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Thread: Mating Games !

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    Default Mating Games !

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    This is a very special Tiger sighting for me as for the first time I was able to see a Tiger at Pench National Park ( Maharashtra Side of Pench ) which is the underrated part of the famous Pench Madhya Pradesh. The difficult topography and extreme shy nature of the cats in this part of the jungle makes every single tiger sighting a very memorable one.

    Camera Details : Canon 1D MK IV , Canon 300mm f 2.8 IS II lens, beanbag, Tv:1/800, Av: f/4.0, iso: 800, Evaluative Metering, Aperture Priority Mode.

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    Congrats on the sighting Haseeb. Always special when you see two of them! Nice to see both facing you and the pose is cool. Wish it wasn't next to the road but I understand the nature of our forests, well done.

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    Lifetime Member Andre Pretorius's Avatar
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    Hi Haseeb

    Wonderful capture, wish I could see them in the wild!

    Agree with Sanjeev about the road, but they use it, just the same as us. This animal is so rare, any clear sighting is a bonus!

    Did you isolate or use a mask on the two faces, looks a bit too clear and not like the environment around them. Maybe blurring the mask might help?
    Last edited by Andre Pretorius; 03-11-2015 at 01:47 PM.
    Regards

    Andre.

    www.gappimages.com

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    BPN Member Andreas Liedmann's Avatar
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    Hi Haseeb agree with the Sanjeev and Andre regarding must have been a great sighting .
    The road is bit unfortunate but as this is a tiger shot it is not weighing that heavy for me. Would love to see that in real life .

    Image lacks a bit of mid tone and i agree with Andre that the faces do look a bit pushed too much compared to the surrounding .

    TFS Andreas

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    Lifetime Member Rachel Hollander's Avatar
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    Hi Haseeb - What an exciting sighting! Great that you can see both faces and the heads don't intersect. I agree with Andre and Andreas's observations and also there is a cyan cast to the foliage and to a lesser extent in the whites of the tiger. An easy fix if you are so inclined.

    TFS,
    Rachel

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    Thank u Sanjeev, Andre , Andreas and Rachel, can anyone of you please rework on it for midtones and correct the mask . I really dont understand the midtones concept :(

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    BPN Member Andreas Liedmann's Avatar
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    Hi Haseeb - i could do that for you , but i stay away from it for the moment .
    I would suggest to you just google - mid tone contrast - there are so many tutorials on Mr Google on that , believe me . we all have different ways to deal with the mid tones , mine are rather complex i heard . So if i start to explain i guess you have difficulties to follow me , and that is not good .
    So for the start you have to know your file , and how to isolate the various tones in the image to treat them individually i.e. darken /lighten /more contrast /less contrast.

    To find out more about the so called luminosity and the values that comes with the luminosity within an image , just google Tony Kuyper he offers some actions and also info on the basics of how to deal with the luminance within an image. In the beginning it does seem very difficult but it is actually not that difficult .

    If you just want to push your mid tones without thinking and knowing what is going on , just google Hougaard Malaan from him you can get an action called "Magic Midtone Contrast " , but than you do know what is going !!! But the action itself is working quite nice , not on every image though.
    Are you using PS i guess , because this is an Photoshop action.

    Hope this helps a bit , btw there are hundreds of ways to skin this cat called : mid tone boost or mid tone contrast all have their advantages and disadvantages . Cheers Andreas

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    Wildlife Moderator Steve Kaluski's Avatar
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    Hi Haseeb, great sighting and what a privilege too.

    I like the overall composition, but for me it's all about the Tiger in the BKG straining 'her' neck around the walking male, that look is priceless, likewise your timing, the two units work extremely well. Personally I'm torn between as shot with the habit and wishing you had popped a 1.4 on and shot tighter. Overall the image looks 'thin', lacking tonal depth, with the blacks & whites being quite punchy & contrasty. I think/feel there is a lot more you can do with the RAW without having to go into more 'complex' adjustments. Andreas is absolutely correct, to try and explain the process would not only be very hard, but perhaps also difficult to understand. You need to have a good grasp of Layers, Masks & Channels within PS to start to get to grips with Midtones & Luminosity masks. If you are proficient then what these guys teach you will, in some part be quite easy to understand and implement, however, it's the 'knowing' of what to use to achieve the final result is the tricky stage and does take a little time.

