Down to Earth

[Ken Watkins]

The young female comes to ground when mum calls, one opportunity in long long grass

Near Savute, Chobe National Park, Botswana, 3rd January 2010.

EOS 1D MkIV

F7.1, ISO800, 1/800, EV+0.33

[Ken Watkins]

Forgot to include this link to what were award winning images of Leopards when I was a boy.

http://www.life.com/image/first/in-g...letter#index/0

[Todd Frost]

Nice portrait Ken. Love the eyes. Thanks for the link. Amazing to see what was cutting edge then compared to now. Very few of those images would have been posted on this site IMHO. We now sit and pixel peep @ 100-400% looking for something that we don't like. In that vein, some nr should be run on the bg on this image. Thought I would say it before the techies did , in print you would not see any of it no doubt. Well done.
TFS
Todd

[Vivaldo Damilano]

Hey Ken, great shot, agree with a bit of NR on BG though. I like the head turn, a beautiful portrait, we are always looking for clean shot but agree with Todd, on print it doesn't make a difference. Everyone says that the D3s has no noise but when I got the camera I was very suprised. The camera can be noisy esp in the shadow area's TFS

[Robert Amoruso]

I agree Ken, pleasing portrait image of this beautiful creature well framed.

Interesting comments on the noise issue. I routinely use my Canon 1D Mark III at ISO 800 and will correct for luminance noise on BG's (what you got here).

Interesting that I got challenged on BG luminance noise on an image I posted in avian using a Canon 1D Mark IV at ISO 400. Sure there was some noise but not a biggy to me.

Your link really shows how persnickety we have gotten.

[Steve Kaluski]

The strong green of the grass certainly lifts the Leopard and defines the head as a portrait image, although personally I would like to see the crop moved down slightly so there is a fraction less above and more below, but crops are personal thing.

Grass is always an issue and not always seen in camera until sadly you review or process, so the blade that runs over the right eye to view and the green over the shoulder to me is slightly distracting, but could be resolved in PS5 quite easily if you felt the need. I would have like to see a bit more clarity/sharpness overall as the nose looks sharp, but the lower teeth and eyes just seem to be a tad off to me?

Ken would appreciate if you could please confirm the lens used, if this was a crop and if so, by how much and where the FP was, as personally I do feel if this is FF there is more detail you could perhaps get out of your image.

[Hilary Hann]

Sweet portrait Ken, nice balanced light. Which lens did you use?

As far as the images from the '60s, I think we should remember that leopards are much more habituated these days, our lenses are far better and most photographers work really, really hard with their compositions and techs. What is more scary is how our images we are posting now will be seen in 40 years … but I'll be long gone!

[Ken Watkins]

Thanks to everybody for your useul and interesting comments.

Firstly this is at most 20% of full frame, so it is inevitable that IQ has suggered for posting. I am certain it would look far better printed, but I am running out of wall space

As to noise I do not really see it as too bad on this, but then I used to use GAF ISO 500 in the bad old days, that was what I would call noise:eek::eek:

Grass is not my avourite object, but it is everywhere and there is little I could do about, Chobe is a National Park and you are not allowed off road so moving to a better position is not always possible, and in this case there was one moment in the "open" I got 3 frames plus none of Mum who was always partially hidden.

As to the old images, I remember seeing them way back then.

I was a Life subscriber, believe me they were better in print and at the time very exciting to see.

[Morkel Erasmus]

still a nice portrait here despite the grass, the large crop and the apparent background noise. I don't mind a bit of noise as it was a given in the pristine days of film...but that being said I like to clean up my backgrounds as much as the next guy :)

thanks for the link Ken - those images sure look like they were captured in the Kalahari! beautiful leopard and nice behaviour, I agree it shows how finicky we have become, but such is life and such is art, eh? for example (me being a musician), if you compare the simplicity of chord structures, arrangements and production of the first real "pop" music (read: Beatles, CCR, Stones, Beach Boys) there was a very raw quality to it which made it accessible and it was loved by all. If you were to produce music in the same "raw" vein today you will not get it on the airwaves - it's become digital, it's become layered, it's evolved, yet it doesn't have that raw beauty that it once had
but that's a discussion for another thread at another time!

[Harshad Barve]

I am loving this as posted , what a cutie
TFS