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Thread: Terminated thommie

  1. #1
    Lifetime Member Marc Mol's Avatar
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    Default Terminated thommie

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    This young Thompsons gazelle had it's life terminated by a mother cheetah on a mission to feed her 2 cubs.
    I was fortunate to document the entire chase & capture sequence and will add some more frames in the sequence forum, hopefully soon.

    Not quite possible at this web resolution unfortunately, but one can see our vehicle in the eye of the thommie.

    Granted it's a little tight on the RHS, but mum's front paw was coming into play.

    Ndutu/Serengeti- Nth Tanzania

    D4s 500 f/4VR + 1.4tcIII f/6.3 1/2500s ISO800, cropped to 4/5 ratio. Ben bag from front pax seat, curves, levels, TK adj, PS CC '15 & ACR.

    C & C most welcome

    Cheers
    Marc
    Last edited by Marc Mol; 10-04-2015 at 12:06 PM.


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    Hi Marc, quiet a stunning close up depicting life and death in the bush. Great detail, dof, colours and comp. I am fine with the tightness on the RHS.
    look forward to more.
    cheers,
    sanjeev

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    Lifetime Member Rachel Hollander's Avatar
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    Hi Marc - A very poignant image. Agree with your self-critique but not a deal breaker by any means. If it were mine I would reduce the blues, particularly in the whites. Well done

    TFS,
    Rachel

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    BPN Member Morkel Erasmus's Avatar
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    A grim and effective portrait, Marc.
    Cannot fault the advice already given - I quite like the portrait framing here.
    Looking forward to that sequence!!
    Morkel Erasmus

    WEBSITE


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    Hi Marc -- Absolutely stunning ! I loved every bit of it , such images makes one to admire the scene rather than looking for small nits if any , agree with the suggestions above but a magnificent image overall . TFS !

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    Lifetime Member Marc Mol's Avatar
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    Appreciate the comments everyone, many thanks.

    Quote Originally Posted by Rachel Hollander View Post
    Hi Marc - A very poignant image. Agree with your self-critique but not a deal breaker by any means. If it were mine I would reduce the blues, particularly in the whites. Well done

    TFS,
    Rachel
    Hi Rachel, please don't take this as a whinge,

    but having 3 (2 x 24" HD Dell's 1 x 27" NEC SpectraView) monitors matched to my PC desktop plus my 15" Mac Retina which are all regularly calibrated, I'm really struggling to see
    any hint of the blue cast in the whites here, I'd like to know what monitor you are viewing this image on, I'd just like to clear this issue up as it's not the first time it has been raised mostly by yourself.

    I always make it a point to double check any colour cast issues prior to posting here on the very keen eyes of fellow BPN' ers.


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    Story Sequences Moderator and Wildlife Moderator Gabriela Plesea's Avatar
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    Dear Marc,

    Awesome capture!

    I too see some blues... Just run a sat layer on the blues?

    Blue Channel saved as a selection in the screen shot above.

    I only have one monitor but calibrated it on Saturday with Andre's Spider 4.

    Kind regards,
    Last edited by Gabriela Plesea; 10-05-2015 at 04:22 PM.
    Gabriela Plesea

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    Lifetime Member Marc Mol's Avatar
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    Thanks Gabriela

    I do appreciate your input

    However, one still has to look for this issue, I guess my point is that what one sees as a blue issue might not be an issue for another, once you remove the perceived blue in whites you're left with a washed out/bleached colour that does not reflect the cool late afternoon lighting/conditions in which this was captured, just my opinion and all very subjective.
    To my eyes at least, this is not an obvious colour cast issue.

    All too often we are looking for colours (often subtle at times) that appear naturely for the given lighting conditions and immediately believe we must remove them.

    Interested to hear other members opinion on this.
    Last edited by Marc Mol; 10-06-2015 at 02:23 AM.


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    Lifetime Member Rachel Hollander's Avatar
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    Hi Marc - Sorry to be late getting back to you. I also have a Dell HD Monitor and a IPS screen on my laptop calibrated at least monthly as well. The blues were immediately apparent to me on both screens as soon as I looked at your image. I do take images into PS to verify if it is blue, cyan or both (similarly if it is magenta or red, etc) but only raise it when a color issue appears to my naked eye on viewing. While yes, sometimes there are color casts in nature e.g. blues in ice or in shadows, personally I thought the blue looked unnatural in the whites here which is why I said I would reduce them if they were mine because I thought it would improve an already excellent image.

    I'm not sure why I saw it and you didn't but I do understand that people see colors differently so perhaps this is something that I have more sensitivity to than you. However, in addition to Gabriela seeing it, I also understand from Morkel and Haseeb's comments agreeing with the advice and suggestions given that they also saw it because my suggestion to reduce the blues was the only suggestion made. I may be wrong and they should feel free to correct me if I have misinterpreted their comments.

    In the end, whether or not to reduce the blues in the whites is something that is totally up to you. As you said, many of these choices are subjective.

