Cheetah portrait

[Sanjeev Aurangabadkar]

A head shot of a cheetah in fading light. I had posted similar one but wider angle which included some more of the body and limbs. Went in tight here to highlight those lovely amber eyes.
7D II
500 II
1/500
f/5.6
ISO 1600

[Mike Poole]

A very clean shot at that ISO in dim light with the 7d2 Sanjeev, nice one.

I live the fact you've managed to get just below the eye level, gives us a nice 'regal' look at him. I don't know what you cropped out, but maybe it would be worth including a little more on the left and below and lose a little off the right for balance. Also I'd consider cloning out the grass stalks as they are a minor distraction.

As you mention the eyes are beautiful, and I think your shooting angle has made the most of this feature and the soft uncluttered BG works well

Mike

[John Mack]

Love the pattern on the cheetahs face nice portrait with a good background.

[Rachel Hollander]

Hi Sanjeev - Great eye contact and nice pov. I think the colors are off a bit, skewing a bit red but with the whites too white. I took it into ACR and adjusted the WB with the eye dropper, dropped the contrast, tamed the whites and highlights slightly and then in PS dropped the blues and opened up the blacks slightly. WDYT?

TFS,
Rachel

[Sanjeev Aurangabadkar]

Thanks Rachel yes your RP looks right to me. Thanks for helping out.

[Andreas Liedmann]

Hi Sanjeev i can understand why you went for the eyes ....but again to highlight the eyes even more is required from my POV.
Framing and the super soft BG is pleasing for my eyes ....I am half way between your OP and Rachel´s RP regarding tone and color .
I think Rachel went too warm and lost some nice tonal structure on the way ....having the fading light in mind .
Just my view

TFS Andreas

[Glenn Pure]

Sanjeev, just back from a trip away so I'm catching up with photos. Another of your wonderful cheetah series. I do think those animals are wonderful. Between you and Gabriela, I'm being spoilt with great photos of these cats. To your photo, I do like the softer whites in Rachel's version but also the colour and richness in your original post. So like Andreas, maybe somewhere between the two? I'm unsure about the cropping here but hard to say much more without knowing what else was in the frame. I think it is the relatively central placement of the head that isn't working so well for me. Overall though, these are not big points. I do love the look of this shot, your POV and the background too. Nice work.