Wild Dog Sentry

[Grant Atkinson]

Canon EOS50D, Canon EF300mmLf2.8is lens, Shutter speed 1/160s, Aperture 2.8, iso800. Color,tone, sharpening, NR in ACR5.6. Some OOF foreground grass cloned out in PS. Cropped to 13mp. Handheld from a vehicle. Location Chitabe, Okavango Delta, Botswana. 02 Dec 2008, 18h20 and overcast.
This single dog was keeping a sharp lookout whilst the rest of the pack were socializing in the background. This meant that the dog stood still for long enough for me to get this shot, despite the slow shutter speed.

www.grantatkinson.com (http://www.grantatkinson.com)

[Marc Mol]

Very nice image Grant, the WD on sentry duty and the pack blur BG are really well portrayed here.
Making good use of SS and aperture.
TFS.

[Egil Droge]

Love the image! Maybe it could be a bit brighter but this tells so much about wild dog behaviour. Always one on the lookout, even, in this case, during a greeting ceremony. I have quite a few images with wild dogs feeding, in most of them there is at least one dog looking around, presumably for danger.
Very well taken advantage of the circumstances, very well done!

[Steve Kaluski]

Hi Grant might be tempted to just tone down a bit of the saturation as it looks a bit bright to me?

Compwise I would have preferred to have all the legs in shot and the dog on the lhs, would then give room for him/her to look into. The 300 is the best tool in Canon's toolbox and this illustrates it well.

TFS
Steve :)

[Grant Atkinson]

Thanks for the advice Steve, I will tone down saturation and see how it looks. Silly question as I am new to BPN, how do I repost (I thought there is a limit of one post per day)
Cheers
Grant

[Grant Atkinson]

Steve, with reference to your comp tips, there was lots of old, dead grass standing right up to the dogs shoulder further to the right, hence my framing as shot...thanks again though
Grant

[Steve Kaluski]

Grant, you should be able to just post it back in on a reply. Suggest you might change the name ie Wild Dogs 2 retaining the original in case you need to revisit it. :)

Steve

[Ignacio Yufera]

Very nice DOF. I love the direction he's looking at, right over our shoulder, IMO sometimes even better than direct eye contact.
Agree with desaturating a little; I find comp not so important since the dog's expression centers all the attention.

[Stu Bowie]

Grant, I like the alert pose, and how are those ears. Im not one for OOF subjects in the BG, but Im going to honest here, it works here, as the whole BG is OOF wild dogs. Steve's hit the main point of the missing legs, and moving to your right would have worked too. Easier said than done.

[Todd Frost]

I love the basic comp but would like to see the legs included also. Love the oof pack in the bg. Well done. TFS
Todd

[Tom Graham]

Agree with Steve about saturation and bright, just a little.
Also as above, like to see legs since they are so unique, long.
FWIW, in Sep of 2009 at Kirkmans Kamp, South Africa, I saw small pack (13) wake up, greet, and start a hunt. Twenty minutes from waking they brought down an impala. That is quicker than I can get my dinner !!! :)
Tom

[Dumay de Boulle]

Lovely image...Tells a story Grant!

[peter delaney]

Great image...

[Sabyasachi Patra]

Nice image. Agree about reducing the saturation and a small crop from the bottom.

Cheers,
Sabyasachi

[Grant Atkinson]

Thanks for all the help here, and the constructive comments. I have desaturated and cropped a little from the bottom, the repost looks better...
cheers
Grant

[Harshad Barve]

nice image and excellent suggations above
TFS

[Morkel Erasmus]

cracking shot Grant...love the DOF and intense stare...repost looks better to me too...
I saw on a documentary the other day the dogs use their painted coats to create the illusion in prey that they are one organism, and I get that feel from the dogs in the BG.