I can’t believe it has already been 3 months since we started this website and I started my schooling. Time seemed to vanish. As a last post I made a montage of photos and videos that show just how much time I was still able to spend in the woods. To share just how many miles I travelled to see the things I saw this season. It goes as far as Prince George, to Cranbrook and even Powell River. It’s a pretty amazing province we live in and I’m forever grateful to be able to explore it.
So, as my last post to this website/Blog. I have made a minute and a half long video of all the amazing sights I saw this year.
I had a great experience learning how I can share my interests with people. I have honestly shocked myself with how much easier I find making these posts. I remember the first couple I did took me far too many hours to get my photos to upload, or even to edit a video together. But its really cool to now see what I did this year, how many things I’ve tried that are brand new to me, And what I can create using my cheap Wal-Mart computer and a phone that is about 8 generations too old.
With the season winding down and the field getting much snowier and tough to access I have now gotten all my game cameras out of the woods so none of them get damaged throughout the winter. I had a couple be really active for me and I got a couple funny photos one of a cougar!
This is a funny little photo I took while I was walking into some timbers to retrieve my camera last week. Young deer probably first time seeing some snow. Definitely first time seeing a human because he had no clue what to do.
Last one for today, but I got this camera I had near my house actually and to my surprise this mountain lion came up to it for a selfie! this cat ended up knocking my camera off the tree and onto the ground and it landed in a puddle. So it no longer works. But I think it is worth it after getting this photo
This week I am going to spend a little bit of time looking at other “Digi-scoping” products. I currently own the Phone Skope case. But last week I got a new phone and the case I have is specific for my old I-Phone 7. Now that I have a new phone I am very excited to try Digi-Scoping with a phone that has amazing cameras.
The first phone-to-spotting scope adapter I looked at is by Ollin , Ollin is a brand new company that has a totally different take on their adapter. Where most adapters snap together, or twist lock. Ollin’s adapter is magnetic. This makes for a very quick, always centered image and a smaller profile for the case as well. One of my favorite YouTube channels Hushin has been sponsored by this brand and that’s how I actually heard about this new company. They recently did a product review and I will post it below…
I looked at one other brand which offers a universal adapter. This is a nice option as well because if I had an adaptor like this, I wouldn’t be looking at new cases for my new phone. This adapter is by HookUpz, and is sold on the Carson Optics website. This is another great idea but it seems like there are too many moving parts that could potentially break.
I think for ease and quickness I am going to look more into the Ollin adapters and hopefully have one for next season!
Alright, finally has come the time for me to go and get all my many game cameras out of the forests. I set up 9 cameras this year and had many different animals cross them throughout the last 2 months. I’m going to share what I found to be the best videos out of them all!
This is a video from one of my highest quality cameras. the camera used for this video was a Bushnell Core S-4K. This video is a pretty cool glimpse at how a Blacktail lives and where they live. All the orange/red shrubs you see in the background are wild blueberries. these blue berry bushes grow above 2,500 ft of elevation here on Vancouver Island. this specific patch is nearing 4,000 ft. the timber that this camera was set up beside consists of mainly Douglas fir, Spruce and the odd Red/Yellow Cedar.
Now this photo is one of the coolest photos to date. The ever so elusive Vancouver Island Wolf. rarely seen by people these are among the toughest animals to get a photo of. I was very shocked to see this on my camera when I checked it. This camera was on a very high ridge that faced north. The snow had been on the camera since the muddle of October and it had finally melted enough for me to go get it. This was the only animal that had crossed this specific camera in the entire 2 months. These wolves must’ve pushed everything else out of the area.
And last but not least this was another Blacktail buck. This camera set up was trying to catch a glimpse of a cougar which tend to walk to roads regularly to cover ground. But the best I got off this one was this nice buck. I had nearly 12 different videos of this same deer walking in front of this camera set up. This road must’ve been part of his morning commute 🙂
I’ve got some cool photos for you this post. I went to Prince George recently to visit some family and saw some awesome animals along the way which I managed to capture fairly well!
Along the highway, just south of Merritt, BC. I spotted this mountain goat across the river valley and up in the mountain. Upon returning back home I asked a skilled conservation officer I know to see if he could identify it for me. He told me this goat is a young Billy (Male), and probably around the age of three. Pretty cool to see this guy, I haven’t seen any previous to this one.
Here’s a cool Image I took of my spotting scope and camera attachment. It was a neat take at this goat, seeing it through my phones camera like this gives it an almost 3rd person view. the photo I used above this photo is practically the same as what my phone was seeing, so it gives you a couple different perspectives.
