I downloaded a trial version of Boris FX Optics to see if it is worth purchasing to take my photographs to the next level. I will not buy it. I can do all that Optics offers in Photoshop. If on occasion I want some other presets I have On1 Effects, Luminar Neo and AI, and Topaz Photo AI. What I use the most are Blake Rudis’ F64 Elite panels in Photoshop Zone System Express and Palette Effects Bundle – f.64 Elite (f64elite.com). These buttons in the panels are basically shortcuts to what can be done in Photoshop without the panels. These addons make it faster to get what I want done. Blake’s tutorials explain how they work in detail.
After shopping for food in New Jersey we drove to Greenbrook Sanctuary | Palisades Interstate Park in New Jersey (njpalisades.org), a private nature sanctuary in Tenafly. The feeders behind the office were full of birds. We had a lovely walk to Green Brook Pond and to an overlook of the Hudson River on the Palisades. Photographs labeled Felix are by Marc.
Our small group of Linnaean NY birders led by Richard Z tried to stay cool by hugging the shade on Sunday, July 3. The highlight was a Ruby-throated Hummingbird sitting on its tiny golf ball sized nest at Great Swamp in Morris County, New Jersey. The rest of these photographs were made at the New Jersey Audubon Sherman Hoffman Sanctuary.
“Bamboo Brook Outdoor Education Center, located on 687 acres, was once known as Merchiston Farm and was the home of William and Martha Brookes Hutcheson from 1911 to 1959. Bamboo Brook’s original 100 acres was donated by the daughter of Mrs. Hutcheson. Ms. Hutcheson one of America’s first women landscape architects attended Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s School of Architecture and Planning, along with other famous women garden designers of that time, including Marion Coffin and Beatrix Farrand. …”
Sherry Felix - port4u 