Tiger Shoot April 09, 2005

[RandySmith]

Tom and Trey -

Thank you very much for coordinating these events. Today's session was really great. I now understand your thumbnail icon Tom. Glad you were able to capture some more horse-fly's today. I'll let you know sometime this week via email about the other cat we talked about.

Take care.
Randy

[OversighT]

I echo what Randy said. I had a great time today and I have a bunch of photos to go through when I get home. Thank you both for organizing this. Perhaps in the fall I'll be back to give Pug Mark another donation :)


T.

[jazzdiver]

Firstly, thanks to Tom and Trey for their efforts in organizing the Pug Mark photo shoots. I really enjoyed the opportunity to come out this morning and see these wonderful animals, and meet everyone participating. I've barely looked at my handful (at only about 75 images, that's far fewer than I anticipated) of images but my first impression was indeed that one's first shoot merits another. I've seen many excellent images here that my efforts today don't measure up as well as I had hoped for, but that's just evidence of "practice makes perfect".

The saturation of the colors was quite strong, perhaps the result of the early morning light that I'm not accustomed to shooting with. Shooting with flash, some diffused and some direct, also needs further exploration to learn what works best. I had pleasing catchlights in the animals' eyes at times, but there were many shots with more "redeye" (green or gold really) than I expected and missed in the LCD previews (note to self: zoom in closer next time). We are each our own worst critic though, and there were some images I liked. I'm going to blame a dysfunctional brain at 7am for any errors I made and will say "I'll be back" another day. Thanks again! Here are just few full-frame shots, with only minor hi-pass sharpening done:

Daryl

[planoj]

Great shots, Daryl. Much better than my first try. Don't be discouraged if they're not as good as you hoped. You will do better next time.

And yes, many thanks to Tom and Trey. I don't know if everybody knows this, but they don't take one penny for their efforts. Everything goes to the park. And Tom and Trey, if you could, please pass on my thanks to everybody at Pug-Mark for everything they do. It's really inspiring to see such selfless devotion to these animals.

Anyway, here are a couple of my favorites from today:





More at http://planoj.smugmug.com/gallery/474831

[bburton]

I think the cats are becoming better at modeling and posing because each month, the quality of the photos of them becomes better and better.

Way to go, guys. Oh, and you photogs did a nice job too

[jazzdiver]

Jason,

I really like that first photo of yours for its originality. I was just looking at an old thread where mmsean had posted some pics, and it seems my close-up side profile of Rocky is nearly the same shot but just cropped slightly tighter. In fact, looking at mmsean's images, I am now even more impressed by the lighting they achieved and I wonder if that was just due in part to slightly different lighting that day than what we had today.

Any discouragement I had over my results today is nothing that bothers me but rather just recognizing there's always room for improvement. Well, maybe not always...Tom, Trey, Jim, et.al....there really are some superb photos scattered throughout the forum.

Daryl

[planoj]

Thank you for the complement, Daryl. That's actually the best picture I've ever taken, IMHO. I really have to chalk it up to dumb luck and cooperative subject, though, because most of my photos are pretty lousy. I mean, just look at my other galleries on smugmug. :)

[jazzdiver]

Jason, yes, I see what you mean...most of your other photos just aren't that good. ..............NOT!

Seriously, you've got some nice images from those I've looked at. But, we all have our favorites and some of mine are still among those I shot with my $150 Tamron lens last year. I'm just really, really pleased with the following shot of a white tiger at the FW Zoo, yet every now and then I'll look at some other photo and decide it's better still. And then I change my mind again! Ha! I guess what that really means is that each of several photos one takes can have their own special "best" aspect to us.

Daryl

[Trey Neal]

Many thanks to all the photographers that made it to the shoot today. Looks like you all got a few keepers and the itch to make another go of it in the future. I know Missy, Anne and Rob all enjoy the shoots and the contributions to the support of their cats.

[Joe_Lorenzini]

Hi All,

I have a request for you from those of us that are on the list to go in the future (me on the 23rd).

Could you detail what lens you brought (if DSLR), what issues you had (light, shadow, etc...) and what you wish you would have brought (monopod, different lens, filter, etc...).

I know others would be as intersted from learning by your experience as I am.

Thanks!

