Weekly Photo Contest February 3 - February 10 | Wildlife

[mpfuchs]

The topic for this week is Wildlife.

I was thinking about a topic where I could lend my humble expertise to judge all entries.
Looking through the list, it turns out we've already had birds within the last year, so I decided to open this up to all wildlife.
No pets, no zoo. Any pictures of wild animals are fair game!

EDIT: as wildlife varies across the globe, I ask that you please include some indication of where your picture was taken.

Rules as follows:

· Do not comment, vote, react, or click “like” on images prior to the winners being announced.

· The photographs must be your own work.

· You may only submit one photo per contest.

· This contest runs for one week, if in doubt, check the dates in the title.

· At the end of the week, The Judge will choose a 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place photo, providing as much feedback as possible.

· If the Judge is unable to complete the selection within 48 hours of the deadline, then last week's 2nd place has to step in. 3rd place takes over should 2nd place be similarly unable to officiate.

· The 1st place Winner will start a new thread with the topic/theme of their choice, and act as the Judge for that contest. (Winner has 48 hours to create a new theme, after that it defers to 2nd place).

· Be sure to update the Contest Master List as soon as you post a new theme.

 

[tizeye]

You mean mermaids are not wildlife? Really???

Substituting a true wildlife pic.
Cataloochee, NC a remote area of The Great Smoky Mountains NP. In 2001, first group of elk re-established east of the Mississippi River in their former habitat and have prospered after hunted to extinction in the 1800's. Cataloochee is an unoccupied (except for a 27 site campground - no electric hookup) former homestead area preserving the original structures of the original occupants.

 

[oblomow]

Anguis fragilis, not a snake but a legless lizard.

 

[Darmok N Jalad]

Eastern bluebird. Location: The home of the Super Bowl LIV champions

 

[Clix Pix]

Hooded Merganser (he's been seen here before on the POTD thread but IMHO this is the most successful shot of one of these guys I've had to date; if I manage to score a shot of another Hooded Merganser or some other kind of wildlife that I consider to be an even better entry between now and the end of this competition I will swap him out. Shot was taken from my deck, and this Hooded Merganser was swimming with his friends and family on our little lake here in the Northern Virginia suburbs of Washington, DC, USA. We only first started seeing any Hooded Mergansers here at all last winter around this time, so apparently they have decided that this is a good place to spend the cold weather season, and this year the group grew from last year's four ducks to twelve of them now -- I guess the original four told their family and friends about this location!

They share the lake with many Canada geese and few Mallard ducks, with lots of catfish and other prey swimming beneath them as a source of food, in addition to plenty of weeds and grasses, etc. I used the Sony 200-600mm, my longest lens, racked out to 600mm, to get this shot, and even at that had to crop a bit. Camera was the Sony A7R IV.

 

[Indydenny]

Here's looking at you . . .
Taken in Ketchikan, Alaska

The Eagle Eye by
This Magic Moment, on Flickr

 

[someoldguy]

Chameleon , Ngorongoro Crater , Tanzania , scan from film

 

[Elbert C]

Male Pacific Walrus taken in the Bering Sea.

 

[mollyc]

I don't find too many truly wild things in the metro DC area. But as this is not a pet or from the zoo, it fits the bill.

 

[Apple_Glen_UK]

This is the first time I have entered this. Here we have some kind of rodent having a sniff around a bin in Antigua. Quite an old photo this - I took it in April 2006 on a Sony camera I had (as you can tell, I am by absolutely no means a pro!)

 

[LiE_]

squirrels having a fight over some nuts I put out for them. Back flipping out the way of the attacker like a boss. Taken in the local forest here in the UK.

 

[dmb8021]

Taken January 2019 in Rocky Mountain National Park.

 

[anotherscotsman]

Make up the numbers.


Watching by another scotsman, on Flickr

 

[r.harris1]

Sunrise Portrait.

USA_CO_NIKON D300S_1847 by Ray Harrison, on Flickr

 

[mackmgg]

Also Rocky Mountain National Park, but a couple years earlier

 

[mpfuchs]

Great to see lots of entries!
I'll be closing this tonight at 9pm EST and announce the winner tomorrow morning.

 

[mpfuchs]

Alright, closing this now.

This is a first for me, so please be easy on my judging.
I'll try to give feedback as if I was looking at my own pictures.
English is not my native tongue, so please forgive any shortcomings on that end.

