I put together and submitted a short video called "Six Minutes" to the 2010 IWFF held in Missoula, Montana, not actually thinking it would go anywhere, but as a "what the heck". I entered it in both the Music Video and Amateur categories. It didn't make it in the Music Video category, but did advance as a finalist in the Amateur category. The awards have been selected, and although I wasn't selected for a "Best Of" or a "Merit" award, I'm listed as a "Finalist" which makes me very happy for a first ever submission to any film festival. You can see the list of awards here.

http://www.wildlifefilms.org/festivals/iwff/2010_IWFF_Award_Winners.pdf

Six Minutes on Vimeo

Hi Don,

What a lovely well filmed collection of birds.
Loved it very much, no wonder you were a finalist.
Well done.

Mick

If yours didnt win the others must have been too good to be true, yours looks fantastic.

Great photography Don! - Great list of species in there...wow!

great stuff Don, you have a real passion for birds..

Thank you Mick, Martyn, Mat, and John for your kind words and compliments. Quite obvious, birds are also high on my list. Basically, if it's outdoors and it presents an opportunity, I'll film it. I'm not quite sure if it's the challenge or reward, or just being outdoors in a remote location away from urban noise. I did have ~60 hours of XL H1 bird footage to work with, but it was still somewhat difficult making decisions. I have already started planning for IWFF next year, and this one will be a 30 minute documentary, which I start shooting this Friday. Again, thanks....Don

Howdy Don!
Congratulations on your first festival showing. Well done. I would love to hear more about your up-coming project as it progresses. Best of luck!

Congratulations, Don. This is very nice.

Jerry

I enjoyed your film. I need to get lower on some of my birds. It is good to see a different look. Great job.

Ken.

Don,


Really a nice Job!! some of the birds i did not recognise at all but that was alright as it was just geat seeing them.

that is good for your first effort to be a finalist, congratulations.

I always enjoy your clips, but a finished piece is a lot nicer to be sure!!! I loved the red shouldered hawk and the kestrel in particular, and the bright red bird, what ever it was.

Looke forward to seeing more of your terrific stuff.


Dale Guthormsen

Dale,
Thanks for your compliments. The bright red bird is a male Vermilion Flycatcher, almost an annual winter visitor in our area. This one has spent the last two winters in a cemetery in the city of Santa Paula, California, and near to where I live. Again, thanks for all who commented...Don

A great pleasure to watch your film, Don.

It's good to see your condor was still in circulation; what a mighty bird. The lighting seemed remarkably consistent on all your fliers. Posting the grey heron as security at the start had a lovely effect ... it felt safe and privileged to stay and watch the show. Your shorebirds included a few long-distance migrants. Well done and many happy returns.

Nice work, Don; and a great diversity of bird species. Well worth viewing.

Beautiful work, Don. Perfect lighting and everything tack-sharp. Shooting Lewis's Woodpecker in full sunlight, getting the red on the face without burning out the white neck ruff is hard to do. Care to share your technique?

Steve,
Thanks for your compliments. I don't do anything special. I shoot with a XL H1 and Nikon 80-400mm lens with a screw on 2X ND filter if required. I try and stay between f11 and f8, camera mode at manual, 1/60th second, and gain at -3db. I also use a custom preset of my own, and make sure I get a good manual white balance. Many say that this camera is hard to focus with the stock viewfinder, but I don't have a problem with it, good eyes I guess. The Lewis's was shot near Santa Barbara, California, early November about 11:00am and the sun was low and not directly behind me, but off to my right side. I also depend on zebra and I have the level set at 80. That's about it, and again thanks for everyone's positive comments.

Absolutely beautiful work! Good luck on 2010 IWFF !

Karl-David Arvidsson

Don,

Great work, and your custom preset is.......?

Here it is, and I have been using this one for over 2 years.

GAMMA CURVE [GAM] GAM2
KNEE POINT ADJUSTMENT [KNE] L
BLACK STRETCH/BLACK PRESS [BLK] M
MASTER PED. [PED] 0
SETUP LEVEL [SET] -2
SHARPNESS [SHP] 1
HORIZONTAL DETAIL FREQUENCY [HDF] M
HORIZONTAL/VERTICAL DETAIL BALANCE [DHV] 0
CORING [COR] 0
NOISE REDUCTION 1 [NR1] OFF
NOISE REDUCTION 2 [NR2] OFF
COLOR MATRIX [CMX] 1
COLOR GAIN [CGN] -1
COLOR PHASE [CPH] 0
R GAIN [RGN] -1
G GAIN [GGN] -1
B GAIN [BGN] 0
R-G MATRIX [RGM] 0
R-B MATRIX [RBM] 0
G-R MATRIX [GRM] 0
G-B MATRIX [GBM] 0
B-R MATRIX [BRM] 0
B-G MATRIX [BGM] 0

Don,
I tried your settings and still got burn out. My problem is this. I am shooting for a movie (ie, it's going to be integrated with film). The producer insists on a shutter speed of 1/60 for everything. Needless to say, lots of light comes in. I have put in a 3 stop ND filter and set the gain to +3dB. Still not good enough. So I took your settings to the extreme to lighten shadows, thus allowing for a small aperture (f/16 to f/22) for light birds in bright sun. Here are the settings, if you are interested. It works against burnout, but, boy is everything flat. Lo and behold, the movie guys like that!!

GAMMA CURVE [GAM] GAM2
KNEE POINT ADJUSTMENT [KNE] L
BLACK STRETCH/BLACK PRESS [BLK] Stretch
MASTER PED. [PED] +5
SETUP LEVEL [SET] +5
SHARPNESS [SHP] 3
HORIZONTAL DETAIL FREQUENCY [HDF] M
HORIZONTAL/VERTICAL DETAIL BALANCE [DHV] 0
CORING [COR] 0
NOISE REDUCTION 1 [NR1] OFF
NOISE REDUCTION 2 [NR2] OFF
COLOR MATRIX [CMX] +3
COLOR GAIN [CGN] -1
COLOR PHASE [CPH] 0
R GAIN [RGN] +3
G GAIN [GGN] +2
B GAIN [BGN] 0
R-G MATRIX [RGM] 0
R-B MATRIX [RBM] 0
G-R MATRIX [GRM] 0
G-B MATRIX [GBM] 0
B-R MATRIX [BRM] 0
B-G MATRIX [BGM] 0

Steve,
Glad you figured out what worked for you, and especially making the film people happy, which in your case is important. I'm sure you will be interested in what your stuff will look like after it's transferred to film, assuming that is the next step. I, and I'm assuming others, would be interested in seeing a short clip with this preset and the difficult lighting conditions you were confronted with. Again, glad to hear your going forward instead of backwards....