Impala in morning light

[Glenn Pure]

Another opportunity (of many) with the impala. I do think they are very photogenic. The animal in focus is a young male just showing his horns. The light was nice that morning and I tried to take advantage of the soft backlighting effect. Crop is virtually full frame - just a whisker off the right side. Original RAW is pin sharp so hope that has come through here. I've added some midtone contrast to the impala in focus. Thanks for taking a look and posting any comments you may have.

Technical: Canon 80D with Lens EF100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM at 220mm handheld. Manual exposure 1/400, f7.1, ISO 1000 handheld. Processed in Canon DPP 4 (digital lens optimiser @ 50, Sharpness = 3, crop, exposure +0.33EV, shadows lifted a little, default NR) then exported 16 bit TIFF to Photoshop Elements with Neat Image NR plugin where modest NR applied globally plus a hint of sharpening in Neat Image. Sharpened (sharpness function [remove Gaussian blur], radius = 0.4 pixels, 50%) after final size reduction.

[Rachel Hollander]

Hi Glenn - This is a tough one. Sharpness and tones look good. The subject pops nicely. However, for me the comp/crop isn't really working. There are just too many rear ends and sides in the bg. It might work with this type of bg if the principal subject was bigger in frame but if you crop more from the left here you will lose the head of the one walking through which also would not work for me. Sorry.

TFS,
Rachel

Whoops, I forgot to mention that if it were mine I would drop the blues/cyans on the nose area, ears and horns.

[Gabriela Plesea]

Hello Glenn,

The Impala is absolutely gorgeous, lovely detail, colours and sharpness. As well as pose and eye contact. I do have this little dilemma about the composition so I thought I'd "borrow" your frame and see what happened if I tried a square crop. I was afraid that cutting the other impala would be a problem but IMO not such a big issue, however I could be wrong Let me know what you think after comparing the two versions?

Kind regards,

[Glenn Pure]

Thanks Rachel and Gabriela. I appreciate your comments and insights. Rachel, I am still learning to look for those smaller details like the cast around the impala's face so thanks for pointing it out (not very obvious on my monitor though).

As for composition, seems my choice here isn't popular. I actually liked having the other OOF impala in this frame - with the one looking at me in sharp focus only. But happy to accept my preference is not mainstream. Thanks Gabriela for your repost. I feel the impala doesn't have enough room to the left in your version. When I look at providing room for subjects in my framing, I think about whether they will bang their body parts on the edge of the frame if they move. Perhaps a silly way to look at it but that's just me. In the tighter crop, I feel the impala is going to bang his nose on the left edge when he turns, or at least come close to doing so.

[Sanjeev Aurangabadkar]

Hi Glenn, yes a nice subject but a few distracting elements that pull the eye away. Colours and details look good.

[Gabriela Plesea]

Thank you Glenn, I appreciate your answer and reasoning

Keep them coming please,

Kind regards,

[Daniel Grossi]

I absolutely love the tone of this image Glenn. It's a little different from the way I would process it, and is definitely one I can learn from. Rarely do I like a square crop, but I think Gabriela's really works for this image.

[Glenn Pure]

Thanks Daniel and Sanjeev. I value your insights.

Thank you Glenn, I appreciate your answer and reasoning

Gabriela, your crop is growing on me although I would still provide a little more space on the left. It would also move the head to the magic 'thirds' plane. It helps to come back after a little while and look again.