@tizeye
This reminds me of our trip to Yellowstone, good memories.
It's tough to get enough depth of field with multiple large animals, and unfortunately the sharpest part of the image is not on the animals. Great interaction though.

@oblomow
This one scared me. I'm afraid of snakes!
Funny as my wife and I got this thing going about if we just call them legless lizards, everything will be fine.
Didn't work for me on this one
Focus is where it needs to be, I know I couldn't have done it, but a little lower angle would have shown a bit more of the lizard. Great capture!

@Darmok N Jalad
Love blue birds! See a lot of them on our walks, but not so many at my feeder to get good pictures.
Did you take this through a window? Or is it slow shutter speed due to the lighting?
Dark winter days are always tough, I wish it had a little more color to it...

@Clix Pix
What a difference the sun makes. Colors are amazing in this one. Whites are blown out a little, but the main thing for me here is the head angle.
Wish I could see a bit more of the profile and actually see the beak.
Feather detail in the brown is amazing, the Sony really does a great job there!

@Indydenny
This one is fun! I imagine it just dove down into the water to catch fish, didn't get lucky and is now just hanging out in the tree to dry off! Posture is great, and interesting to see how it's only hanging on with one talon.

@someoldguy
I really enjoyed this one. Mostly because I'm not at all familiar with taking pictures of chameleons.
Imagine there is a lot that goes into getting a shot like that.
Also thanks for posting something scanned from film. Shows that you don't need the latest and greatest.
DoF separation is what makes this one for me.

@Elbert C
Wow, if it was solely about making an environmental statement, this one would be the winner hands down.
Exposure is spot on for me and the pose is great. Hope you got another one where you can actually see the face too!
Oh and that gull, didn't even see that one at first

@mollyc
Talking about DoF separation. Textbook.
Also like the colors on this one. Background is a bit busy, but I actually like it, because it's believable.
I've tried myself on butterflies before and getting a shot like this really shows your skills, great job!

@Apple_Glen_UK
I can totally see this. Amazing how tame some of the wildlife is at tourist hot spots.
During our vacation on Jamaica, I got within a couple of feet of a bunch of egrets. Good thing, because I didn't have a long lens with me

@LiE_
This is definitely to most fun entry!
Wish I could have been there with you watching the couple roughhousing around.
They also look fairly big, which helps getting good shots. I have a feeling they might come back for more nuts and play!

@dmb8021
Really nice portrait. It took me a bit to figure out which way the light is coming in from.
At first it seemed off, but after looking a the picture longer, I appreciate the rim lighting around the neck fur. I would like to know what equipment you used as the exposure works really well for me.
Also the background separation works really well with the lighting.

@anotherscotsman
Amazing. Another great macro shot. Colors are perfect and the DoF separation really works in your favor.
Reading on flickr that this grasshopper is actually poisonous makes the picture even more interesting to me. Curious to know if you already knew that ahead of time, or after the fact when you researched the species?

@r.harris1
Love it!
The morning light is very flattering. And everyone that's ever tried to take a picture of an egret knows how difficult it is to expose them correctly. Great job. Also love the detail/sharpness around the eye.
I'm a bit surprised by the amount of noise at ISO 252 or maybe that's not a correct number on flickr.
Everyone on here that's been following my posts know that birds are my passion, and if this was a birds only competition, this would be my winner.

@mackmgg
Assuming this is in the fall, the colors are a bit uniform, which I guess works to camouflage the animal just as intended. Nothing you can do about that.
The lighting again works well. Even though it's head on, I feel like I still get some of that profile due to the side light. Focus is dead on, great capture.


Alright, now the tough part. A bunch of really nice entries and I'm also excited about the diversity of species. Some of them out of my comfort zone.

The winner is @anotherscotsman really loved this one, but you'll have to explain the caption to me
Runners up @mollyc and @r.harris1

 

[r.harris1]

Wow, many thanks @mpfuchs and nicely done @anotherscotsman and @mollyc! Everyone else too, this was a fun topic with some lovely images indeed.

I may try and reprocess that image if I still have the original raw as it was done a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away .

 

[Clix Pix]

Well done, everyone! Congratulations to anotherscotsman -- that grasshopper photo is so compelling....

