Giraffe, Elephant, and Antelope

[NateS]

1.

2.

3.

 

[NateS]

bump

 

[Jemmind]

I love the giraffe best because it has a nice background. I know at zoos you cant really control the shoot, but it's monotonous in color when you have brown animals in the dirt.

 

[NateS]

Very true. The elephant was kind of hard since the background is the same color as the animal and the other one being in the dirt doesn't help much. Giraffe turned out nice though since it was such a nice blue sky that day.

 

[NateS]

bump

 

[Ajay]

I think #1 is definitely your best out of these. It is hard when the animal is similar in color to your background and it looks like you were shooting in the middle of the day which makes it easy to overexpose. I can't wait to get to the zoo and take some shots of my own!

It says your photos are ok to edit so I did a quick edit on the elephant shot. If you want me to take it down just let me know.

I used CS2:

1 - adjusted levels
2 - toned down the highlights with a shadow/highlight adjustment - this also made the colors a bit richer
3 - slight adjustment in curves to increase the contrast a bit
4 - dodged his eye a little bit
5 - burned in the background and his trunk - both the dodging and burning was done at 10% and set on midtones
6 - did an unsharp mask at 20/40/0

Let me know what you think.

 

[NateS]

Interesting edit. A little bold for my tastes, though I might like it blended with the original (mix between the two). Thanks for the comments and idea. Gives me something to play around with.