_/oe

[jazzdiver]

Hi Joe,

This was my first tiger shoot and I took my Nikon D70 with VR70-200 lens, and 1.7x extender. Well, actually I took everything in my camera bag, but that's what I pulled from it. I shot with flash quite often, sometimes using direct flash but also using the diffuser dome for my SB-800 quite a lot. I've not studied all my photos yet to really discern which were likely shot with the diffuser, but I'm thinking it may not have helped much, if any. Quite a number of my first shots of Sugar, the lionness, found she had nice lighting but unfortunately some distinct "redeye" type reflections in her eyes, so I'd like to avoid that on my 2nd shoot (I may go on the 23rd, though I've yet to decide). I've deleted those photos or I'd show you one as an example. In any case, that's the main thing I might try changing next time, perhaps by way of shooting either with the flash off camera or simply using my LumiQuest Pocket Bouncer. I noticed at least one of the guys at the shoot was using a LumiQuest SoftBox....but I forget who that was or what his results were.

I also took a monopod which Tom and Trey quickly pointed out as largely useless to those of us so equipped. They were right. So, leave it home unless you'll be going somewhere else afterwards that it may still be useful. I observed Tom shooting with a 28mm lens for some close-up photos of the tigers as they layed near the fence, and that too suggests an idea of trying a shorter focal length, while also remaining wary that you'll need to pay extra attention to moving away from the fence quickly, should the tiger get boisterous.

I swapped my extender on and off the 70-200 a fair amount, the photos with it often being for tight head shots from a distance or else for close-up shots of the eyes. If a sharp, fast lens of 35-300mm was available, I'm guessing that would be a great lens for this shoot, but even a 70-200 as is will serve you well.

Of course, be sure you've got enough media cards for your DSLR. I only shot about 75 images but had 2.5 GB of cards on hand if needed.

Regards,

Daryl

[Joe_Lorenzini]

Hi Daryl,

Thanks for the great information. It sounds like you were able to get pretty close to the tigers. Can't wait to get out there and try it.

I'm curious to why the use of flash. I'm assuming it wasn't that dark out so was it to remove shadows? We're the tigers that close to you that you could use a flash and did it bother the tigers when you did?

I'd be interested to hear the settings you used on your D70, flash and non-flash. I'm assuming you kept it near or at ISO 200 and shot Aperture priority, if not, I'd be interested in why.

Again, thanks for the recap, it's very helpful!

_/oe

[jazzdiver]

Joe,

Yes, at times you are easily within arm's reach of the big cats...your arm, or theirs if you're not careful, hence the caution about moving back quickly from the fence if they decide to charge it. Sugar seemed to enjoy challenging Tom to see how long he'd stay put as she ran up to the fence.

Indeed, the flash was just for fill lighting to soften or remove shadows, although I'd say it is questionable just how much it helped, particularly when the cats were farther away. The early morning light was low enough that it threw sunlight in somewhat below the cover of the trees that shade the cages, but there were shadows to contend with nonetheless. I'm still not very "up" on what contistutes low versus high contrast natural lighting, the effects of light at various times of the day, etc., but I thought my images seemed more saturated than I expected. This is in comparison to shots I've made of tigers at the Fort Worth Zoo, and it may even be just a slight color variation in the fur of the Siberian tigers at Pug Mark Park vs. the zoo's Indochinese Tigers. My zoo shots were usally later in the day also, around 3-4pm.

I shot most everything at ISO 400, in favor of getting just a slightly faster shutter speed or smaller aperture, used balanced TTL when shooting flash, and did indeed shoot in aperture priority mode or manual....I'd have to check my EXIF data to be sure, and I've not done that yet.

Regards,

Daryl

[RandySmith]

Joe & Darryl -

I was shooting with a 1dmkII, a 10d, iso 50 to iso 400 as well. I used a diffuser on my 550ex flash, and a 2x extender on my 70-200mm. I switched out to my 85mm prime as well.

Here's a link to some of the ones I took. Only suggestion I might make is to be careful of the poison ivy that is around, I'm pretty sensitive to it I guess, and briefly bumped into some, well the hazards of the trade ! ha-ha ...

Any thoughts or critism's of my photography/presentation allways welcome, I can take it .. I only want to improve !

http://www.fototime.com/inv/83D3F453B35AC50

Thanks alot.
Randy

[jazzdiver]

Randy,

Those are some very nice photos, and I do indeed like the quality of your flash lighting. Weren't you using a LumiQuest SoftBox? The framing of your photos is an interesting idea, varying the depth of how it extends into the photo to emphasize the subject. At first I thought it was some kind of odd vignetting until I noticed how your varied it from shot to shot. Overall, I like the result but probably saw a few images where I might've preferred more foreground to be visible. But, with the addition of your signature on the print, it does give a nice result. Well done!

Daryl