This was a tough one and I agree with r.harris that this was also a fun and interesting topic, too. Lots of variety here, from the commonly-seen to the not-so-commonly seen species and in how we all approached our subjects....

mpfuchs, you and I are in total agreement about the head angle on that hooded merganser! The darned things do whatever it is to "blow up" their "hood" and it pretty much obscures nearly everything about their head except the eye, and if you don't catch them at the right angle, which I've tried repeatedly to do, it's impossible to see the beak or any other features. They keep moving and turning, moving and turning....and sometimes unexpectedly dive under the water. Wish I could just make one pose nicely for me! LOL! At least this time I was able to get one reasonably close to me and the sun was shining just right, and I could nail the eye (thanks to Sony's wonderful Animal Eye-Focus), which helps a lot.....

 

[someoldguy]

This was a fun contest . I got to go through all my old travels in search of an entry . Ended up with the chameleon , taken on my last big trip shooting film . Taken with an EOS 1 and a 28-70L in 2006 . Scanned onto CD at the time of developing by Fujifilm . Had to do lot of work resizing and editing to get it up to what I felt was acceptable to me today .
The whole endeavor of photographic chameleons comes down to 2 things .... realizing they're around (problem solved via a squashed found on the drive by the lodge ) ,and then finding them .They blend effectively into their surroundings , but after you find one , others are easy .
Photographing is pretty easy , they're ambush predators , so they don't run . Just a matter of getting a shot through the foliage .

Anyway , congrats to the winners and on to the next one !

 

[mollyc]

@mollyc
Talking about DoF separation. Textbook.
Also like the colors on this one. Background is a bit busy, but I actually like it, because it's believable.
I've tried myself on butterflies before and getting a shot like this really shows your skills, great job!

Thanks for the mention! My bokeh is natural, but I did have to do a bit of cloning to get some poles out of the way. ?

Congrats to @anotherscotsman!!

 

[Scepticalscribe]

Great competition topic, @mpfuchs, plus excellent (and thoughtful and empathetic judgement) and some superb entries.

I was especially taken with those by @mollyc, whose careful eye and beautifully shot and composed work I have long liked, and those of the other two deserving entries also on the podium, namely @r.harris1 (lovely shot, terrific colours and composition) and @anotherscotsman (that grasshopper would not have been out of place on the cover of a book by David Attenborough accompanying a TV series in the Life on Earth documentaries).

And I also loved @Indydenny's stunning eagle, and enjoyed the squabbling squirrels submitted by @LiE_.

 

[anotherscotsman]

Alright, closing this now.

This is a first for me, so please be easy on my judging.
I'll try to give feedback as if I was looking at my own pictures.
English is not my native tongue, so please forgive any shortcomings on that end.

@tizeye
This reminds me of our trip to Yellowstone, good memories.
It's tough to get enough depth of field with multiple large animals, and unfortunately the sharpest part of the image is not on the animals. Great interaction though.

@oblomow
This one scared me. I'm afraid of snakes!
Funny as my wife and I got this thing going about if we just call them legless lizards, everything will be fine.
Didn't work for me on this one
Focus is where it needs to be, I know I couldn't have done it, but a little lower angle would have shown a bit more of the lizard. Great capture!

@Darmok N Jalad
Love blue birds! See a lot of them on our walks, but not so many at my feeder to get good pictures.
Did you take this through a window? Or is it slow shutter speed due to the lighting?
Dark winter days are always tough, I wish it had a little more color to it...

@Clix Pix
What a difference the sun makes. Colors are amazing in this one. Whites are blown out a little, but the main thing for me here is the head angle.
Wish I could see a bit more of the profile and actually see the beak.
Feather detail in the brown is amazing, the Sony really does a great job there!

@Indydenny
This one is fun! I imagine it just dove down into the water to catch fish, didn't get lucky and is now just hanging out in the tree to dry off! Posture is great, and interesting to see how it's only hanging on with one talon.

@someoldguy
I really enjoyed this one. Mostly because I'm not at all familiar with taking pictures of chameleons.
Imagine there is a lot that goes into getting a shot like that.
Also thanks for posting something scanned from film. Shows that you don't need the latest and greatest.
DoF separation is what makes this one for me.

