My Favorites from 2019
As the year comes to a close, it’s time to reflect on 2019 and what’s to come in 2020. My photography goals for 2019 were to get out and shoot more than in 2018 and try to improve the quality of my photos. Made some progress on both of those goals.
Yellowstone in winter was the highlight again this year, along with several local trips to the gulf coast/surrounding area. Looking forward to seeing what 2020 will bring. It’s going to be an interesting year for sure.
Here are some of my favorite photos from 2019.
Great egrets from High Island rookery that made the top 100 in Audubon’s photo contest.
Yellowstone Bison with some frozen fog @ -22 deg F.
Yellowstone coyote jumping up the hill towards us. Off the charts experience.
Black-necked stilt posing for me at Bolivar Flats
Thousands of American Avocets on the shoreline at Bolivar Flats with my group from Galveston’s FeatherFest.
Reddish Egret in silhouette at Bolivar Flats.
White morph reddish egret at Bolivar Flats along the Texas gulf coast.
Reddish Egret from Bolivar Flats.
American Avocet taking off at Bolivar Flats.
Willet landing at sunrise at Bolivar Flats.
American Avocet at Bolivar Flats.
Yellowstone Coyote Full Frame
Here is a full frame shot of the Yellowstone coyote as he went around me after jumping up the hill. Was a very good day.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500mm F4 IS II, handheld while sitting in a snowbank.
1/1600 sec @ F8, ISO 400, manual mode
Yellowstone Coyote Among the Cattails
Yellowstone coyote on his way to the small creek before he ran up the hill. Full framed shot without any cropping. Saw this composition coming as he got near the cattails. Used back-focus button to get him in focus and then recomposed to put him in the lower left corner with the cattails in the top of the frame.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500mm F4 IS II, handheld
1/3200 sec @ F8, ISO 800, manual mode
Once-in-a-Lifetime at Yellowstone
Our second coyote encounter on Day 1 at Yellowstone was incredible. One of our workshop leaders spotted a coyote crossing the river at a distance. We got out of the snow coach and walked down the road to try to get a better view of him. He got up on the bank and made his way to our right in the snow, catching some food along the way.
Three of us went with Jared further upstream and waited for him to come to us. While sitting in a snowbank, got some cool shots of the coyote working his way along a small winding creek at the bottom of our hill. Was very happy to get those shots and expected him to continue along his way at the base of this hill.
All of a sudden, he took off and ran/jumped up the hill directly towards us. Luckily didn’t have my tripod or would have missed some of the shots as I had to lean back and to my left to shoot as a small tree got in the way.
He bounded up the hill while glancing from left to right with making direct eye contact with me several times. He would blast up out of the snow, which created a cool ring of snow around him. As he got closer, began to wonder if he was going to run right into me so I briefly lifted my head up to see how close that he was getting and he veered off to my left, leaving me with some full frame shots as he went by.
He kept going up the hill while almost face-planting into the snow allowing for a couple of cool head shots. At the top of the hill, he looked back at us and then went down the road like nothing happened. He left us with the thought “What just happened and did we capture it?” Downloading my photos revealed that I got 37 out of 40 photos in the sequence in focus when he ran up the hill in about 75 seconds. Have a 12 frames/sec camera really paid off.
I keep having these once-in-a-lifetime photography experiences in Yellowstone, which will ensure that I keep going back. Thanks again Jared and Doug. One of my favorite Yellowstone encounters ever.
All photos were taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500mm F4 IS II lens, handheld
Manual mode, 1/1600 sec @ F8, ISO 400, 500mm
Tim Timmis Photography 