Wet & Wary

Wet & Wary

I captured this image of a young Black Bear "checking out the competition" while feeding on a salmon carcass in a stream in the Great Bear Rainforest of BC in the early autumn of 2011. I've visited this same creek over the past few years and this bear looks very much like one I've seen a few times before. If it is the same bear it tends to get "kicked around" a lot by the older and larger bears and is, consequently, very wary of other bears (as can be seen by the look it's giving here towards a bear that's way upstream). Interestingly this guy is much less wary of humans and won't hesitate to go about "doing its thing" with humans nearby. In fact, this bear won't hesitate to "push" humans back a little (euphemistically speaking, of course) if they get in the way of its food. Though still on the small side, It's a bear you definitely want to show the proper respect for.

Bears do have individual and unique personalities that become quite apparent when you watch them for awhile. Some are bold, some are shy, others are inquisitive, and so on. Whenever possible I like to try to capture images of them that reflect their unique personalities, but it isn't always easy. And, if you're interesting in capturing photographs that have an impact on those who don't know the individual bear, it also means you have to capture that personality in a way that still has some general visual interest. The tough thing, though, is "distancing yourself" enough from your own emotional attachment to an image (or bear, or deer, or elk) to be able to judge if an image will be received well - and as intended - by others. For instance - I certainly think this image conveys "wariness", but I may be imposing my own knowledge and relationship with this bear on the image (and a non-invested individual simply wouldn't see it).

Following this line of thinking through to its logical conclusion quickly leads one to ask the question "who am I shooting my images for anyway?". It's a good question to ask. And the answer to that question can be critical to one's self esteem when they show their all-time favourite image to someone else (or post it on a website or on an image critiquing gallery) and it gets nothing more than a yawn! The real question is: Does the response of others even matter? If you're a professional the response obviously DOES matter, but if you are shooting as a hobby (like the vast majority of wildlife photographers do), then the most important person to please is definitely YOURSELF!

Besides general feedback on any aspect of the image or commentary (which would be more than welcomed), I'm curious if - when looking at this image - you'd think the bear was "exuding" wariness?

Subject: Black Bear (Urus americana) with its meal...
Location: Great Bear Rainforest, BC, Canada
Camera: Nikon D3s
Lens: Nikkor 600mm f4 VRII lens - supported on carbon fibre Gitzo 1348 tripod with Wimberley head. VR on and in "Normal" mode.
Exposure: 1/250s at f5.6. ISO 2500. -0.67 stop compensation from matrix metered exposure.
Crop: Minor - this is about 85% of full-frame image

All the gory details about this shot (processing details, conservation, etc.) and some background info on the Great Bear Rainforest can be found here...

http://www.naturalart.ca/galleries/latest/detail_2.html.

As mentioned, feedback (and critiques) welcomed - probably best to view the larger version prior to doing so!

Cheers...thanks for looking...

Brad