Luangwan leopard

[Marc Mol]

Thought I'd get a themed image in before closing time

A young male leopard relaxes on the upper bank of the Luangwa River after a long hot day that is so typical during the extended dry season here.
One bonus for this time of year is the lack of grass to interfere with portraits.
My vehicle was positioned on the dry riverbed allowing me this nice & low POV.

South Luangwa Nat Park- Zambia.

D4s 500f/4 VR 1/500s f/6.3 ISO800. Almost F/F, levels, curves, mid tone adj, in ACR & PSCC.

C & C most welcome

Cheers

Marc

[Gabriela Plesea]

Hello Marc

Been waiting patiently to see what you brought back from your last trip - well it was certainly worth the wait! The intense stare from this leopard would grab any viewer, DOF spot-on, great IQ and sharpness where needed- image well processed and presented

Beautiful young male, his nose still pink and he is in such great condition, what a joy to view this image tonight - well captured, thank you Marc for sharing, looking forward to more!

Kind regards,

[Rachel Hollander]

Hi Marc - Nice pov and look at the male leopard. Interesting that he seems to have 2 different eye colors or maybe it is the way the light is hitting the eyes. The midtones and blacks seem a bit strong to me. If it were mine I would open the midtones up slightly.

TFS,
Rachel

[haseeb badar]

Hello Marc ! This is an incredibly sharp image . Nice low angle here, I liked the tones here, only the purplish leaves or shrub in the BG is slightly distracting especially on the right hand side of the image.

[dankearl]

I think this is just gorgeous...
The eyes look fine to me, I would just smooth out the BG a bit....

[Morkel Erasmus]

Lovely low angle, dappled light and intense stare here.
I like the contrast as posted, but would be keen to see the midtones opened up as per Rachel for comparison...

[Sanjeev Aurangabadkar]

A very nice image Marc. I like the comp, the details and the stare you got here.

[Marc Mol]

Appreciate the comments everyone, many thanks.

Hello Marc

Been waiting patiently to see what you brought back from your last trip -

This was actually taken on my previous trip to SLNP in Nov, Gabriela and have just started processing my files from my last trip to Tanzania.

Interesting that he seems to have 2 different eye colors or maybe it is the way the light is hitting the eyes. The midtones and blacks seem a bit strong to me.

Good pickup on the eyes Rachel, this male did have two slightly different eye colours, his right had a more turqoise tone than his left. I agree that this downsized web jpeg has choked blacks, yet
on my processed TIFF file it is fine, not sure why that is and would pay to check my histogram before submitting. Perhaps Andreas may have an answer for this??

only the purplish leaves or shrub in the BG is slightly distracting especially on the right hand side of the image.

The purple colour in the BG is actually the beautiful flowers from the rain tree that was blooming at the time and for me add a little extra to the scene.

[Andreas Liedmann]

Hi Marc great low angle with a look right in the face , nice comp and overall good color /tone combo .

TFS Andreas

[christopher galeski]

Beautiful image,like the comp,good sharpness and light.

[Dumay de Boulle]

Fantastic image, one of the best processed images of your i have seen. Colours look great and the sharpening and IQ is perfect. Lovely clean surroundings as you have mentioned. Great stuff Marc!

[D. Robert Franz]

Great eye contact. Love the spot lighting! Great image for sure!