    Thanks for the discussion,
    Rachel

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    Lifetime Member Marc Mol's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Rachel Hollander View Post
    Hi Marc -

    I'm not sure why I saw it and you didn't but I do understand that people see colors differently

    Thanks for the discussion,
    Rachel
    I'm not sure how old you are Rachel, I'm heading towards 60.......but it could be my aging eyes and really hate having now to pickup any glasses when reading or on the PC

    Head on over to Gabriela's great Sequence forum to see how the chase scene played out:

    http://www.birdphotographers.net/for...pson-s-Gazelle

    Cheers
    Marc


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    Story Sequences Moderator and Wildlife Moderator Gabriela Plesea's Avatar
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    Dear Marc,

    When I receive comments about colour casts (as well as other issues), I have a number of choices: to agree with the issue and try correct it (that happens often in my case), to disagree (but then I have to demonstrate my point, LOL), or to say "yes I see it, thank you, it is there but I like it for this and that reason". I do look for issues in my own images before posting, I also look for them in other members' posts. And especially when I see a "C and C most welcome" below the image presented, which invites me, or rather gives me permission to critique - it translates into an expectation of me to cover a number of technical and other aspects of the photograph in question.

    This amazing capture you have here is unique and impossible to ignore - as soon as I saw the thumbnail I opened it with great excitement. And wet my lips in anticipation of a Story Sequence, of course:) Marc, to me the amount of blue in places detracts from the "feeling" of the scene making it cooler, and somewhat less effective. I did feel bad about jumping to this issue before I told you how impressed I was about some technical aspects which added strength to the image (eg. proximity of subjects, framing, etc.). But I thought you really could not see the issue, so I took the image in PPCC to have a proper look and then showed you my findings.

    So important for us all to convey feeling: positioning of subject in the frame, symmetry or lack of it, cropping, determining whether the lighting and colours contribute to the meaning, the message. I do not always produce the goods but I keep trying, and count on your help in the form of critique. And while I remain humble about my abilities to produce work that "grabs you", I continue taking great pleasure in your work, as well as others' - as long as I am free to express my humble opinion.

    Kind regards,
    Last edited by Gabriela Plesea; 10-06-2015 at 01:08 PM.
    Gabriela Plesea

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    Lifetime Member Rachel Hollander's Avatar
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    Hi Marc - Sounds like your eyes have about 10 years more use out of them than mine.

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    BPN Member Andreas Liedmann's Avatar
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    Hi Marc a very powerful and nicely tight cropped image ........ just going in the face , so well done .
    For me the colors do look ok at first look , but i agree that there is tiny bit of blues coming through in the whites and the darks , mostly visible in the horns of the Gazelle . But this is no big deal for me at this stage , but agree if i wanted to print it i would try to be 100 % correct from my perception .
    What i do miss though is the critical sharpness here in this low res file , i would expect finer and sharper detail from a Nikon 4DS .

    Regarding your and Rachel color impressions differ somehow , i would at first ask you guys , have you set up your screens both to the same color temperature ? are you having the same screen ? are you having the same color LUT ? are you using the same color meter and calibrating software ? are you having the same ambient light in your darkroom ?
    So all are variables which may and will differ i guess , do not forget that .

    Gabriela why did you use the blue channel for the selection ? what was the idea behind it ? if you use the blue channel as a single channel it is just grey , got nothing to do with color in this stage !!! You could have selected the RGB composite with the same effect you just select luminance values with the blue channel no colors .
    If you want to select colors use the color selection tool .

    Hope you folks do not mind jumping in late to this discussion .

    Besides the technical small issues , great work Marc

    TFS Andreas

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    Lifetime Member Marc Mol's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Andreas Liedmann View Post
    Hi Marc a very powerful and nicely tight cropped image ........ just going in the face , so well done .
    For me the colors do look ok at first look , but i agree that there is tiny bit of blues coming through in the whites and the darks , mostly visible in the horns of the Gazelle . But this is no big deal for me at this stage , but agree if i wanted to print it i would try to be 100 % correct from my perception .
    What i do miss though is the critical sharpness here in this low res file , i would expect finer and sharper detail from a Nikon 4DS .

    Regarding your and Rachel color impressions differ somehow , i would at first ask you guys , have you set up your screens both to the same color temperature ? are you having the same screen ? are you having the same color LUT ? are you using the same color meter and calibrating software ? are you having the same ambient light in your darkroom ?
    So all are variables which may and will differ i guess , do not forget that .

    Gabriela why did you use the blue channel for the selection ? what was the idea behind it ? if you use the blue channel as a single channel it is just grey , got nothing to do with color in this stage !!! You could have selected the RGB composite with the same effect you just select luminance values with the blue channel no colors .
    If you want to select colors use the color selection tool .

    Hope you folks do not mind jumping in late to this discussion .

    Besides the technical small issues , great work Marc

    TFS Andreas
    Thanks Andreas

    Some good and valid points on colour cast and calibrating your monitor

    Regarding sharpness quality for this web resizing I did not use any sharpening at all, this would be the reason and remiss of me not to do so.


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    Lifetime Member Rachel Hollander's Avatar
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    Thanks Andreas, of course you are correct about additional factors that affect calibration and viewing. This has been a good discussion without hijacking the thread too much.

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