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Betsie Storm
11-29-2009, 03:10 PM
Cape buffaloes (Syncerus caffer) are gregarious and fun to watch, especially the cute calves. These two youngsters look like they are practising for settling future dominance issues. This image was taken in Hhluluwe-Imfolozi game reserve in RSA's Kwa-Zulu Natal province. This reserve is renowned for their contribution to black rhino conservation. Hhluluwe-Imfolozi is probably the best place to see the elusive black rhino as well as the white rhino, the rest of the big 5, numerous other species including the handsome nyala antelope and large numbers of bird species. Another of my favourite places in our beautiful country.:)
Full size image with selective levels & curves adjustments, some warming, vignette & sharpening. It is meant to be a natural history image and I did not remove any elements from the image. C&C welcome as always.
Exif:
Camera Model: Canon EOS-1D Mark II N
Date/Time: 2008:05:04 10:39:26
Shutter speed: 1/400 sec
Aperture: 7.1
Exposure mode: Manual
Flash: Off
Metering mode: Spot
ISO: 800
Focal length: 500mm

Morkel Erasmus
11-29-2009, 03:46 PM
nice interaction here Betsie, and great exposure. I still need to visit this reserve!! :)

Danny J Brown
11-29-2009, 06:24 PM
.....and a nice natural history image at that. I like the sweeping tail on the right and of course the birds are a real bonus. The tallgrass in the background is very nice as well. Overall, a very pleasant and interesting image. Thanks Betsie.

Harshad Barve
11-29-2009, 09:03 PM
Beautiful image , lovely interaction and spot on exposure,
TFS

Stu Bowie
11-30-2009, 01:12 AM
Hey Betsie, good central placement of the two youngsters. I like the softer light, which in turn has brought out their detail nicely. Both sharp, and the oxpeckers add to the image. Great image.

Morkel Erasmus
11-30-2009, 01:44 AM
looking again now Betsie it seems you applied some blur to the surroundings? the reason I say that is that there's a difference between the sharpness and look of the grass all around the legs but right next to the legs it's sharp?

Marc Mol
11-30-2009, 02:35 AM
Very nice symmetry here Betsie, just need to clean up your sharpening (around the legs) in layers, as Morkel has also suggested.

Betsie Storm
11-30-2009, 03:43 AM
Thanks everyone for kind comments!
Morkel- well spotted, I never saw that, now it jumps out at me:o. Guess it's the result of late evening pp'ing...my normal sharpening workflow is to do a few runs of "smart sharpen" on a bg layer of the resized image, then a new bg layer with NR, erase the subject on the NR layer, flatten....you saw the result of some very sloppy erasing round the legs & tail.....:eek:
Thanks for mentioning, will check properly and fix the resized file.

Steve Canuel
12-01-2009, 02:29 AM
They do look relaxed which is accentuated by the soft light. Colors are nice as is the comp.