Happy new year to everyone!

I have been very remiss in keeping up any news items or any blog posts. And since it’s the beginning of a new year, I have will make a concentrated effort to share more. I think most of you who visit the site are martial arts folks, so I tend to feel more a need to post something relevant to that, but this last year I have had a heavy focus on photography. I will be including more and more of that here.

So to begin with, a very short recap of the end of 2014.

Many of you know I was in Japan for my usual training trip with Hatsumi Soke. I also took quite a number of pictures. I am just starting to process those now, so in my next post, I will share some images and update you on that trip.

For now, I would like to share a recent photoshoot here locally. Living in Florida now, it’s been great for winter wildlife photography. Many of the northern birds migrate south, so the opportunities in local reserves and parks are terrific. And now many are building nests and preparing for families hatching in the spring. In this post I have captured a bald eagle, sitting on a branch right near Great Herons nesting. The bald eagle and his mate have a nest just a few trees over from the Herons. And lucky for us photographers, it’s all conveniently located along a path!

One particular morning a few of us were set up, cameras focused on the eagle majestically sitting in on his branch. As we know, they have been known to sit for hours, and without warning, lift off and fly away. I have waited those hours, only to blink and they are in the air. Well, this one morning, I lucked out!! I didn’t blink, I was looking through the lens, noticed a slight shift in his position and thought, oh, he’s getting ready to do something. Finger on the shutter I pressed away and was rewarded with the thrill of him leaping up and kicking off the side of the branch and fly off. I have never seen that. Recently a photographer said, all the sitting, waiting, nothing happening kind of day, is paying dues, for THIS MOMENT! So I had to share it with you all.

Please feel free to write a comment. I love to hear from you, and also, what subjects you might be interested in hearing from me 🙂 (If any).