I was in awe of the lilac breasted roller at first sight, and they have remained my very favourite bird to spot on safari ever since. It would be a challenge to think of a time on a game drive when I saw one and didn’t mention it; not necessarily as a request to stop, but it is just such a striking bird that I can’t help but comment on it. Seeing them with a beautiful clear blue sky in the background is a bonus, but they are beautiful even in flat light.
Here are a couple of images of lilac breasted rollers from my most recent trip.
A lilac breasted roller coming in to land at an ant hill. The rollers were very active in this area, which was not far from the banks of the Chobe River. They gave me lots of opportunity to try to catch them in flight. Chobe National Park, Botswana. April, 2024.This roller posed for a decent amount of time, in perfect early morning light, allowing not only for some good photographs, but a good opportunity to study the bird. Notice the tiny hook at the end of the beak, and that the eyebrow feathers are perhaps the plainest ones anywhere on its body. Makgadikgadi Pans National Park, Botswana. April, 2024.Another roller in perfect light, showing off a view of the underside and wings as it takes off from its dead tree perch. Makgadikgadi Pans National Park, Botswana. April, 2024.
I felt like some colour on a dull day, so small birds with bright feathers it is. The lilac breasted roller remains one of my favourite birds to spot on safari, and I was quite excited on my past trip to have the chance to see other types of rollers as well. I didn’t get great photos of the other rollers, but included them anyways to show the variety of colours.
A lilac breasted roller.A purple roller.
It was unfortunate to only see the purple roller and racket tailed roller high up against very bright skies, but at least I did get the racket tailed roller at the right angle to show off the interesting tail feathers.
A racket tailed roller.A southern masked weaver.
These weaver images were taken in different areas; the southern masked weaver is wide spread and they create very interesting nests that often hang over water. The males are in charge of construction, and the females in charge of determining if the nest is up to standards or not. When you come across a large colony, you will often see nests that have been abandoned partway through construction.
A southern masked weaver colony in the midst of nest construction.A male long tailed widowbird in breeding plumage.A male violet backed starling.
It was far too cold for me to get out and photograph any local birds this week, so instead I have come up with quite a random assortment of African bird images to share this week.
Wishing everyone a wonderful week ahead. Stay safe out there!
A pair of crested francolin, part of a large group that were foraging along the side of the road.
My personal favourite, the lilac breasted roller.
A female bearded woodpecker seen on an early morning game drive.
This photo makes me laugh, because when I look at it, I can hear the bird calling “Go Away”. These are a pair of grey go-away birds.
A coqui francolin pausing from it’s foraging to give me a photo op.
I missed the opportunity to get out and photograph my local birds today, which is a bit of a shame, as it has been a lovely day with mild temperatures and blue skies. So instead, I’ll share a few images of my favourite African bird, the stunning lilac-breasted roller.
This will be the last Sunday post not only of the year, but of the decade. It seems a bit hard to believe. I don’t yet have a grand plan for the blog in 2020; so far, the only plan is to continue to share images and some of the stories that go alone with the photos, and see how things go.
Wishing everyone a fantastic week ahead, and many thanks for your support throughout the year.
For the last few days, it has been very quiet around the yard in terms of bird life. While last weekend the chickadees, nuthatches and flickers seemed to be around non-stop, the past few days, even on my walks, I haven’t heard a twitter.
With birds on my mind, I decided to play around with some of my photo art edits for my post this week. This is a topic that I have worked on previously; if you missed some of the posts from a couple of months ago, here are two links to take a look at:
Travelling through southern Africa, pretty much any time of year, will provide the opportunity to see a great variety of birds. Today I chose to focus on ones with feathers in shades of blue. I hope you enjoy the variety of images today, and wishing you a wonderful weekend!
Oftentimes, spotting a congregation of vultures like this, and heading to where they are circling yields an interesting discovery… but in this case, they were all just hovering over a bare patch of desert beyond this bush.
A group of wattled cranes seen in Botswana.
A little bee-eater ruffling its feathers.
Try as I might, I am unable to identify these raptors. They were spotted on a game drive in Botswana from the Leroo La Tau camp.
A red-billed quelea flock at sunset.
Red-billed quelea leaving a roosting spot. That small tree was absolutely vibrating with energy while they were there.
An African harrier hawk taking some grief from a pigeon.
My personal favourite, the lilac breasted roller.
A Meyer’s parrot spotted in Botswana. This was the first wild parrot I’d ever seen.
As mentioned last week, I decided to go with bird images for my last round of editing images with On1 Photo Raw, Topaz Studio and Luminar, seeing how the results compare with the different software choices. I thought bird images would be a great choice because there are lots of fine details in feathers that need to be enhanced, and often things like distracting backgrounds that need to be minimized.
