A Spot of Time

[Gabriela Plesea]

Every now and then when travelling through the Kalahari I am granted a spot of time. It is a moment of sublime, one that leaves me feeling small and makes me realise that the universe is far greater than me, that I am here only temporarily and at times so privileged to witness the greatness of nature. I keep returning to this spot of time, always in awe and I often experience an overwhelming desire to worship. The Kalahari is my religion. The exchange, the energy, the emotion I felt when I encountered this creature of the desert still defies my understanding - I should not be surprised or moved by what I see anymore, since I kept visiting the same place until I became part of the landscape.

I let you be the judge here - this is not new, you certainly have seen it before. But the possibilities are endless, each time I cropped and re-framed it felt as if I wrote a new story about the same subject. I spontaneously found this lion to be beautiful as soon as I saw him, and in my mind - even though the context slightly changes each time I touch this image - I can only see his beauty, regardless of the form and shape of my story.

You might not like it, but this is how I saw tonight the glory of his appearance. I know some of you can process this image so much better than me, kindly let me have your thoughts. Image flipped horizontally and a touch of colour. A slightly tighter crop, sharpened before posting at 50%, corrected highlights selectively.

Nikon D3S
Nikon 500mmm F4
ISO 1000
F 7.1
1/1600s

Wishing you all a magic evening,

[Mike Poole]

I'm pretty new here, so haven't seen this shot before. I don't normally like baseless crit, but on this occasion - WOW!

[Gabriela Plesea]

Dear Mike - you are very kind, thank you from the heart. This is one lucky sighting, and I barely manage to give justice to this beautiful lion who almost walked into my lens, so calm and unconcerned about the photographer whose hands are trembling so badly in her excitement to get so close to her subject. Everything was right - the light, the point of view, the distance, the pose. Any good image normally represents those features the photographer believes to be most valuable of a scene - in my case, I wanted to capture everything as a whole, for it was too good to be true. I feel I failed this challenge... For it was a challenge, one can never capture the whole, and just like a painter, one selects whatever defines the subject, or the place, meanwhile I can never be never satisfied these days, I feel like an artist whose work of art has gone wrong, my dilemma being those choices I made about what I should have shown and what I should have left out. All a matter of camera settings, but at the time it felt like I was doing the right thing.



Kind regards,

[Don Railton]

Hi Gabriela, I have just come back from shooting Kangaroos looking for a particular shot/stance that I think might suit the B&W theme. After looking at this image I might just delete everything and go clean the pool... I can never compete with something this good...! Its beautiful, regal, powerful, and so much more and I am so glad you had the chance to capture it.. If you force me to produce a niggle I would say the blury gasses just above you name are a trivial distraction...

regards

DON

PS. IMHO you did this point of time justice, you may never be truly satified with it but we never should be with our endeavors, not unless we want to give them up.

[Rachel Hollander]

Gabriela - powerful words for a powerful image. I have loved each version of this image that you have posted (except the blurred one which I think was the same sighting but a different image :S3:) and this is no exception. You have wowed me again. The eyes just bore a hole in the soul. Only minor points from me, a touch more room above if you have it so the top of the mane isn't cut off and I would dodge the two darker stems in front of the lion near the bottom edge. Well done again!

TFS,
Rachel

[Gabriela Plesea]

Whew, hello Don, I must make sure your praise does not get to my head:bg3:, thank you so much for these kind words.
Talking about Kangaroos, I would absolutely love to have a shot of these lovely guys, unfortunately I can only get a glimpse of them on Animal Planet!
Please do not think of deleting, often one finds a real gem in between the shots of the day. How about a close-up of a Kangaroo? I look forward to see what you got today, Don!
Regarding blurry gasses - could not do anything about it, there was a bit of a breeze and it caused some movement there, I think:bg3:

Kind regards,

[Gabriela Plesea]

Thank you dearest Rachel,

This is a great compliment, coming from you. Your work is exceptional and I have learnt a lot from your images. Still learning!

