by Brad Hill
The Welcoming Committee
<div>I nabbed this shot in the estuary of the Khutzeymateen Grizzly Sanctuary in the spring of 2015. The Khutzeymateen is found near the northern end of the region on the BC coast that is known as the Great Bear Rainforest. And, most would argue that the region is well-named, especially the part about the rain! But during my 2015 photo tours we didn't have to battle any rain to speak off - but the blazing sun (for 9 straight days!) did present us with major photographic challenges. Which means that we actively searched out bears that were in slightly more muted lighting - including in the shade. When we spied this female bear and her two cubs feeding along the shoreline right on the edge of the shade and sun while being illuminated by beautiful muted and dappled lighting I was instantly excited.</div> <div> </div> <div>While the mom was pretty comfortable with us, these cubs were pretty shy...so rather than waiting until we motored in reasonably closely I chose to begin shooting with a long lens quite early on in the encounter. This shot was captured using a 600mm focal length (hand-held while motoring in on the bears in a smallish Zodiac inflatable boat) from quite a distance and it was one of my first shots of the sequence. Not surprisingly, the bears didn't hold the perfect six-eye pose for too long, and a few minutes later I was real glad I had decided to shoot early (the bears didn't run, but they dropped their heads and turned their sides or butts to us!).</div>Subject: Female Grizzly (Ursus arctos) with cubs on shoreline of Khutzeymateen estuary
Location: Khutzeymateen Grizzly Sanctuary, northern BC Coast, Canada
Camera: Nikon D750
Lens: Sigma Sport 150-600mm zoom @ 600mm - hand-held from moving zodiac. Optical Stabilization on and in "OS1" mode.
Exposure: 1/640s @ f8; ISO 2500. -0.33 stop compensation compensation from matrix-metered exposure setting.
Crop: This is about 85% of full-framed image
A lot more info about this shot - including some comments about the Sigma Sport 150-600mm lens, post-processing info, and a 2400 pixel version of the shot - can be found here on my website...
http://www.naturalart.ca/galleries/latest/.
Comments and critiques welcomed - probably best to view the larger version prior to doing so!
Cheers...
Brad
PS: Like all wildlife images on my website and that I post on NPN, the subject is fully wild and completely unconstrained. Besides the potential impact of my presence, nothing has been done to intentionally alter or affect the ongoing behavior of the subject and, of course, there has been no use of any form of bait or other form of wildlife attractants (including vocalizations)
Comments
6 commentsShoot early, Shoot often!
I like how they all seem to be in different spot lights. Mom and the cub in the middle with the highlight on their left side and the cub on the right with the highlight on his right side.
Cool shot, Again!
I agree that the three-way perfect eye contact is a key element of this excellent capture. Love the lighting angle and you were able to translate the shadows beautifully. Interesting to me is that usually some specular highlights are slightly disturbing to my eye as unnatural doughnuts, but here they seem just perfect...
Neat to have all 3 lined up like this Brad, the diffused reflection with all the specular higlights doesn't do much for me and if it was mine I would consider cropping much of the water out and making it even more of a pano, just personal taste.
Brad, I like the graphic nature of this image, with the long reflections of the bears. It does seem to me that there's a bit more real estate on the right side compared to the left. Any particular reason you avoided having the threesome more centered in the frame?
Max
PS - I hope it went well with Richard!
I love the way this image shows the natural habitat. Wonderful scene.
Hey Brad. I really dig the key lighting falling on your subjects, really makes it pop compared to otherwise dreary weather often seen in photos from this location.
Expert framing and placement too...