The Dell UltraSharp U2312HM With LED Flat Panel Monitor Review

Recently my 19 inch, 6 year old, View Sonic flat panel monitor gave up the ghost, as they say. So, time to check out reviews, and get a new one. This would be my main monitor, also using a 15 inch Samsung for NX2 and Photoshop menus, mail and such. I wanted a larger one, but I thought 30 inches would be too large for my office desk setup. Definitely did not want a glossy display, but for sure wanted one with IPS, which is In Plane Switching. You ask, what in the world is this IPS? It is a technology developed in 1996 by Hitachi, but essentially it ensures color accuracy from any viewing angle. I went to one of my main sources of photography information, Naturescapes, http://www.naturescapes.net . It is a great photography forum with like minded folks that have plenty of knowledge and experience. There were a few higher priced monitors mentioned, mostly by NEC, but the more reasonably priced ones that kept coming up were Dell's UltraSharp models. Dell's UltraSharp monitors start at 22 inches and go up to 30 inches. I decided on the 23 inch one, which through Dell was $299.00. They are all wide screen. I clicked the "check out" button and awaited the little brown truck. I received it 5 days later. My husband put the stand on and said it was VERY easy to setup. It comes with VGA and DVI cables and a USB upstream cable, which enables the USB ports on the monitor, which there are four, two on the back and two on the left side. There is also a DisplayPort connector and a DC power connector for a Dell Soundbar. This monitor swivels and tilts for your best viewing angle and can also be positioned in portrait mode. I plugged it in and turned the computer on. The Windows 7 64- bit OS recognized it right away and installed the drivers without any problems. It went to the proper resolution of 1920 x 1080 without any adjustments by me. The colors seemed pretty good right out of the box, but I calibrate all my monitors with my Huey Pro, by Pantene. I did that, and noticed the Huey Pro adjusted the gamma ever so slightly. The main menus can be accessed by buttons on the bottom right of the display. There are brightness/contrast, Auto Adjust, Input Source, Color Settings- where you input RGB or YPbPr, Gamma- PC or MAC, and Preset Modes- Standard, Multimedia, Movie, Game, Text, Color Temp. or Custom Color, Display Settings, Other settings and the Personalize. Since I had used a hardware calibration, I did not adjust any of these settings. So far I am very happy with how it renders my images all through the steps of post processing. I would definitely recommend it or any of Dell's UltraSharp monitors.

Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge Very Productive In December

In the past Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge has had good activity during the months of Jan-March, but this year it started early. The ducks started to arrive, then the roseate spoonbills, avocets, reddish egrets and the like. Also, a local favorite gave us some really nice photo ops by staying in the same place, with predictable perches, a male belted kingfisher. Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge was established in 1963 and consists of 140,000 acres of water and marshes adjacent to Cape Canaveral. Today the northern half of the refuge, about 20 miles of the 35 mile long refuge is open to the public. It is well worth a visit for anyone interested in viewing some of Florida's precious wildlife! Most all of the areas are accessible by car. The most popular road is Black Point Drive. For more information about the refuge, and a map, just click on this link http://www.fws.gov/merrittisland/Index.html. Here are just a few of the species that can be found now around the refuge.

Northern Shoveler



Male Hooded Merganser



Roseate Spoonbill



Male Belted Kingfisher



All images copyrighted by Nancy Elwood and Naturesportal

A Grey But Productive Day

This past Saturday myself and a friend went on a road trip to Gainesville, Florida to visit the Butterfly Rainforest, associated with the University of Florida. It was rather an overcast day, with the sun sneaking out on occasion. We looked along the way at different small ponds and the like to see what we could find. Well, we found this rather small pond with numerous pairs of hooded mergansers. We setup with our tripods and camo, and ended up being able to get ourselves some nice images. Of the three kinds of mergansers found in North American, the red-breasted and common the others, the hooded merganser is the smallest. The other three kinds of mergansers are the Chinese, Brazilian and Auckland Islands mergansers. The Hoodie is the only merganser endemic to North America. We were able to get our shoot in before the rains came, and then we were off to the Butterfly Rainforest. Being a bit cool and a tad wet, did not make for great butterfly activity. I learned that until a butterflies body temperature reaches 100 degrees, it just does not do much flying or moving around. But, we made do and I was able to get a few images I liked.

Female Hooded Merganser



Male Hooded Merganser




Isabella's Longwing Butterfly (C)- Native to the tropical and subtropical areas of the New World




An Owl Butterfly (C)- Native to the rainforests of Mexico and Central and South America


All images are copyrighted by Nancy Elwood and Naturesportal

And The Action Continues!!

Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge is now full of ducks (northern shovelers,pintails,american wigeons and blue winged teals), roseate spoonbills, kingfishers, and the like. The trick is getting them in the right light. Black Point Drive seemed to have most of the action this past weekend. The early morning or late afternoon light is so much better! The Viera Wetlands still has numerous nesting great blue herons. The crested caracaras and bald eagles are being seen regularly catching their meals on the 100's of coots that have populated the wetlands. The early morning light proved to be wonderful for the great blue herons and feeding bald eagle. A little bit of cloud cover or darkened sky make for nice surrounds, but will force you to use higher iso's, to get enough shutter speed to catch the action. Remember the secret to using higher iso's, without the added noise, is to expose to the right of the histogram. Just dial in a bit of plus exposure compensation, either by the exposure compensation dial, if using aperture priority mode, or if using manual exposure, moving into the plus side of the exposure scale at the bottom of your view finder. Take a few test shots looking at the histogram each time to make sure the exposure is showing at least to the middle of the right side. This type of information is all included in my workshops. For more information please see my website, http://www.naturesportal.net/.








All images are copyrighted by Nancy Elwood and Naturesportal

The Activity is Heating Up!

This past weekend I was at the Viera Wetlands, located in Viera, Florida. It is one of my favorites places to photograph. This time of year the activity really gets going and it did not disappoint! The ducks haved started to arrive, as in hooded mergansers, blue winged teals and northern shovelers. The crested caracara's are back setting up their nests as are numerous pairs of great blue herons. It is also a favorite place to see american and least bitterns. There are also a couple bald eagle nests close by, so they make appearances also. Here are just a few images from the weekend.

American Bittern



Crested Caracara



Mating Pair of Great Blue Herons



All images are copyrighted by Nancy Elwood and Naturesportal

The Deland Fall Festival of the Arts

The art show that I had my booth the weekend of November 19th was in Deland, Florida. It turned out to be one of the best yet for me!! It also turned out that the National Wildlife Federation Magazine arrived in members mail boxes that weekend, showing my winning image. That turned out to be a BIG draw! Thanks for all who stopped in!! It was great meeting and chatting with everyone!

Halifax Art Festival

This past weekend was the Halifax Art Festival in Daytona Beach, Florida. A lot of folks came out to view the more than 200 artists that had been juried into the 49th year of this show. I made some great contacts and was able to chat with many very nice people. It was certainly a wonderful way to start the art show season and was the first public viewing of my winning image of a black skimmer with its chick!

A Visit To The Butterfly Rainforest

The weekend before last a friend of mine and myself made a trip to Gainesville, Florida, to the Butterfly Rainforest that is part of the University of Florida's Museum of Natural History. They have butterflies from all over the world. Once a year, for two weekend mornings, they have a private workshop, put on before the public is admitted. This is the only time they allow tripods and will put butterflies of your chose on any surrounds of your chose. It is a great photographic opportunity! Although I tend not to use a tripod with my setup, being able to have the personnel place the butterflies where I want, is terrific. My setup mostly is the Nikon D300s and Nikon 70-300VR lens with a 20mm extension tube. Also, as a bit of added light I use an on camera SB-700, balanced fill flash settings, reduced to around -1.5 or so. For additional info on the Butterfly Rainforest follow this link, http://www.flmnh.ufl.edu/butterflies/. Below are just a few of the images I was able to get that day.

A Clipper, native to southeast Asia



A Mexican Longwing



A Tailed Jay- native to the Indo-Australian regions



All images are copyrighted by Nancy Elwood and Naturesportal

Finally After All The Hours and Early Mornings!

Yesterday I received some wonderful news!! I placed First in the Baby Animals category, Pro level, of the 2011 National Wildlife Federation Photo Contest, with the image shown. With so many excellent photographers out there, I feel privileged to have been given this award! I am passionate about trying to capture the best in our natural world and hope in so doing showing people how special the natural world is to us all!




All images are copyrighted by Nancy Elwood and Naturesportal

Not A Bird, But They Do Have Wings

OK, subjects were not in abundance this past weekend at our favorite wetlands, Viera, but we were still able to practice our panning and telephoto lens techniques on the frequently overlooked green darner dragonfly. They are everywhere now, latched together, having sex, or should I say propagating the species. The male must transfer sperm from his sperm-producing genitals (located in segment 9, at the tip of his abdomen) to the accesory genitals located on segments 2 and 3, underneath his abdomen. These include a sperm resrvoir and a penis. He does this on his own. The female, when found, then connects her genitals located at the tip of her abdomen against his abdomen, where he has transferred the sperm. He holds the female behind her head, by three claspers. Then around they fly. When finished, he tows her around and over water so she can deposit the eggs. Now, you probably know more then you ever thought you would want to know about dragonfly copulation. But, you must admit the natural world is a fascinating place. The top image is of two green darners connected with the back one,female, depositing the eggs into the water. the second image is of course caught in flight.




All images are copyrighted by Nancy Elwood and Naturesportal