A leisurely morning canter

[Hilary Hann]

Somewhere on the border of the Maswa GR and the NCA, Tanzania. The lines of wildebeest can be seen in the hills behind the tree line. This area was very productive for giraffe and we saw large herds with many calves. With the recent and recurrent rains, the plains were quite green.


7D; 300mm; ISO400; 1/500 @ f10

[Morkel Erasmus]

I really like this one Hilary. Great image design, great exposure and detail throughout. I love the dynamic running pose of the giraffe (albeit in a perfect world the head would've been cocked just a tad more towards the focal plane :t3) and the wildebeest on the RHS giving him the inquisitive look.

It's also interesting that that particular WB is facing the opposite direction than all the others making their way to the RHS, making it look like he was for a moment pursuaded to join the giraffe...:w3

[Marc Mol]

Beautiful light, great comp and colour on this fine pano animal scape Hilary, love the stride on the giraffe.
For mine I do find the gnu on the RHS a touch distracting, not a huge concern.
TFS

[Vivaldo Damilano]

Fantastic scene and setting Hilary, love the good detail, the trees and the animals in the BG TFS :cheers: I also agree with above comments on remove wildebeest bottom right.

[Rachel Hollander]

Hilary - I like this a lot and had the exact same reaction Morkel did. :bg3: Well done and looks like it was a productive trip so far.

TFS,
Rachel

[Roger Clark]

Hilary,
I too like this image for the same reasons mentioned above.

It is good to see very green for this time of year, as the last couple of years have been unusually dry in this region. When was this taken?

Roger

[Steve Kaluski]

Hi Hilary, crop real compliments the image well, but my initial thoughts are along the lines of Marc's. I know you have a love of f/10, but I would have suggested going either side. :w3

Nicely processed.

TFS
Steve

[Roger Clark]

Steve,
What is wrong with f/10?

For me, I like the gnu, as it adds interest. The only nit I see is head angle: tilted slightly away. The image would be stronger if the head angle were at least an equal amount tilted toward than away. regardless, still a very nice image in my opinion (wishing I was there--but not to be this season this year).

Roger

[Steve Kaluski]

Roger it's just not a setting I would consider, I would much prefer f/9 or f/11, just personal preference I guess.

[Tom Graham]

I can''t make up my mind about the WB lower right. But think I like it.
"prefer f/9 or f/11"
You can see the difference between f10 and f9 or f11?
Personally, just my opinion, but I think too many of us shoot at f4, f5.6 when f8 or f11 would serve better.
Tom

[Marc Mol]

but I think too many of us shoot at f4, f5.6 when f8 or f11 would serve better.
Tom

Broad statement Tom.......depends entirely on what your subject is.:w3

[Hilary Hann]

Thanks everyone, interesting discussion. Depending on what I intended for the image, the wildie could go but happy with it either way. I have others with different head angles which I'll explore.

As I see it, my modern camera is set up to handle all these f stops efficiently and for this kind of photography I see little advantage in sweating about it. I manually expose, so I'm watching the scene, keeping my focus (back button focus) hopefully where it should be, and adjusting my exposure as it is happening. If I then need to avoid all but the old analogue f stops, I fear that my brain will implode. So until I see strong visual evidence that it makes or breaks an image then it just isn't an issue for me. If I post without exif data, will the slight variation in f stop from f10 to f11 be apparent? Just pondering it all ....

Roger, I'll send you a message re the area. :S3:

[Tom Graham]

One important parameter of fstop is depth-of-field. Landscape photographers "worry" about depth-of-field a LOT. (And so should all photographers).
And no, f10 to f11 is not important. But f5.6 to f11 is - because f11 has two times the DOF as f5.6.
Tom

[Hilary Hann]

One important parameter of fstop is depth-of-field. Landscape photographers "worry" about depth-of-field a LOT. (And so should all photographers).
And no, f10 to f11 is not important. But f5.6 to f11 is - because f11 has two times the DOF as f5.6.
Tom

Tom, of course I know the difference using f stops will make on DOF but that hasn't been the discussion on this image or on a previous one of mine. It has been more along the lines of why don't I stick to the traditional f stops (so go to the closest one) instead of using intermediate f stops. I would hope that everyone commenting on the f stop issue would know that there is a huge difference between f5.6 and f11. But thanks for the contribution, always appreciated. :S3:

[Tom Graham]

Hi Hilary, I was sure you know the DOF difference with f stops, just had to try and clarify for anyone else reading. Maybe a different jargon whether we are Canon or Nikon abusers :S3: . Maybe because on my Nikons I use auto ISO a lot and that requires I set f stop and shutter. Take care and happy safari.
Tom

[Morkel Erasmus]

Thanks everyone, interesting discussion. Depending on what I intended for the image, the wildie could go but happy with it either way. I have others with different head angles which I'll explore.

As I see it, my modern camera is set up to handle all these f stops efficiently and for this kind of photography I see little advantage in sweating about it. I manually expose, so I'm watching the scene, keeping my focus (back button focus) hopefully where it should be, and adjusting my exposure as it is happening. If I then need to avoid all but the old analogue f stops, I fear that my brain will implode. So until I see strong visual evidence that it makes or breaks an image then it just isn't an issue for me. If I post without exif data, will the slight variation in f stop from f10 to f11 be apparent? Just pondering it all ....

Roger, I'll send you a message re the area. :S3:

Interesting thoughts Hilary. I am sort-of in the same boat is you, using manual exposure but choosing my own f-stop and SS (I tend to stick to "traditional" f-stops like 4 or 5.6 or 8 though f7.1 is a favourite of mine :w3) but allowing the camera to vary exposure by auto-adjusting ISO within set upper and lower parameters (200 and 12800 in my case for D3s, 100 and 6400 for D7000). It obviously often happens that the camera chooses a "non-traditional" ISO value. I have yet to see any real difference between the traditional ISO values and the pseudo-intermediate values, although much has been said in the discussion forums on this.

I don't really see how going to f11 or more would've been beneficial here as you will never really get a lot of DOF with a 300mm lens.
It's always interesting to check on DOFMaster (http://dofmaster.com/dofjs.html) what the exact focusing depth was at the focusing distance with the camera/lens combo you used. :t3 you might realise that f5.6 would've been enough, or that f10 wasn't enough :w3

[Hilary Hann]

Truth is Morkel, that I didn't particular choose f11 for any other reason than that I wanted to be above f5.6. Don't trust my focussing skills with moving animals below that, although I don't always stuff it up. I knew that the trees were well out of range, but it's all swings and roundabouts and all in all, I'm fairly happy with my choices. (and I won't be showing the ones where I really made big mistakes! :e3 )

[Grant Atkinson]

The shot works for me, only thing that I would prefer is head angle a bit more towards you, but the giraffes stride is good, and I like all of the wildebeest, as well as the distant tree lines..nice work.
cheers
Grant

[BenBotha]

I like the photograph just as it is. The wildebeest adds dimension to the pic.

Ben

[Harshad Barve]

[QUOTE=Morkel Erasmus;769658]I really like this one Hilary. Great image design, great exposure and detail throughout. I love the dynamic running pose of the giraffe (albeit in a perfect world the head would've been cocked just a tad more towards the focal plane :t3) and the wildebeest on the RHS giving him the inquisitive look.

[QUOTE]
Plus one here
TFS