Hyena, lots of Mongoose of various types, various bats and tons of birds!

Here are a few photos of birds that we saw in South Africa throughout our trip.  South Africa is a premier birders spot with over 900 species calling it home for at least part of the year.  And while I am far from a hard core birder I do enjoy documenting and looking up the species that I saw.  Since I didn't even have a bird book for that part of the world (the cheapest one I saw was about $35) I had to sneak peeks at the bird books that were being sold in each and every gift shop to get my IDs :)

Yellow Hornbill - a VERY common species around Kruger National Park




This is a Crombec (not sure what type).  They have virtually no tail feathers to speak of, which makes them look quite funny.  Before I looked up the species I thought maybe his feathers had been pulled out by a predator, but nope... that is just how they are!




Collared Sun Bird - These little guys are Africa's version of a hummingbird, though they do not hover, they do LOVE nectar from aloe plants.  This is a male sitting on a Marloth Aloe flower. 

Greater Blue Eared Starling - South Africa has many starling species.  Several of them are incredibly iridescent (they look anywhere from black to green to blue depending on the light) from head to tail (not something that you can capture all that well in a photo).  These guys are very common, but nevertheless the beauty of them is something I never got tired of.

Many would consider the Lilac Breasted Roller as one of Africa's more beautiful (and trademark) birds.  I never did get the 'killer' shot of one that I wanted but got a few shots I can't complain too much about.

White Capped Shrike - These little guys flock together and like to talk a lot.   I think their fluffy look is very cute :)

Pied Kingfisher hovering above a river.  I WISH I could have changed the lighting situation on this photo to illuminate his head better, but it is still a neat thing to see.  I also got photos of a brown hooded kingfisher and a giant kingfisher.



Cuteness!!

I spent yesterday at the Denver Zoo and a good portion of that time was spent watching 4 baby siberian tiger cubs, born May 31.  How cute are these little ones!!  There are two males and two females born to mother, Koshka (Koosh-kuh), and father, Waldemere (Wald-uh-meer).  I believe they are both first time parents.  More photos posted on facebook if interested.

after a bit of a break

I had a nice visit with my friend Lee in Salt Lake City last week, so no update on the blog, but now I am home and have 5 million photos to review (of dogs).  I am happy to say that I got a reply from F&W telling me they will look into rewording the contest contracts in future years, as other artists have also complained. 

Here are some pictures of my girls from the trip - and even a photo of me with them taken by Lee. 

In more related art news I am excited to say that my piece "The Interrupted Drink" has been selected by the Society of Animal Artists for their 2010 show "Art and the Animal".  This is the 50th aniversary show and the competition was very stiff, so it is quite an honor to have a piece selected.  The show opening will be at the San Diego Natural History Museum in September.  I will be attending the opening weekend.  On the flip side my piece was not selected for Birds In Art this year.  Oh well I will certainly try again next year.  I have seen quite a few accepted AND rejected works from BIA and there are some amazing works that did not make the show this year, the level of competition and work is astoundingly high!  I do not envy the jurors for these shows.  Here is "The Interrupted Drink"

Before I left on my trip I also had to decide which pieces I was sending to the Greeley Stampede Western Art Show.  The final selections ended up being 5 scratchboards and one pencil piece; 4 are horses and 2 are wildlife.  Sizes range from an 8"x10" piece up to the large cougar (24"x36") Now I am spending a fortune framing everything so hopefully some of them will sell.

maned wolf puppies at Denver zoo

When I went to the zoo in early March I was seeking out pics of the new litter of maned wolves born at the zoo in late December, but not on exhibit until the end of February.  They were out of sight and sleeping on that day so I stopped back by today and battled the throngs of school children and one of the pups (there are three total) was out and about for quite a while.  They are almost 3 months old and very leggy and tall already.

Not great photos as it was bright sunlight on top of the snow from two days ago and rather midday, but they are not a critter you get to see all that often, so what the heck :)  BTW they are much darker brown when very young and start to get their red coat and markings at about 2 1/2-3 months.  You can see they are much lighter red than the adult still.  I love the little milk moustache marking on them (adults have it too)!

The little one climbed right on top of Mom and was so cute.  Mom gave him a bath and was very sweet to him.  Unfortunately the cutest shots were out of focus.  My camera needs to go in for some repairs, as it is misfocussing much more than it should, but I just can't part with it... LOL

Look how long thier legs are already!

just for size and color comparison with Mom

The bald eagle also put on quite a show and was screaming and throwing back his head.  Unfortunately backlit and I didn't bring my flash with me for fill flash, but still a nice pose.

A visit to the Denver Stock Show

Yesterday I took the day to go to the Denver Stock show.  I was especially excited to watch and gather reference photos at the AQHA Ranch Horse championships... a competition that emulates more real working type events than most other horse shows events.  I missed the reining portion unfortunately but got to watch trail class, ranch riding and cutting.  Lighting in those buildings is pretty poor so I had to shoot high ISO and while not superb from a photography standpoint I gathered many usable reference photos for my artwork.  You can expect more horses soon!

Here are a few pictures, but as I said the light makes them not too great.  I'd love to photogrpah an event like this outdoors.

I also visited the Coors Western Art Show.  I am trying to get into this event again next year, so keep your fingers crossed for me.  This show always has outstanding western art and a good number of sales (about 70% were sold).  Gold frames seem to be "in".  For some reason I just have never really liked gold frames... but may give them a try just because they seem so darn popular. 

Here is the update on my cougar... hope to have an update on the graphite horse soon too, but what can I say I love scratching more than pencil these days!

A Few Backyard Birds

Well I do call this blog art and photography, but so far it has mostly been about art, and honestly will most likely continue to mostly be about art... but who says I can't toss in some photography every now and again.

Today I went up to Red Rocks in search of some environmental aspects for my next scratchboard.  I will be using a zoo animal as my primary subject, but since he is on an artifical platform I needed some natural elements to put him into the wild in my art.  Anyways I stopped at the trading post, where they have some bird feeders in their back area.  The primary birds I sighted in attendance were magpies, scrub jays, dark-eyed juncos (all colors forms), a few house finches and chickadees and one spotted towhee and one orange-shafted flicker.

Slate colored Junco

Chickadee

Pink Sided color Junco

Spotted Towhee

Western Scrub Jay