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Big Brown Eyes
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Big Brown Eyes

by Peter Cross

Gallery: WildlifePosted October 14, 201260 views4 comments
From my last trip to the local nature preserve. This doe was feeding under an oak tree and looked up at me with her big beautiful eyes. This started as a normal image but there was too much extraneous detail to either side. So it was a good candidate for turning it into a vertical and making a portrait. I'm pleased with it. She has something in her right eye by the tear duct and I don't know what it is. I warmed this up a bit to 5500K. This is a crop using about 40% of the original. Detail held up fairly well. Light sharpening. Comments and critiques welcomed and appreciated.

Tech Info

Canon 60D with EF 70-200mm f/4L @ 200mm plus 1.4 TC = 280mm
1/125th @ f/5.6, ISO 1000
tripod

Comments

4 comments
Comment posted by Jenaya Launstein on October 15, 2012 at 12:27 AM
Hey, Peter...what a sweet looking doe! I really like this image. It has a quiet elegance and nice mood and feel to it. And those eyes ARE big and beautiful. I think your choice on colour temp/balance is excellent. I've been enjoying all your deer images even though I haven't had enough time to comment as often as I'd like. I can see the effects of the TC on the bokeh and OOF zones, but it's not enough to change the overall great feel to this. Love the colours as well. Nice one.
Registered on February 8, 2011, 254 Posts, 1302 Comments
Comment posted by Brad Hill on October 16, 2012 at 9:39 AM
Hi Peter,

Nice colour and exposure on this one - and those eyes definitely dominate the image (tho' to me they look a lot like big black eyes! :wink: ).

A few random thoughts - mostly on the personal preference end of the spectrum: For my taste (and especially for a portrait) I'd prefer to see more separation from and/or a cleaner background - tho' I recognize that with the lens and TC combo you had opening the aperture up more could have been problematic. I'm also wondering if a slightly lower shooting angle (looks to me like you're shooting down on the doe) might have strengthened the image a little? If this one were mine I'd probably crop just a tad off the top - to my eye it seems a bit top heavy (and I think I'd do this without adding any more room below). There is some noise visible in the background, but this type of noise is quite easy to handle during post-processing...

Cheers...thanks for sharing this...

Brad
Registered on May 29, 2007, 431 Posts, 6061 Comments
Comment posted by Gary Reed on October 16, 2012 at 1:02 PM
Hey Peter, nice detail on the doe. For me the light is to even and this causes a flattening of subject and background. If you have to shoot at longer distances sometimes casting light is the only thing that will make the difference in depth of field. For me that is what is missing here. There is no seperation from the doe and background light. :rolleyes:
Registered on September 19, 2009, 198 Posts, 1074 Comments
Comment posted by Lon Sharp on October 16, 2012 at 11:30 PM
I like the unusual sense of background, and think there are multiple effective ways to present this capture. I would go the other way from Brad's suggestion and take some from the bottom, putting eyes at the center of the image! Different strokes... :wink:
Registered on December 9, 2007, 258 Posts, 9892 Comments