And to wrap up my quick trip up north, once we had gotten to Prince George we had a lovely welcome home by the Whiskey Jacks. These birds are a super tame species found throughout most of BC. Even wild ones like this guy are tame enough to grab trail mix out of your hand, they will join you at the picnic tables and even inside the tent sometimes! They are one of the largest songbirds native to BC and have been found in places as far as Mexico.
Welcome back everyone, it’s time for yet another Inquiry post!
Another couple weeks further into the school semester, and only a couple more posts to go. I focused the last couple weeks on capturing photos over video. I spent a lot of my time with my phone mounted to my binoculars rather than the spotting scope as well. This is something that takes more time to set up but I find once I do get everything set it does a better job of capturing what I am seeing. I spent most my time in the Shawnigan valley and the Sooke hills this time around. I’m usually in the Cowichan valley so it was a nice change of scenery. and like always, I managed to take some photos of some wildlife which I’m going to share with you right away here.
First up for this post is this cute photo I took of a couple does (female deer for anyone who may not know). I really liked this photo because it is the first time I’ve ever seen deer here on Vancouver Island bed in a slash! Usually I see them resting in timber or farmers fields. but these two set up camp in the wide open and hung around long enough for me to take a nice photo of them. always cool to see how these animals like to live their life in the wild. It was a very rainy cold day when I took this photo so that’s why the one on the right looks so grumpy.
Next up is this younger buck I saw in and around Oliphant lake, Shawnigan BC. What I liked about this photo was how clear it came out compared to most the photos I take. I think this is because the buck was “sky lined” (A fancy way to say there was nothing behind it). This allowed my camera to better focus in on him rather than selecting a whole bunch of trees or shrubs to focus up on. Super healthy deer this guy was, seems like he was eating lots in preparation for the winter.
Just going to end it off with a cool photo of some timber I hiked through. Put a game camera in here so hopefully I can share what animals are walking around with you guys soon.
Welcome back! Time for another post, This previous week was a very busy for me and I didn’t manage to get too much time out in the wilderness. That being said, I did get a quick opportunity on my way to school late last week down at Esquimalt lagoon. I had my scope with me and had seen some ducks have migrated back into the area and snuck in a little video of a young mallard drake (male). Who was just growing in its adult feathers, at first glance you would almost say its a female but after inspecting the beak and wing pattern you are able to identify it as a young drake.
Alright after trying to get this video to upload for far too long I finally got it to upload. Here is the young drake video I got before school last week. I really like how stable this video was, It’s the first time I’ve had a video stay both stable and in focus for whole time. as I said a little earlier this was a difficult bird to identify, I found this website that is, as the name states “All About Birds”! It was a super helpful website for this video anyways. The page I linked covers only mallards, but the website has hundreds upon hundreds of different bird species. The website does a really good job of having an assortment of visuals like images and videos. It has a bunch of readings and studies and all around is useful for anyone trying to identify birds.
Next up I took this video of this bull elk in the Cowichan valley roughly a week ago. I had troubles with my tripod for this video and realized my tripod leg had actually become loose and while taking the video. The wind never helps either, if you take a close look at the bushes near the elk you can see just how windy it was this day. something cool about this bull is that I found a shed last year which was really similar in size and structure of this animal. For anyone that doesn’t know what a shed is I’ll give you a quick explanation. Antlered Ungulates such as deer, elk, moose, etc. grow a new set of antlers each spring-summer. after this growing period they keep their antlers on for only a handful of months typically anywhere from 5-6 months. After that period of time they loose their antlers through a process called “shedding” when an animal sheds their antlers a common term for them are “sheds” or shed antler.
Now that I gave you a very brief understanding, here is the shed I found last year. if you end up watching the video above closely you can see the bull has 5 points on each antler. exactly the same as the shed I found, meaning the animal that shed this antler would have been similar in age/maturity as the bull I have a video of above. Just a cool little coincidence…
Anyways, That’s going to conclude this post. I look forward to sharing with you next week. Thanks for reading, ~ Alex.
Another week down and I’m back again with a bit of photography. This week was a little tougher for me personally between other commitments and terrible weather when I did finally get the chance to go out my photos aren’t the greatest. I did improvise a little bit and played with some time-lapse (which you’ll see soon).