    Everything I have done to the image was within LR (same module as PS, camera raw), hence my point about utilising what you have, although I've pushed it a bit more only to illustrate my points. I could be wrong, but I get the scenes of late afternoon, with the light coming from the RHS, therefore you get that richness of colour on the female and along the ridge of the back, his face would therefore be in shadow and so the whites would be rather 'flatter' like the side of the belly, not bright white. I've cropped the tree out, thought it looked cleaner and gave more emphasis to the two Tigers, but it now may be too tight? The road, well it's there nothing you can do, but sweeping round does seem to be better than a straight road IMHO.
    Keep your images coming, it may encourage people to see them in the Wild and realise they are more important in the habitat, rather than on a wall.

    TFS
    Steve

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    BPN Member Andreas Liedmann's Avatar
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    Hi Steve , thanks for your support of my thoughts , you took it a bit further , for you it is easier to do so cause of your better wording !!!
    I do find this rather complex to explain without knowing Haseeb`s skills in image editing !! As you know i tend to expect more than is actually there from time to time , so asked myself where to start and where to stop so i decided to give a very rough direction . With your addition it would be a better starting point .


    Cheers Andreas

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    Andreas, it's far better to watch a tutorial on a lot of PP stuff as it is, as you say, quite complex in parts and so trying to put fingers to keyboard without missing a step, or in 'plain' English would be extremely hard. As I said Haseeb, without knowing how far you are in the PP it's difficult to know which other areas you should look into, I still feel that having a good grasp of the RAW converter & PS will provide the best platform, only then would I suggest exploring other arenas to bolster your arsenal of tools.

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    Story Sequences Moderator and Wildlife Moderator Gabriela Plesea's Avatar
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    What a wonderful sighting, Hasseb!

    I viewed this image with much interest and also read everyone's comments, decided to give it a try as well and this is what I came up with. I used curves and levels in PP and played a bit with saturation.

    Really looking forward to see more images from you,

    Kind regards,
    Gabriela Plesea

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    What a sighting!!
    I agree on the initial crits - last repost works best for me...
    I too find the big cats in the roads often, and it doesn't stop me from taking photos of them :)
    Morkel Erasmus

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    Thank u Steve , Andreas, Gabriela and Morkel ! I am must say the image looks much much better then the OP. I liked both the versions of Steve and Gabriela and will try my hand in achieving the similar result .
    It was a hazy morning and thn when the sun came out, the thick forest of Pench revealed a lot of shadows from RHS of the pair , I really made a mistake of not putting on a T.C. but that happens i guess with tigers in front of you. I will try to keep a calm head next time if i witness something like this and try to achieve everything perfect on the field.

    As far as PP is concerned , i have recently started to use the Layers and Masking , and have learned a few things. I will post the next image from the same series with similar light and conditions. Thank you everyone for your suggestions and versions of this image.

    Haseeb.

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    Hi Haseeb, if you get it right 'in camera' i.e. Exp, DoF, SS then this will provide an excellent platform to work from and will also help with the Blacks & Whites because you can avoid clipping them. Keep checking your histogram and try to get a good spread across the axis, don't use the screen for colour, only composition. In doing so, less time with any PP and more time out in the field.

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    I think Gabrela nailed it colour wise. Lovely look back pose and the angle of the youngster is great. Nice one!

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    Hello Everyone ! Sorry for the late reply on this . I have tried to process it once again according to the feedbacks and Steve's and Gabriela's version. Thanks for all your inputs :)
    Haseeb.

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    Wonderful work, Haseeb! I am so glad you did an an RP - to me the colours here look much more natural and the sharpening is spot-on

    In the future try to watch out for the blacks, e.g. tail, muzzle, those soft cushions underneath the paws, belly etc. - they can easily become chocked during processing if you are not careful with the sliders. Since the subjects are some some distance here it is not a big issue, but with close-ups it is essential to get a bit more detail where possible

    I really appreciate that you took your time to rework this, such a special image! Now you can go ahead and print it

    Kind regards,
    Gabriela Plesea

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    Thanks a Lot Gabriela for the encouraging words :)

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