@Elbert C
Wow, if it was solely about making an environmental statement, this one would be the winner hands down.
Exposure is spot on for me and the pose is great. Hope you got another one where you can actually see the face too!
Oh and that gull, didn't even see that one at first

@mollyc
Talking about DoF separation. Textbook.
Also like the colors on this one. Background is a bit busy, but I actually like it, because it's believable.
I've tried myself on butterflies before and getting a shot like this really shows your skills, great job!

@Apple_Glen_UK
I can totally see this. Amazing how tame some of the wildlife is at tourist hot spots.
During our vacation on Jamaica, I got within a couple of feet of a bunch of egrets. Good thing, because I didn't have a long lens with me

@LiE_
This is definitely to most fun entry!
Wish I could have been there with you watching the couple roughhousing around.
They also look fairly big, which helps getting good shots. I have a feeling they might come back for more nuts and play!

@dmb8021
Really nice portrait. It took me a bit to figure out which way the light is coming in from.
At first it seemed off, but after looking a the picture longer, I appreciate the rim lighting around the neck fur. I would like to know what equipment you used as the exposure works really well for me.
Also the background separation works really well with the lighting.

@anotherscotsman
Amazing. Another great macro shot. Colors are perfect and the DoF separation really works in your favor.
Reading on flickr that this grasshopper is actually poisonous makes the picture even more interesting to me. Curious to know if you already knew that ahead of time, or after the fact when you researched the species?

@r.harris1
Love it!
The morning light is very flattering. And everyone that's ever tried to take a picture of an egret knows how difficult it is to expose them correctly. Great job. Also love the detail/sharpness around the eye.
I'm a bit surprised by the amount of noise at ISO 252 or maybe that's not a correct number on flickr.
Everyone on here that's been following my posts know that birds are my passion, and if this was a birds only competition, this would be my winner.

@mackmgg
Assuming this is in the fall, the colors are a bit uniform, which I guess works to camouflage the animal just as intended. Nothing you can do about that.
The lighting again works well. Even though it's head on, I feel like I still get some of that profile due to the side light. Focus is dead on, great capture.


Alright, now the tough part. A bunch of really nice entries and I'm also excited about the diversity of species. Some of them out of my comfort zone.

The winner is @anotherscotsman really loved this one, but you'll have to explain the caption to me
Runners up @mollyc and @r.harris1

Many thanks @mpfuchs - I was certain that @Elbert C or @Indydenny or @r.harris1 were destined for top spot. The 'Watching' comes from the fact that the beast was clearly keeping a close (compound) eye on me given that I was only a few inches away (35mm lens). With something as brightly coloured as this that was happy to be out in the open, it's a cert that it was poisonous - only read about the defensive 'spit' when I read about it later.

I'll try and get back with a new topic but likely to be tomorrow. Thanks again for the topic and judging and thanks to everyone who makes the effort to participate.

 

[tizeye]

Alright, closing this now.

This is a first for me, so please be easy on my judging.
I'll try to give feedback as if I was looking at my own pictures.
English is not my native tongue, so please forgive any shortcomings on that end.

@tizeye
This reminds me of our trip to Yellowstone, good memories.
It's tough to get enough depth of field with multiple large animals, and unfortunately the sharpest part of the image is not on the animals. Great interaction though.

Yes, that was taken with an old P&S camera (or perhaps a Nikon D40 kit lens) I need to get back up there with my current equipment... including Sony's animal eye focus and far better lens. While it was a daytrip for me I don't know what was more exciting, watching the elk or the trailers and Class C campers traveling on the single lane dirt/gravel switchback road up/down the mountain with pullovers to support two way traffic. Also, no electricity at campsite (but did have a restroom supporting tent campers), but with the tree cover even solar power would be useless. It is definitely worth the trip though if staying in Maggie Valley/Waynesville area.

 

[Elbert C]

Alright, closing this now.

This is a first for me, so please be easy on my judging.
I'll try to give feedback as if I was looking at my own pictures.
English is not my native tongue, so please forgive any shortcomings on that end.

@Elbert C
Wow, if it was solely about making an environmental statement, this one would be the winner hands down.
Exposure is spot on for me and the pose is great. Hope you got another one where you can actually see the face too!
Oh and that gull, didn't even see that one at first

Haha, I didn't see the gull too until I uploaded the images onto my computer. ?
Great job on judging the theme, mpfuchs.
Congratulations to the winners!