Following in Sanjeev's Tiger footsteps, one of two brothers that morning on the hunt. This one just emerging from with the forest.
Thanks to those who viewed or commented on the previous posting.
Steve
Subject: Young Tiger (Panthera tigris) emerging from within the forest
Location: Ranthambore, India
Camera: Canon 1DX MKII
Lens: EF200-400mm f/4L IS USM EXT HH
Exposure: 1/1000s at f/5.6 ISO4000 (should have gone to 6400 for more SS)
Original format: Portrait, very slight crop from foot & LH side
Processed via: LRCC 9.4 & PSCC2020
Post Production: It’s ALL about what you do with the tools and not, which brand of tool you use.
Beautifully composed Steve, the play between the patch of light where the tiger stands and the dark FG and BG just make the tiger, especially its face stand out so well. And of course, the raised front left paw:) How did you handle the exposure? Spot on the tiger or evaluative? Did you use + or - EC? Since most of the frame is dark, I'm trying to figure out how should I have exposed. You never know when you can come across a tiger...:)
Nothing different to any other time, I use the Histogram to maximise the capture, but I could have clipped the HL's in the BKG just to push things more, knowing I could recover the slight blown areas in PP. Remember the image you see on the back of your camera is a JPEG not the Raw and any slight blown HL's aren't really blown, you still have a way to go before you truly blow them.
Spot on the tiger or evaluative?
Evaluate, rarely do I change, nor should you. The only time I have changed was shooting backlit Coots, because of the head and I think that was Partial.
Did you use + or - EC?
Zero
Since most of the frame is dark, I'm trying to figure out how should I have exposed.
OK Dan, normally most of the images I do are processed very simply, but occasionally, you as the 'artist' have to be a little creative to bring the image to life, simply because of either the conditions and or the capture raw file. I often see folk saying - well that's how it looked, well it's not because the camera has already put in place some of the settings you have registered in the camera, ie if you set 'Standard' and use DPP then the image will automatically have a bit more Saturation, Contrast & sharpening, I don't because I want to be in control. In addition some folk will use the Picture styles to actually create in camera, so it all depends on you and how you perceive the image to look.
Here all I have done is played with exposure, contrast & saturation layer masks, nothing complicated and not pushing the pixels, so basically you 'sculpt' the light and tonal range. Hope that helps.
This is almost the look of the raw...
Post Production: It’s ALL about what you do with the tools and not, which brand of tool you use.
Hi Steve ... nice pose of the subject inside its habitat .
I quite like the forest feel of the image and the incidence of light is cool .
Color and tone ... well matter of taste , personally I might have gone slightly lower on both ends ... nothing wrong though .
I am not 100% on your chosen crop , think there is " too much" space on LHS and not " enough " on the RHS .
Thank you Steve for the detailed feedback, I get the part about being creative, putting it into practice is the hard part for the moment, but with practice it will be better (contrast and saturation mask are still star wars for me:).
Hy Steve, I think I have a rough understanding of them (BG on one layer, create a layer mask of the animal on the other layer and work on them separately). With layer masks you can make adjustments to a certain layer, like hue/saturation/exposure etc that are not permanent, you can just delete the LM and start over. I will have to rewatch the tutorials you linked me.
Just what I wanted to see a before and after. All your post should look like this(in my opnion). Nice deep rich colors and tones. One of my favorites from you.