In very broad strokes, I’ve come to realize editing an original image in Topaz Studio that requires colour correction is not something I enjoy doing, and not something I will try to do moving forward (until they provide some updates to that portion of the interface). I don’t find that the colour temperature slider works well enough to deal with complicated colour scenarios, and I can get much better results using On1 Photo Raw, or even Luminar.
The first images I picked are of a purple roller that I spotted on the banks of the Boteti River in Botswana. I decided to edit original images in each program, rather than correcting colour first in On1 Photo Raw and editing the resultant images. For a series of images, it’s obviously not a good strategy, but I really wanted to see the different colour rendering and how well I could adjust the images. The results are mixed.
First up is an image from Luminar. Despite desaturating the blues, the sky still looks a bit too blue and oversaturated. The roller was quite a distance away from me; all of the purple roller images were shot at 300mm, and I think Luminar brought back an acceptable amount of detail in the feathers. There’s only so much you can do with images of a small bird on a distant tree!
This is the version from Topaz and try as I might, this was the best I could do with the sky. I find it has an odd colour cast, but I am happy with the detail in the feathers.
This is the On1 Photo Raw image. I think the sky in this version is the most true to life. The focus seems a little bit off, but I only had these purple roller images to work with, so I made the best of it. This is the only time I have ever seen a purple roller, so despite the image series being far from perfect, I still wanted to edit and share them because they really are a striking bird.
Next up are some wattled cranes, also seen along the banks of the Boteti River while staying at the fabulous Leroo La Tau camp. While these images were all shot on the same morning, the light was changing very fast and the birds were moving around relative to our vehicle, so some images were shot into the sun and others with the sun at my back. Wattled cranes are listed as a vulnerable species; our guide Calvin had been so excited to see a group of this size while we were out on game drive.
First up is the Luminar version. You can tell from the white hot sky this was shot well after sunrise, and that the sun is already quite high in the sky. I think what I like best about this version is the shimmery effect of the grasses behind the cranes. There is a bit of a warm cast to the image, especially when compare to the On1 Photo Raw version.
This Topaz version was shot earlier in the morning, with the sun at a more forgiving angle. I love the postures in this image, with the three birds foraging while one appears to be on sentry duty. I did colour correction for this first in On1, as I gave it a quick go in Topaz and was just getting frustrated with the results.
Here are the wattled cranes edited using On1 Photo Raw. I think this and the Topaz versions are the most successful in terms of colour rendering.
Up next are one of my favourite birds, the beautiful lilac breasted roller. Unlike the purple roller, I have seen this bird on all my trips in Africa, and have gotten a few really good shots over the years.
The version from Luminar.
The version from Topaz.
The version from On1.
These roller images are the best ones for comparing the software, since the bird is fairly close and the light unchanging. I am finding the version from On1 looking a little crunchy when compared to the other two, and the Topaz version lacking a little bit of contrast. I think I was able to bring out the colour and tones the best with Luminar on this particular image. I found Topaz was able to bring out a lot of fine detail in the feathers without making the image look crunchy (it’s hard to see on a web sized image, so you’ll have to take my word for it). I think the On1 version could have done well with backing off the tonal contrast a couple of points; though if that version had been posted in isolation, I would be very happy with it.
I started getting some editing fatigue looking at so many similar images, so I decided for the last few, I would just pick a few one-off bird images, and edit one of each in the various programs.
I edited this image of cormorants using On1 Photo Raw. This was shot during the early morning on Phinda Game Reserve, at one of the large dams on the property. It was a chilly, misty morning, and this cormorant was flying in while hippos were calling the in background. It felt like the reserve was just starting to wake up while we were sitting here.
This is an African Hoopoe edited using Topaz Studio. I found the colours in this image flat (no fault of Topaz this time) and thought the image would work much better in black and white.
This is a flock of red-billed quelea heading to a roosting spot at sunset. This was probably the largest flock that I have seen, spotted while staying in the Okavango Delta. I know from watching nature programs that these birds can flock in extraordinary numbers.
There are pros and cons to each of the programs; Topaz and the colour correction issues I have been having, Luminar with the lack of adjustable luminosity masks, and with On1, I don’t find the noise reduction function is a good as some other options. But saying that, all the options are robust programs that have a lot of great features, it’s just a matter of learning how to use the tools to your best advantage. I don’t feel like I am in any type of editing disadvantage by choosing to use these software options over the more common Lightroom and Photoshop scenario (that I also used for several years).
From these editing immersions and comparisons, I think I am a getting a little closer to knowing where all these options fit into my workflow.
