Some more Malawi shots

[JohnReid]

These are the first animal landscape photos I've attempted to take, please let me know what you think. Thanks



http://www.stevesforums.com/forums/v...jump_to=457353

[oBSidian]

John,

Nice shots! The standout for me is #5 - the elephants - nice framing and great colour.

The other one that I like best is the kingfisher (#3), though maybe a tighter crop might help bring the focus more onto the subject? Also, the green plastic object in the water to the left of the photo could be cloned out, and the oar somewhat distracts though it is pointing at the kingfisher!

#1 I find the subjects a little too far to the left, and a bit too much space on the right, so maybe crop a bit off the r.h.s. ?

#4 I like the bird, but the island with cormorants in the background distracts b/c it is almost in line with the subject and bright white.

#6 I like a lot, too - the title is apt


My 2 cents!

Best wishes,

-Ben

[JohnReid]

Thanks Ben, I appreciate the critique, all very fair and apt. The only exception is that thegreen plastic object is actually a sunkenwooden dugout (I think this spot was the dugout greaveyard).

Thanks again for commenting.

[peripatetic]

My reactions:

#1 - excellent, best of the bunch.

#2,3,4,5 - I have composition issues with all of these.

#2 - I don't think the shallow DOF works.

#6 - nice composition.

I heartily applaud the effort here, to mix landscape and wildlife. It's very hard to do well, but ever so much more interesting than close-up portraits.

If your interest is aesthetic/artistic rather than in the content of the image (i.e. the animals) then I think that wildlife portraits are very cliched and hard to do anything original.

As Michael Reichmann put it: "I'm not convinced the world needs another photograph of a lion."

Bravo for attempting something difficult and very worthwhile.

[JohnReid]

Thanks very much for the comments, peripatetic - it wouldn't be a lie if I said Michael's article played a big role in encouraging me to try shoot this sort of style. The hardest part was having the discipline to keep my 80 - 200 on rather then reaching for the 500.