Male lion in repose

[edwardselfe]

A nice big (but young) male lion I found over the weekend in the northern area of the Luangwa Valley. It was early morning and there was low cloud so very dispersed light. Struggled to get enough SS at the beginning of the sighting but things had improved by this point.

Comments welcome.

1D4 + 500mm f4
ISO 800, 1/640s, f4

[Steve Kaluski]

Hi Ed, nice relaxed pose and he certainly has that, 'regal' look about him. Lovely diffused BKG and I do like the tones overall, both in the subject & BKG, very complimentary. I think the DOF has worked in your favour and there is enough SS for this stationary lion.

Overall though I do feel it looks a little flat and straight away if you tweak the white slider in Levels to around 224 it lifts/brightens the image, it's just at the point where the whites start to clip. I think you can also explore Selective colour, in the Red, Yellow and Black channels, it just helps to define more the detail in the subject and bring up that lovely main. If you want I can fwd a RP to you rather than posting yet another, your call, just drop me a line with your email if that is OK. I just feel it need some contrast in the whites & darks to bring a bit more life into the subject. It's all in the original capture, it just needs a little more 'extraction' IMHO, but you may wish to wait and get more feedback.

TFS
Steve

[Loi Nguyen]

Ed, lovely lion in soft light and great BG. I see now what Steve said about the image being a little flat. A slight tweak would make this a great image I think. Loi

[Douglas Bolt]

Beautiful creature and nice capture. Regarding Steve's comments, here's one easy approach: make a duplicate layer, change blending mode to Soft Light and reduce Opacity to ~30%.

[Markus Jais]

Great lion shot. I like the pano format. The low angle and the head turn are wonderful. Great warm light and colors.
How did you get so low? Was this from a car?

Markus

[Rachel Hollander]

Hi Ed - a nice pose and the pano comp works well. I would prefer just a teeny bit more room on the lhs. Nice pov too. I agree with Steve that a slight tweak in levels and selective color will take this up a notch.

TFS,
Rachel

[edwardselfe]

Great lion shot. I like the pano format. The low angle and the head turn are wonderful. Great warm light and colors.
How did you get so low? Was this from a car?

Markus

Hi Markus,

Thanks for comments. I was in a vehicle but the lions were on a small mount which we could drive around below them and choose different angles. There was no one else around in this area of the park so didn't have to juggle places with other vehicles.

Ed

[Morkel Erasmus]

Hey Edward. Great angle and that splendid soft light...Steve's right on the money (and way ahead of me time-wise) as usual.
I'd be interested to see you work this one a little and perhaps provide a repost, others may also benefit from it.
South Luangwa is VERY high on my to-visit list!

[Anette Mossbacher]

Hi Ed very nice pose and angle of this young chap. Steve is as usual spot. I also do would love to see a RP when you worked a bit on it more. :))

have a great eve

ciao Anette

[Roman Kurywczak]

Hi Edward,
Love the pose and I like Steve's suggestion of lightening a touch. All in all a fine image!

[Steve Canuel]

Nice color and soft light, I like it as posted.

[edwardselfe]

Thanks all for your comments. Steve K I agree with you and should have spotted that myself, but I also agree with Steve C that I like the soft light and didn't want to over-do it. So I've gone about half way (to roughly 235 on whites) and just 2 on blacks. Does this do it?
Thanks.
Ed

[hennieloots]

Hi Edward. I love the repost. The colors and contrast look great on my monitor. I also appreciate the pose and the low angle just adds to this excellent capture.