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Thread: Napping Pride

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    Default Napping Pride

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    Taken at Duba Plains, Okavango Delta, Botswana, 10:30am
    Canon 6D
    80-200mm @200mm HH and manual focus
    1/500 f/8 ISO 400
    LR: Highlights full left, shadows full right, tweaked whites and blacks, gradient filter on upper BG
    PS: Lumonosity masks for lights/darks, smart sharpening @50% and .9 pitch
    Topaz Adjust for final touches

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    A killing machine at rest! Beautifully captured, Ed! Judging by the horison - perhaps needing slight CCW rotation?

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    Now that's lion round. I am always surprised, even with the winter heat, how they always seem to like lying on top of each other. Looks a bit tight. I think it needs a bit more space on either side IMO. The LH male's leg seems cut off too. I might also bring the saturation down a bit concentrating perhaps on the yellow and oranges. How do you find the Topaz plugins generally Ed? I have been experimenting with the denoise a bit and am finding it great so far. TFS

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    I like the palms in the image (something different) Nice sharpness on the subjects, good advice from Carl re. colour and space and the CCW rotation from Tobie....TFS Edward

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    Wildlife Moderator Steve Kaluski's Avatar
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    Hi Ed, typical environment of Duba and they like to make the most of the little shade available.

    Apart from the above, there is also a dust bunny in the blue sky, about a third in from the LHS. BTW did you add any yellow? Any reason why you posted so small, you can go to 1200px wide.

    Try to get a better spread across the who Histogram for your Exposure in camera (ETTR), avoiding heavy adjustments in the Exp panel, so the image will have a better IQ.

    BTW who was your Guide, James?

    TFS
    Steve

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    Lifetime Member Rachel Hollander's Avatar
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    Hi Ed - Flat cats, a typical posture for these beasts during the day! Good suggestions above but the most important thing is to get as much right in camera as possible. You shouldn't have to do such heavy adjustments and I wonder whether they are needed or if you are doing so because someone suggested it for your workflow. Maybe post your straight out of camera image as a jpeg in this thread and we can see what the issues are.

    TFS,
    Rachel

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    Thanks all for valuable input. I totally get it and will go back to this shot and try to improve it with your suggestions at heart.

    We watched this pride for some time. We first found them scattered around in the bright open grass. Then the big female wandered over behind this clump in the shade and one-by-one the others lazily followed. Eventually they all just collapsed into a big pile and dozed off just as you see them.

    Steve, didn't add any yellow -- I'm not a good enough judge of color casts to even notice to do that. I don't see the dust bunny right off, but will look for it. The post came out small because I had issues uploading -- the uploader kept saying the dimensions were too large or the file size was excessive so I just did whatever I could to get it to go. I'll work on that.

    Carl, I have several of the Topaz plugins but use only a couple routinely and try not to become too dependent on them. DeNoise is important though because I often shoot at higher ISOs for technical/equipment reasons. ReMask plugin is pure genius and the latest version is brain-dead easy so I use that often to mask off areas for certain local adjustments. I use Adjust mostly to play around and learn about the potential tonalities of an image.

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    Rachel, since you asked here's the original shot SOOC converted from raw to JPEG.

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    Lifetime Member Rachel Hollander's Avatar
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    Hi Ed - Thanks for posting that and I think most of your problems are in your work flow and pp rather than in the field. You exposed to the right and it is a little hot in places. I would start by dropping the exposure -.50 in the raw converter and then adjust the highlight and white sliders until there is no red blinkies showing. You don't really have to adjust the shadows too much, if at all, because the dark shadows and choked areas are in the bushes. You may want to buy Artie's Digital Basics to get a better handle on pp. Shout if you need help.

    Rachel

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    Rachel, many thanks! For some odd reason many of my safari shots came out hot and then I play **** trying to tame it. I'll work on that to the extent I can. Great suggestions. :)

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    Wildlife Moderator Steve Kaluski's Avatar
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    Attached Images Attached Images
     
    Ed, had you set 'Highlight alert' in the menu. Sometimes you can get away with a few 'blinkies' showing, just depends on the situation.

    The post came out small because I had issues uploading -- the uploader kept saying the dimensions were too large or the file size was excessive so I just did whatever I could to get it to go. I'll work on that.
    If you are Exporting from LR then you need to set the dialog boxes to tell LR the parameters to work to, not just crop, but looks like that is now sorted on the above post.

    Exif data says f/1.4?

    Do you use GPS, if not then I might be tempted to switch it off, primarily if you are shooting endangered animals like Rhino, Tigers etc for obvious reasons, but your call.

    Here you go re the 'spot'.

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