Wading into Sunset
Hey all,
Back after a successful (and enjoyable) month on the road...so time to resume posting. Hope you all have been well...
After working in the Great Bear Rainforest over a number of years you come to appreciate the nuances, subtleties and moodiness of soft, diffuse light. If you don't...well...perhaps you should consider shooting somewhere else! But even with this newfound recognition of the power of pastel colours it's still wonderful when the sun comes out, especially late in the day. In fact, I was just about to snap a tightly framed abstract sunset shot when a moving brown blob hijacked my chosen AF bracket and turned my landscape shot into this. The nerve of the bear...no consideration for photographers!
When I was processing this shot I was confronted with a bit of a conundrum. The thin blue line that runs edge-to-edge in the image - which was produced by the ripples of the moving bear reflecting off a brilliant blue sky - was naturally hyper-saturated with colour. To be blunt, it was saturated to the point of almost gaudiness - but completely naturally. Now, I rarely hesitate to criticize photographers who delve deeply (as in "too deeply") into the power of HDR software or who like to really crank up the colour saturation during image processing. And here I was...with an image that looked like it was pushed WAY too far in Photoshop! What to do? Well...believe it or not, I chose to abandon reality and DESATURATE the blues by 15 "units" (in Photoshop) in an effort to return the naturally-occurring scene to one that appeared more natural (even if it isn't)! I'm not sure, but this may be the first time where I "cheated" on an image by pulling back on the colour!
Subject: Adult male Grizzly (
Urus arctos) wading in last light of day
Location:Great Bear Rainforest, BC, Canada
Camera: Nikon D4
Lens: Nikkor 400mm f2.8 VRII lens - hand-held from floating zodiac. VR on and in "Normal" mode.
Exposure: 1/400s @ f5; ISO 280. No compensation from matrix-metered exposure setting.
Crop: Moderate - this is about 75% of full-frame
Like almost always, additional details about the image (including processing details) available here:
http://www.naturalart.ca/galleries/latest/.
Comments and critiques welcomed - probably best to view the larger version prior to doing so!
Cheers...
Brad
Comments
11 commentsThanks - and good question on the cropping. Here's my thought process for including the amount of water I did (and the relationship to the amount of background).
1. The water has beautiful, rich colours and a subtle reflection of the bear (that helps lead the viewers eye to the bear)
2. The background sucks - it's flatter tonally, colour deprived, and more chaotic
3. I like a low angle on my subjects (in most instances) and including more foreground enhances the "low level" (eye-to-eye with the bear) aspect of the image
Put these together, plus position the bear in a composition dominated by rule of thirds thinking and...poof...there you go - the composition I shot and is displayed here!
On the darker water on the bottom - to my eye (and gut feel) it added a nice bit of "anchoring" to the bottom of the shot. Others could see it differently - which is totally fine...some "each to their own" on that aspect of it!
This image is basically about light and contrast, including focus contrast...(i.e., the bear "pops" partly because of light, and partly because of selective focus and a thinnish DoF).
Hope this helps...cheers...
Brad
Side Note: (Kathy will be in Vancouver next week and will post you from there.)
Love the low angle and the amount of water included. Love the blue line. Love the light.
I wonder if it's worth selectively darkening the BG some more?
Thanks for the feedback - always appreciated! I already responded to Jerry's comment, but here's my response to a few more of the comments:
1. To Gary re: Having bear larger in frame: I can see that image - and the argument for it - too. What appealed to me about this scene - beyond the beautiful and contrasting blue line (which I had nothing to do with creating!) - was the subtle reflection of the bear in the water...along with those almost golden tones. I think going tighter would have pulled those elements out of play. But - as you point out - now we're talking about a different image, and perhaps it WOULD have been stronger than this one!
2. Lon: On the crop and positioning of the blueline in the frame. Interesting and valid point. I wondered about that myself, and experimented with exactly what you have described (with blue line more off-centre). But in the end, when I did that the position of the bear seemed too extreme (for my taste) and I decided it was more important to have the main subject (the bear) conforming to the "rule of thirds" than having a supporting element (the blue line) do so.
3. Marsel: re: your comment: the blue line makes the shot. Pretty much agree. I guess one could argue that the bear makes the shot, but I'm betting if that blue line wasn't there this one would have be binned (or perhaps kept but not processed).
4. Morkel: on selectively darkening the background even more: You know, from a creative perspective I fully agree with you. About the only thing that held me back from doing that (and call it a "dumb Brad thing") was that I had already pulled the brightness of the background and felt that pulling it down even more would have taken the image just a little too far from what was in my viewfinder. Which is probably stupid of me!
Thanks all - great feedback...
Brad