Box Turtle

• Series: Photo of the Week • Tags: photographynatureturtlesEastern Pennsylvania

In my last photo of the week post, I did my best to outline some of the struggles of wildlife photography, particularly when the subject is skittish or fast-moving.

This particular subject was neither.

Eastern Box Turtle, in profile with shallow depth of field.

So, it was friday night.

I decided to go for a walk because the evening was cool and I wanted to get some exercise and fresh air, after another day cooped up on the laptop in the “home office.”

I figured I wouldn’t see much in the way of wildlife that would be easy to photograph, and had brought just my camera and 45-150mm lens.


And then…

Rear of the box turtle.

I saw much more wildlife than usual, starting with this particular box turtle, who was just sitting quietly in the middle of the path, not far from the house.

I took some pictures, and ran back home to grab my other lenses.

Turtle wasn’t going anywhere, at least not quickly.

And when I came back, I could shoot him close up.

Closer...

Really close up.

Very close on the turtle, with red eye.

But I got my favorite results using a portrait lens with a very wide aperture.

The turtle is moving away.

Maybe, it’s too wide open, and there is too little depth of field in place of sharpness.

But believe me, I could have gone even more overboard. This is me restraining myself.

Photo of the Week: EXIF DATA
Image EXIF data describes
Time StampFriday, June 26 2020
Camera MakePanasonic
Camera ModelDMC-GX85
Focal Length42.5mm
Apertureƒ/2.0 (if I recall correctly)
Exposure Time0.008s
ISO640

I don’t think I really even bothered him that much.

He didn’t go into his shell, and would only turn around a bit if I tried to get him head on.

I suppose he preferred his image to be taken from the back, side, top, etc.

But, I also didn’t want to bother him too much, so I continued on my walk and let him continue on his.

Front-ish angle of turtle picutre.

By the time I returned to where he was, he had disappeared into the woods, probably tired of the paparazzi.

Thanks for reading!

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