I had no space at the top, this is almost full frame. I did have some in front of the lion but decided to give him less space than on previous occasions. I have about thirty or so images of him, all taken as he walked towards us, this was shot from only a few metres and the images that follow include just eyes and nose, this is how close he got. I have only a few where he looks right at me. I love enlarging those, I can see the reflection in his eyes:tinysmile_shy_t:

This is not the same sighting as the blurred lion (that was shot this year). It is much older, in fact I think my first post on BPN was this lion. It is now on the cover of a calendar for 2014, I was so happy when they chose him:tinysmile_shy_t:

I see what you mean about the dark stems, will dodge them, thank you. I will do some delicate cloning at the top to make some of his hairs shorter, I am planning to print this on canvas for our study so thank you again for pointing this out, I am so used to this image I cannot see these details anymore.

Hope your Sunday is fun and relaxing, enjoy your afternoon,

[Anette Mossbacher]

Hi Gabriela,

the conversion looks very nice. There is more you can do. What I don't like is the "dodgy" area in front of the lion. The little branches coming up, some sharp more or less, some of the same grass plant blurred. Does not work for me, blur all or none :bg3: Or get the lawn mower out, which would be a pitty for them, they looks nice. Selective you can do that and means a lot of work!

Have a great Sunday

Ciao
Anette

[Gabriela Plesea]

Thank you very much Anette, I will fix the issues you mentioned, will think about it and come up with a solution:w3 There's grass, and also grass with seeds, in the same focal plane with the lion - this everyone can easily see, but there's more grass right in front and everything moving with the wind-this is where the blur comes from. Also, I know it looks odd but those dark thin blades of grass were just as you see them, white on the bottom (yellowish in the RAW), possibly because more grass moving in front of them. Will sort out everything and post the RP!

Enjoy the rest of your evening, I am off to get the lawnmower and do some trimming :bg3:

Warmest regards,

[Sid Garige]

Gabriela,

Majestic subject and wonderful tones. Worked out very well. Agree with Rachel on little more space on the top if available. Liked it very much.

-Sid

[Morkel Erasmus]

Gabriela, I'm loving your experimentation with this theme, soon you'll see how addictive this process can be :5
Like Rachel said, this sighting's images have all of us ogling over it - and the stare here is great (like the flipped version too :tinysmile_shy_t:). Your toning has worked very well here, and aside from Rachel's crits (which I agree with), I would add that you could dodge the eyes a bit more (up to the point right before it starts to look spooky/freaky).

[Neil Burton]

Unlike Morkel :p I tend to dislike over done eyes, if the eyes are wrong the whole shot loses everything. Be careful if you dodge further. ;) Apart from that this is outstanding.

[Steve Kaluski]

Hi Gabriela, I think because we have seen the image in a few options (crop wise) I feel the colour outweighs this and has far more impact and richness, so for me it's hard to comment on this, but I think you have enough feedback to ponder on. :S3:

TFS
Steve

[Morkel Erasmus]

Unlike Morkel :p I tend to dislike over done eyes, if the eyes are wrong the whole shot loses everything. Be careful if you dodge further. ;) Apart from that this is outstanding.

Neil, I also dislike "overdone" eyes, hence my suggestion to do it slightly and not until it looks freaky :5

Gabs, agree with Steve - the colour one still takes the cake for me :cheers:

[Andreas Liedmann]

Hi Gabriela i already loved the color version of this and here i think my emotions are going the same way………… stunning.:cheers:.
I love the soft tonal transitions you have in your conversion , only thing is the blacks does look a bit solid .
But i still wanted to play a bit ….. so here is an RP slightly lighter in the subject and darkened the LRC .

TFS Andreas ,great job, Gabriela

[Gabriela Plesea]

Thank you all so much for comments and suggestions,

I have learnt quite a lot with this post and right now busy browsing through some books - I am beginning to understand what makes a great image when it comes to conversions but I still have to figure out how to achieve what I have in mind. So I am going to find something new to process and give it a try.

Thank you Andreas, I love these subtle changes you have made, so kind of you to take the time to do an RP!

Steve and Morkel, I cannot promise you this is the last you have seen of this lion:t3, but right now I am looking for something different to process, maybe not a mouse or a rat:bg3:, maybe not a jackal:S3:, well, we'll see...

Have a great evening, everyone!!!