Recycling natural beauty: what ELSE do you do with your observation photos?

I’ve provided many of my better pics to conservation organizations and agencies for use on websites, brochures, informal field guides, etc. Some have been published in field guides and other biological publications. One year I printed several and framed them as a gift to my wife for her office.

Several years ago I picked up a brochure at a wildlife refuge in Hawaii (where I was vacationing) and was pleasantly surprised to see they used a few of my pics from a previous visit there which they obtained from my Flickr site. I was browsing the brochure and thought “These pics look familiar …”

5 Likes

All of my cell phone photos are automatically backed up on Flickr so I like that site for its convenience. The cell pics are all added in private setting.

I’ve also sold and donated publicly viewable photos that I’ve posted there.

1 Like

I paint them (digitally mostly for now)! Without the photos it’s hard to see the details! I have fun sorting through my observation photos for painting candidates and it inspires me to think a little about composition etc when trying to get good photos.

Painting them also helps me learn the anatomy and morphology too, double win!


Source: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/102929168


Source: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/106792375

I sometimes post photos I like to Flickr. Hoping to just inspire a person or two to take interest in wasps :)

20 Likes

Thank you Elliot!

It took me a while to accept that your first picture is not a photo, your art is fantastic!

2 Likes

a link to your blog please?

1 Like

Your paintings are astonishing, so much detail! I’m glad there are people interested in wasps. I also like them, although my main interest is in other taxa so I don’t know that much about them. My favorite wasp species s probably Pelecinus polyturator

2 Likes

Thanks :) Yes Pelecinid wasps are quite unique! Be careful though, once you start looking into unique wasps, you quickly find just how amazingly unique a lot of them are. E.g. Agriotypinae, Cryptanusia, Labium, Trigonalidae, Mymarommatoidea, etc…

3 Likes

This is from his profile: https://www.artstation.com/headsoup

Great stuff!

1 Like

Hey Dan, some great stuff here and on your painting site!

Do you mind me asking which apps you are using for the digital painting? (I got a kind of obsession with collecting these myself.)

I am on IG im a late joiner but have hated how it has turned into videos lately. If i wanted video i would be on tiktok.

I have a FB photography page which basically updates from IG at tbis point as I dont do fb anymore really.

I have mastodon and Flickr but i droped Flickr pro a few years ago with the price hike from $30 to $80/year. I keep my data backed up on HDs so i dont need online storage.

I keep my own website sunguramy.com

I probably share the most regularly on IG / because it mirrors, FB page.

I used to want to work for Nat Geo or such, cave and some nature photography, but decided a few years back i do it for myself and thats enough. Ive won a few competitions both local and international, been published online NatGeo (your shot selection type stuff and editor favs), and even had photos of mine purchased for their books a few times. So I cant be terrible xD but I also have a very different take on cave photog and seem to not do what mainstream wants. Nor do I use fancy kit (currently shooting Lumix Lx100, before 2020 i was using LX3!). Above ground i do use a Pentax KP mostly unless im just shooting iNat obs and use my cell phone with a macro lens clip on.

I keep a cave journal and print it annually so my photos are there. There on my walls, some others walls, ive tried calendars in distant past but often get stuck with 20+ OH YES WANT and then get them in and 2 actually buy. If I ever did it again I would do presales only. I still send to family though.

I am also making my own guidebook for literally every species I find on the land we care for. All my own photog with shorthand ID tips that jog my own memory, as well as where (which likely would only make sense to me or someone who knows our terrain well). But it is for me so I dont care Im writing it for me. It is photography heavy with very few words.

So yeah…the photos I put here get multiple places. Sometimes I wish more, but most days I am content. Ive always loved art (and did scientific illustration for biotech for a while - still do on freelance basis here and there) but I have mostly given up on ever being known for it. It isnt worth my time or energies and i prefer people who follow me just do so 'cause they like my eclectic work. :)

1 Like

I make every year a book with 100 species new to me - mainly as guidebooks for myself. But they keep accumulating. :-)

https://www.blurb.com/user/strick_else

11 Likes

prints fpr myself family and friends mostly.

I’m not confident my photos would fare well in print, I took the plunge just yesterday and took two of them (grey herons) to be printed 30*45cm, we’ll see how that comes out.

I have pretty much zero sense for home decoration, so plastering photos everywhere would be a good substitute (or make me look unhealthily obsessed, which wouldn’t entirely be wrong).

@headsoup Your paintings are absolutely stunning and I love that gecko sketch!

Correct

I didn’t realize that they were that scarce. On the other hand, I haven’t seen any for a few years now. At one point there were three running about our backyard one summer. Way before my first zoom lens though.

My cousin moved to Australia decades ago and a few years ago she came back with her Australian partner for a family reunion. We were all suppressing some chuckle though when the Aussie began running excitedly through the park with her camera to capture some squirrel shots. As always, exotic is a relative term.

Here’s a kind of unusual colour hybrid I spotted this spring for your amusement:

Not a great shot, but an interesting sight.
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/129490175

2 Likes

One of my good friends flipped out when he spotted an Armadillo! He’s from the UK and had only seen them in a zoo - he took off chasing it through the woods to get some good photos. It cracked me up!

4 Likes

I’ve been using Infinite Painter (especially the ‘Wet Marker’ brush which feels very paint-like to me) on iPad. I also tried Procreate but it just didn’t work as well. Hoping to get a nice tablet to connect to my PC someday soon-ish where I’ll use Krita and see how that goes.

Diana was asking Ajott :)

D’oh! Okay, okay. I’ll get tested tomorrow.

IP user? Awesome! My favourite painting/sketching app too. Been using it ever since it first appeared on Android. You should share your blog with Sean, the developer. I’m sure you would quickly be offered a featured artist spot on their blogs.

Have you tried Concepts yet? Amazing vector sketching app. Especially since they added a decent watercolour brush.

Though both of these apps need to add natural color blending. (What about Rebelle? Played with that yet?)

Your stuff is quite inspiring. Thanks for sharing it.

Those books are great! I might try to put one together for myself as a learning tool, though lots of the critters I photograph around me aren’t readily ID’ed…

Thanks, how would I best contact Sean? I don’t have FB/Instagram/Twitter…
I find IP has a few annoying bugs (undo loses it’s place at times, especially when messing with layers/masks, some crashes here and there) but is still great for what I use it for.

Agree on the colour blending, that’s the feature I want to see improve most. Which is why I use the Wet Marker brush as it kinda allows me to do that in a fairly realistic way.

I’ll check out Concepts, it looks pretty cool (especially infinite canvass for practice)! I like playing around with different drawing apps :)