Now first up I did manage to take a video of this younger bear. Judging by the size of his head compared to the body I’d say it is a young boar (male). I messed around with the video a little bit in Microsoft Clipchamp. I used its software to keep the bear central frame and enlarged the video as well so it fills in the majority of the frame. I played with it forever trying to stabilize the video but it must be a ‘Premium’ feature because I don’t think I had access to do this. Me and my friend spotted this bear from about 265 yards, (~800 feet) and I captured this video through my binoculars hence the shakiness
Alright, Next up like I promised here is my little time-lapse clip I captured over the weekend. I know the content doesn’t entirely fit my topic of outdoor photography but in a sense it does a bit. This previous weekend was the first official full moon of fall. Thankfully we had a super clear sky that evening and I was able to take this footage off by deck. I had a tough time getting my phone to focus and stay focused in this video. This was about my 8th attempt taking a video of the moon. even in this video (which by far was the best), I still had troubles with keeping a clear image. Towards the end the sheer brightness of the moon overwhelms the camera as it tried to stay focused and it unfortunately blurs it out.
All-in-all I really enjoyed the little bit of time I did get to mess around with some photography this week. I put up a couple trail-cameras (motion activated camera) which I hope to capture a couple up close videos of some animals. hopefully in the next weeks post I’ll be able to share some of these. I did actually like my moon video, sure it has some areas for improvement. but it was my first time looking up through my scope so I am happy with it. Down the road I may try something like this again maybe a sunrise or moon rise once the mornings get later and later.
Once again thanks for viewing the blog, I hope to capture some more cool things to share with you guys soon! Take care and until next week
Welcome to my first week of outdoor photography & videography!
A bit of a run down on what equipment I own and what tools/techniques I’ve experimented with. I personally own what’s called a spotting scope. A spotting scope is a large, high power optic similar to a telescope. In order to have a steady and clear image looking through the scope ( or videoing/photos),I then have a I-Phone adaptor which mounts my phone directly onto the scope. the scope must be mounted on a tripod and as stable as possible. This isn’t always the most simple task, a ton of factors come into place and the biggest one is straight up the terrane I’m in. Mainly I’m either on the side of a rocky uneven cliff face or in the middle of a logging slash with endless branches and brush impleading any flat spot I may be able to find. The next biggest is the weather. Weather never seems to end here on the west coast. between high speed winds and seemingly sideways rain someone trying to capture images never gets a break.
I previously spent the weekend a little north or Cowichan lake and spent the day looking for some animals. I managed to come across this cow elk grazing on some Salal ( A native ground bush here in BC). I had a couple problems taking this video which I will address later and focus a bit on how I’m going to improve throughout the year. This video was captured from roughly 440 yards away (1320 feet, or just shy of half a kilometer). so other than the darker streaks through the lenses and the shakiness I am quite impressed with how clear the image came out!
Here’s an image I captured on the previous weekend as well of a young blacktail deer. This image was actually through my binoculars rather than my spotting scope due to how close I managed to get to this guy. Keeping my phone and binoculars steady was the toughest part with this one. I took this image just after a fairly long hike and was definitely out of breath. I also don’t have a good way to stabilize my binoculars or hold my phone in a spot that it can use my binoculars like a lens. I also tend to run out of hands when I attempt to do this. Between holding my bino’s and my phone in just the right spot all the while the animal I’m trying to photograph is carrying on with its day. Nobody did say this was easy I guess….
Next up I want to just touch on a resource I found which I hope can make my imagery a little better for future posts. This is a super well known group of guys on social media, TV and their website which you can find here… https://outdoorsmans.com/blogs/spotting-scopes/digiscoping-tips-and-tricks
They are super passionate outdoorsman who have found a way through videography to make a living. They started with a fairly basic YouTube channel, and now own a great online store and have designed a large amount of different products which they sell nationwide. Anyways, I was reading up on their one blog which the link above will bring you too and it goes over some great things to watch for while attempting to ‘Digi-scope’ (attaching a phone/camera to an optic). In my future post I hope to touch on a few of their pointers and implement them into my photography!
As I touched on a bit in my “A little About Me” page of this website, I do a ton of outdoor activities. most of my time come the fall months are spent in the backroads, Previous seasons I have tried my hand at photographing animals out in the wild. I have juggled a couple different ideas on what my project might be about. But this one just seems to stick with me, I’ve never been very good at it. I usually get a couple of different things which I am going to work on, these include…..
Shakey videos resulting in trouble getting clear vision
Animals out of frame. My spotting scope is finicky on phone position so I am going to work on taking my time with it a bit more
Game camera photos, Game cameras have always been a fun way to get closer photos of animals in their natural habitat.
With these select things in mind I believe I can get better at photography this season. I hope to better share some of my experiences and some of the sights I get to see in my free time. I look forward to sharing with you guys!
