A fine toad

 

Our group ran across this whopper of an American Toad (Anaxyrus americanus) while on a nocturnal field trip in Shawnee State Forest (Scioto County, Ohio) on September 10, 2023. I could not resist making images of the big amphibian, and the toad cooperated nicely as they often do. Of course, I toad her not to move and fortunately she toad the line nicely. I've got scads of toad imagery, but can seldom resist new portraits, especially when the model is as fine as this one was.

I do appreciate the articulating back screen of my camera (Canon R5), which allowed me to set the camera on the ground for the shot and still see the composition by merely folding the screen out and looking down at that. To further ease the task, I have the touch screen set so that when I touch a spot on the screen, the camera automatically focuses on that spot then takes the image. This is all getting almost too easy.

I've spent my fair share of time in pre-articulating screen days prostrate on hard rocky substrates to get on my subjects' level, and that ain't much fun. I have zero qualms about going prostrate for photos and do so all the time. In fact, it's one of my favorite positions for photographing wee beasts, as it's important to be on your subject's level. But going flat on those hard rocky roads with big pebbles jabbing you? No thanks and I'm grateful for camera technology that sometimes makes that unnecessary.