I shared this image a while ago, on my profile, and it's been rated as "needs work". Now, I know this site is mostly visited by guys that want to be fashion photographers, and think nothing of spending hours in post on a single image so maybe it's not the best venue to look for feedback on a wildlife photo (personally, I loathe the idea of sitting at a computer, when I could be outdoors).
The only change I made to the image since I first posted it was some minor adjustments to the contrast. Here's the text that accompanied the original:
I get up early on weekends, go for a hike, and get away from people. It's my time to unwind, and I really love animals. Most of my shots are tight, as I have been a portrait photographer for a long time, and like the idea of wildlife portraits.
Howdy, I also love shooting wildlife! Animals are by far my favorite subject. There is nothing more exciting than seeing an animal in its natural habitat, especially if it doesn't see you first. I like the image... if there was more to it. I understand getting nice and tight on a subject, but it just doesn't work for this particular image. I wish there was a little more deer. I tried cropping the image as a portrait and I personally think it looks a little better, but still not loving it. Sometimes you gotta know when to get nice and tight, and sometimes you gotta know when to shoot a little bit more. Especially for wildlife (if they don't run away first), try to shoot at different focal lengths if possible. Shoot wide, shoot tight, play with the scene.
Clearly it is a very appealing shot.
I know what you mean about many of us doing fashion, beauty, glamour and headshots, spending crazy amounts of time at the computer and mainly the lovely ladies get the good comments and superb shots of other subjects get less recognition, but most photographers seem to be men and that's just nature, so as a natural history photographer you should understand, nature is an unstopable force.
In this case I think your head shot would look better cropped to just above the ears and if you have the extra space on your file a little lower at the bottom. I know you'll never shoot it again but let's say you did, then I would try to have the camera lower, so you are not looking down on your subject, although I do like the way the chin and the saddle of the back mirror each other in this perspective.
Nice job.
Thanks for the feedback. Kevin, when you downloaded it and cropped it (something that other people freak out about, but not me), you may have noticed it was exactly 1080x1080. If I was printing this, I might go for a different format, but since I share images like this on Instagram to promote my outdoors website, I crop to a square.
Ian,
I always enjoy reading your feedback, so I'm glad you commented. For images on my website, I crop as tight as I can, since there is a whole bunch of considerations when it comes to image size, quality, and speed of loading for SEO. I can't afford to waste any space on non-product. So then I struggle a bit to find the right amount of space around other photos. But you are correct - cropping from the top would have placed her eyes in the upper third. I'll have to go find my original, and see if I can figure out why I cropped this way. As far as the angle, I hike up and down small hills, with a 150-600 on a tripod, stopping to look for the deer and occasional moose. If they are skittish, the window of opportunity is very small. In this case, I don't think it would have been possible to get down much lower.
I fully understand about the pov and lack of control of the subject.
I'll preface my comments by saying I am not an animal photographer so take this for what it's worth. Looking at the image, the shot is technically well done. I like the deer's head position, ears up, catch light in the eye, and separation of the deer from the background.
There is some composition fixes though. The deer's body should either be all in, or out (or very soft focus) half and half is distracting for my eye. Also it seems the shot was done from slightly above the animal...maybe a lower camera position would help...like eye level.
Some thoughts..If this is a crop....I wonder if you have space with the full image to pull off some Peter Hurley head-shot concepts like putting the eyes at the top third horizon line of the image, keeping those beautiful ears, and having a bit more of the body show.
Mike
Technically speaking, the shot is done well. Its in focus, the WB is correct, the deer itself is in focus and sharp and the background is blurry enough to give the photo some depth.
With that being said, the only thing that I would (and this is a personal choice) would have it where either there is the whole body shoing or the front half of the body (show some legs). Right now, it seems a little off balance.
With that being said, I don't do animal photography but mostly portrait and nature (with a sprinkle of weddings on top).
That's almost what i said too! Great minds think alike.
It is a good shot! It could use a little work though, especially in post like you said. I would maybe bring down saturation of the greens a bit to make the deer pop. Also, try to crop to just get the head OR all of the body. Photos like this that are in the middle are not as powerful.
So I dug up the original, and it was shot pretty tight. I can't find another cropping that works better with this. After looking at the images before and I after, I could see exactly where I was when I took the photos that morning, and I was pretty much right on top of her. This one wasn't skittish after all - she was hamming it up for me.