Mountian lion head shot

[fairybasslet]

Honestly? This shot would not score in my camera club's competitions. The focus is too soft, the bottom left of his mouth is blown out along with the background so that they blend in together, there is no catch light in his eyes, and the composition isn't pleasing to the eye because too much of his face is cut off:both ears, whiskers, chin.

 

[PARADISE HUNTER]

There was about 15 feet between me and the cage. The bars on the cage were too small to reach a paw through, but some of the tigers and a lion seemed to make a game of trying to spray the guests.

The spraying thing is bad news. I know a guy who was sprayed by a tiger, as a kid at the zoo and still tells the story with serious contempt.

PH

 

[PARADISE HUNTER]

Honestly? This shot would not score in my camera club's competitions. The focus is too soft, the bottom left of his mouth is blown out along with the background so that they blend in together, there is no catch light in his eyes, and the composition isn't pleasing to the eye because too much of his face is cut off:both ears, whiskers, chin.

I appreciate where you are coming from, but I don't think the OP was entering the pic into a contest.

Most of the support for the picture was more for the beauty of the animal and not so much the quality of the photo.

PH

 

[fairybasslet]

I appreciate where you are coming from, but I don't think the OP was entering the pic into a contest.

Most of the support for the picture was more for the beauty of the animal and not so much the quality of the photo.

PH

The OP wrote:

It is zoomed a little and I shopped out the bars. The bar on the right came out easily. The bar on the bottom didn't.

Comments?

It seemed to me that he was talking about the technique he used to shoot the photo and post production editing, and he asked for comments. It seems to me he was asking for comments about the photo, not the animal. That mountain lions are beautiful is a no brainer, imho.

Having attended many competitions at my camera club where judges critique photos before giving them a score, I thought TwoBit could benefit from what I could hear a judge saying about the photo. If he didn't want feedback, why would he ask for it? If he wants to improve his photography then I think it's important to be honest. I learned a long time ago not to take criticism of my photos personally. 9 times out of 10, the judge is correct and I've learned so much from critiques of not only my photos, but the photos of fellow members of my club.

Sometimes it's a matter of personal aesthetic preferences. For instance, I've noticed that a lot of older judges don't like photos with a narrow DOF, even if that was what the maker intended. I've seen many photos scored lower because of what the judge *likes* as opposed to technical aspects of the photo, which is not always *fair.* But my attitude is, if I like it and it's technically sound, that's all that matters. If you like the photo even if it's not technically sound, then that's all that matters to you. Maybe Twobit feels differently.

It is very hard to shoot at zoos through bars. If you have your camera's aperture opened all the way, it is easier to blur them out. Also, when you zoom, a tripod will help with keeping the focus sharp.

 

[TwoBitTxn]

Thank you FB for your comments. You are right, I am trying to learn. I knew some of the issues, like the chin blending into the back ground. I'm still trying to learn composition. I didn't know the ears being cut off would be an issue. Catch light in his eyes? You can see a reflection, but I'm not sure I understand.

 

[fairybasslet]

Before I joined my camera club I had no idea what a catch light was until a judge criticized one of my photos for not having one.
Here's an explanation.

Catch light - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I also had a judge criticize a photo of a fish for not having a catch light. Then she said, "Well, maybe you can't really get that." Getting them in fish is really hard.

There are some generally accepted *rules* of composition. I'm learning new ones all the time that have really helped me. One of them was aspect ratio that I just learned last month taking an uw photo workshop in Cozumel. The teacher gave a 2 hour class on composition. Once you have a general idea of what the accepted rules of composition are, then you can have a lot of fun breaking them! And when you break them, and it works, that is sweet. You should see if you have a camera club near you. I learned so much from competitions, workshops and just hanging out with other photographers. There are also online forums where you can learn a lot. This is a pretty good one.
Steves-digicams.com Forums The most important thing, of course, is to HAVE FUN!!!

BTW, I really learned about blown out highlights the hard way. A judge was particularly brutal critiquing an image of mine during a competition (scored it a 5 which is a total insult score) and I lost a night's sleep over it because I thought it was one of my best shots. I emailed it to another member of the club and she said to me "The first rule is, never lose sleep over a score." How right she was.

Good luck