Neil Solomon
Featured Speaker,   June 2006 Meeting

Topic: Great Gray Owls of Northern Minnesota

BIOGRAPHY

During the winter of 2005, Great Gray Owls descended upon Northern Minnesota from the boreal forests of Canada in unprecedented numbers. This phenomenon, which occurs periodically, but unpredictably, provided a unique opportunity for observing and photographing North America's largest owl. Images of the Great Gray Owl in this winter habitat will be presented and the challenges faced by the photographer in capturing these images will be discussed.

Neil Solomon was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York. His interest in birds started as a ten year old watching Black-capped Chickadees feed on the seeds of giant sunflowers in a neighbor's yard. Some years later, after obtaining a graduate degree in Mechanical Engineering, Neil ended up in San Diego and is still here 30 years later. He dabbled with photography, mostly landscapes, until 2001, when he purchased his first digital SLR. After taking a local bird photography workshop in 2002, he became passionate about photographing birds and is often asked what his favorite bird is to photograph--it is the bird he is photographing at that moment! For Neil, the photographic process is as much about observing the behavior of the birds as it is about pressing the shutter button.

Today, he travels whenever he can, near and far, in search of birds to photograph. His equipment consists of the Canon 1DMkII body and the Canon 500mm f4, Canon 300mm f2.8, and Canon 100-400mm IS lenses.

You can visit his website at: www.nsolomonphoto.com