I´m recently back from two weeks in South Luangwa, Zambia. It has been a great trip, and Edward Self visited me for a afternoon tea. It was very nice to meet him and meet someone I only know from here in person. This is from an early morning. We were looking at a big herd of buffalos, when we suddenly heard the impalas alarm behind us. We turned around and there this leopard just had caught this impala. The impala was still alive, and while we watched and shoot away with pictures, the impala kicks got weaker, blood start dripping on his neck and the light went out in his eyes. This is just about the moment of death.
Nikon D4
Nikon 600 mm
f7,1 | 1/2000 SS | ISO-900
Cropped slightly top and rhs, adjusted curves, selectively sharpened and a bit lightened.
I stayed at T&T in Mfuwe area. I stayed there from 8th to 22th november. I didn´t go with Ed. But he stopped by for a coffee one afternoon. Really nice to sit and talk to him and exchange experiences, but of course very different he is a professional guide and I am a turist. But our interest in wildlife photography and BPn is the same :) If you are interested you can read and see pictures, in my trip report (that I am halfway through with so far).
Hi Gregor, a CCW rotation I think would help and even a tad less Saturation? Like the choice of crop format and overall composition of the Leopard & kill, just seems a lot of space either side to me.
This is perhaps one of your best images from what I have seen, and I am now referring to processing as well as content. The light is stunning and here we have a leopard on a kill making eye contact with the photographer, as well as a dying impala having one last look at the world - I find this quite dramatic and it moves me. I would have liked the subjects to be a little closer for more impact, have you considered a tighter crop? I am quite sure the IQ can handle it. Congratulations Gregor, and thank you very much for sharing!
Thanks for comments and good critique. I love BPN, here you have to think about what you do with the pictures.
So I did a tighter crop. Now It is a pretty big crop, but IQ holds I think. Generally In my development process I´m in a spot where I go from close ups to include more habitat. I see that I choose cropping different than a while ago. CW rotation I left as is. I thought about this, and I adjusted it according to the horisontal line in the background, this also reflects the real situation (background is horisontal, foreground is leaning slightly from left to right). But maybe the picture is nicer if fg is horisontal? I still vote for having it this way. I still only work in LR. From Raw I did take it down 600 degrees, to make the picture cooler. I like the grass to be yellow and not to much red/saturated. Morning light was warm. To compensate a bit, I have saturation +4 and vibrance +10, moderat I think. In this new version, to try Steves suggestion, I selectively desaturate the leopard -25. I was aware the Leopard looked saturated, worked different versions, but in OP stayed as general settings was (but of course selectively sharpened). I think in op colors on the Impala does not look to saturated. So the saturated look is in my thinking a work of the morning light in the leopard fur. But this is a possibility. I´m not sure what I think. Straight out of the camera the whole picture is significantly warmer.
Moment of death
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