Back to colour pix for this one. These were young males that were not too serious about their duel: more of a practice session. Taken in the Okavango Delta, Botswana. I have a few frames from this interaction including some where a bit of dust was kicked up but I liked the body and head positions best in this one. This is most of the frame: just a little off the bottom and right. I didn't do a great deal to achieve this: mainly some minor adjustments in curves.
Thank you for taking a look and any comments you may share.
Technical: Canon 80D with Lens EF100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM at 400mm handheld. Manual exposure 1/640, f7.1, ISO 640. Processed in Canon DPP 4 (digital lens optimiser @ 50, Sharpness = 3, crop, lighting adjustments, default NR) then exported 16 bit TIFF to Photoshop Elements. Sharpened (sharpness function: remove Gaussian blur, radius = 0.4 pixels, 50%) after final size reduction.
Last edited by Steve Kaluski; 10-14-2017 at 06:03 AM.
Hi Glenn you have captured a nice dueling scene ....does look more like a friendly duell.
I like the pose of them both ,and it is good hat the eyes are clearly visible . Tone and color are looking good to me , even if a tiny bit of tonal depth in the subjects would not hurt .
I am 50/50 on the framing , i might like to see a bit more above rather than the space at the foot of the image. A little more sharpening might help for more definition in the subjects .
BTW i do not think that these are Impalas , i would say these are Leechwe ?
Ahhh... bungle on my part - thanks for your correction Andreas. I never paid much attention and I don't think our guide made this clear. I'm sure you are right - these are Red Lechwe. Among other things, horn shape is quite different to impala. Perhaps Steve or another moderator can change the title of the original post.
As for the crop, I agree more on top would be good but I had no frame left. I could add canvas but may be tricky without clever content filling tools.
Hi Glen, I would agree with Andreas's thoughts here.
In addition I feel you were a bit lucky on the SS with these two sparring, the DoF looks spot on, but 1/640 I personally would like more SS to freeze the action, however I know that you said the 80D is not perhaps ideal at higher ISO ranges. Overall the image looks a bit flat and of one tone, now this might be reflective late, overcast afternoon I'm not sure, but tweaking the Exp, HL, Shadows, Brightness and some Colour sliders I feel it adds some more separation. Although not clipped just watch the Blacks don't go too heavy and begin to loose some of the finer detail in and around the eyes, some cracking detailing the horns.
I have to echo Steve's observation and say "cracking detail in those horns" indeed:)
Action well captured, great timing. Love the pose from both protagonists here and the eyes are full of expression. Glad you left some space at the bottom of the frame although a little more at the top would be good, not a big issue though.
Steve's version brings out lovely detail and improves tonality as well as sharpness. I have been on this Forum for a number of years but still learning something with every thread. A pleasure to view, as well as follow the conversations here. Thank you for sharing, much appreciated.
Thank you all for your comments, and especially Steve for his repost. As usual, you've done your magic again here Steve. I will hopefully get there one day but in the meantime, I appreciate all your patience.
Duelling Red Lechwe
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