Over There

[Rachel Hollander]

Taken at the lower platform near Brooks Falls, Katmai National Park, Alaska in the afternoon. The bear was looking at another bear approaching from the distance. He's a youngster so his fur is in the process of changing to darker color.

Canon 50D
300 f2.8 plus 2x tc
1/1000
f5.6
ISO 200
Tripod, slight crop, eyes lightened, slight s/h, contrast, sharpened

C&C welcome and appreciated. Thanks,

Rachel

[Katie Rupp]

Hi Rachel, I like the dof perspective that comes from the sharp foreground, the water in the midground and the oof bg. The pose is great; I just finished working on a similar image of a bear in Lake Clark NP and it struck me that they are always on alert for potential trouble.

[Hilary Hann]

Hi Rachel, I like the pose and the way you've composed the image. The background is complementary. Only the softness of the bear reduces the impact of the image for me. Could be a function of the 2x converter … I've never had a lot of luck with super sharp, crisp images using that converter.

[Stu Bowie]

Rachel, your comp works well, and I like the layered BG. Good pose from the bear, looking into lots of space. My dream is to actually see these guys in the wild like this.

[Morkel Erasmus]

nice composition Rachel although I would like to see a little less on top. the softness of the bear mentioned, could well be a result of the 2x TC - it looks more like a lack of detail than outright softness, so I'm not sure mere sharpening will help? :(

looks like the light was also on the harsh side?

[Harshad Barve]

nice pose and suggestion here
TFS

[Robert Amoruso]

I like the all grass FG and BG you were able to get him in as well as the diagonals created by the grasses. Transitions from the FG to BG grass adds depth to the image. Bear looking back also works well as it is very obvious that he is concerned with something in the distance. You left a good amount of room in the front for him to look into. Nice work getting a different type of image at that location.

[Rachel Hollander]

Thanks all for the comments. I went back to the original RAW file and applied more sharpening before conversion to TIFF. Let me know if this is better (hopefully it's not over sharpened).

Thanks again,

Rachel

[Marc Mol]

Love the pose and surroundings here Rachel, shame about the softness with the 2X tc. I believe the new Canon 2x tc (like the Nikon) is a real improvement.
TFS

[John Ippolito]

Rachel, I really like the pose, comp and the bear's concerned lookback. Softess or lack of detail in the bear for whatever reason as mentioned. 300 2.8 has razor sharp optics, so maybe it is that converter as others suspect.

[Rachel Hollander]

Thanks Marc and John for the comments. The lens and converter were rented so it is possible it was the combination and/or my lack of complete familiarity with it.

Thanks again,
Rachel