Opportunity or threat?

[Jay Shah]

Many thanks for comments and viewing the previous image.
Yet another B&W image.
Cheetah mom intensenly scanning the surroundings for threat and dinner. Masai Mara.

Nikon D850 600 mm
1/1000 f4 ISO 3600.

Lookign forward to C&Cs.

[Jonathan Ashton]

Hi Jay, sorry buddy but this isn't my cup of tea. It looks rather stark to me, I think it is the almost pure blacks and whites on the body and the very grainy looking head.

[John Mack]

The pose on the leopard are nice also like the mound it is on. The black and white treatment doesn't work for me here. Im sure this would look good in color.

[Andreas Liedmann]

Hi Jay ... the cheetah i looking like that " GRUMPY CAT " that was floating around the web some time ago ....LOL.
I do like the pose and the overall clean look of the image .
But in terms of IQ / conversion and tonality it does not work . Wonder about the IQ with the 850 .... i think it must be your way how you process the files .
Just a thought from my side .
Try a slower sensitive approach ....

TFS Andreas

[Rachel Hollander]

Hi Jay - I have to agree with the above comments. The pose is nice but the conversion doesn't really work. If you want to shoot me the RAW I can take a look at it over the weekend and try a conversion.

TFS,
Rachel

[Jay Shah]

Hi Jonathan, John,Andreas and Rachel, many thanks for your comments. Thanks to your comments, now I see couple of issues with this image which I did not see before posting. One is: there is not much information available on PP of wildlife image. So when I tried to apply "rules" for B&W images from other genres, it does not work as you have pointed out. Also, I went from Colored PP Tiff file to B&W conversion and some more PP which destroyed IQ. I just posted another image where I have addressed these issues. Will be eager to see what you think.

[Andreas Liedmann]

Hi Jay .....what " rules " have you applied to this shot ? I think there are no rules as such , and every image is different . And need to be processed differently !!!!

[Jay Shah]

Hi Andreas, yes you are right. What some of the "specialists" of B&W images recommend is to clip, albeit slightly, HLs & Shadows to increase contrast. Now this may work for Archtiectural image or landscape, for wildlife, as I later realized may rob image of the details on the subject.