Oh the places you'll go...

Initial Idea

I am planning on visiting Edinburgh Zoo this summer, therefore, I am going to take my camera and take advantage completing coursework whilst enjoying a good day out. Documenting the animals that belong to each area of the zoo.
As I will be photographing wildlife, I am going to need to use a telephoto lens as this will enable me to get a close shot of the animals in their territories. The lens I will be using is a Canon 75-300mm. I will be looking at using a wider aperture with a fast shutter speed to capture the animal in it's movement, freezing the image and giving me a shallow depth-of-field, most importantly a nice sharp crisp clean image.


Research
Andy Rouse

I have chosen to research Andy Rouse because I find his images really strong because of the shallow depths-of-field, compositions and how he has used the scenery to frame some of his images. I like how his images have soft tones created by the shallow depth-of-field.
These are the kind of images I am aiming to achieve. To do so, as I have said before, I will be looking at using a wider aperture with a fast shutter speed to capture the animal in it's movement, freezing the image and giving me a shallow depth-of-field. Also, I will have these images in mind as inspiration, aiding me into thinking about framing my images with the scenery etc.


Wildlife Photography

Larger telephoto lenses are often required for wildlife photography, although if you prefer to capture the smaller insects etc then a macro lens that would allow for magnification and close focusing would be required.

The best time to shoot wildlife photography is at dawn or dusk when the light is not always cooperative because that is mostly when the wildlife become more active.

If you have the money, fast telephoto lenses are ideal although, there are now more affordable, slower telephoto lenses that can capture great images too. 

Contact Sheets

One of my favoured animals. Just thought I would add these images in because they make me smile :)

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This was originally going to be one of my final images, although looking through my images and thinking about the concept of the assignment I have chosen to go with another image.

f5.0   -   1/400   -   ISO 400
I chose this image because I like how the shallow depth-of-field allows you to focus directly on the tiger. Inspired by Andy Rouse I tried to frame this image with the leaves/background and the tree trunk. I feel this image has worked rather well, even though at first I wasn't happy with the idea of the leaves obstructing the tigers face but from the angle I was at, I was very limited and really had no choice.

Final Images

I found these three images the strongest from my shoot.

f5.0   -   1/400   -   ISO 400
I decided to go with this image rather than my previous choice because I feel that this image has more mood to it, also down to the fact that the tiger only has one eye which is shown better in this image that it is in the other image. I feel that this holds a strong story behind it and upon researching and reading into this, I found that Tibor (the tiger) has been brought into the zoo along with another tiger from Spain which they are hoping will mate, although Tibor had damage to his eye which on arrival at Edinburgh Zoo was checked and treated by vets who deemed it necessary for it to be removed to cause him less pain. The zoo are really hoping the pair mate as there are as little as approximately 300 of these Sumatron Tigers left in the wild, which is a good thing but also it would be nice to see these animals where they belong! In the wild.

f5.6   -   1/320    -   ISO 400

I am really happy with this image of this White-naped Crane. It was a difficult image to capture as these birds  had a tendency to jump about and dance around along with the fact that the aviary they were kept it were very crammed with tress etc. I think that the shallow depth-of-field and the composition work really well in this image. Also I like how the red patch around its eye stands out from the rest of the colours in the image being of natural colour. I think this image has character and holds it's own story behind it from the bird broken beak. 

f6.3   -   1/320   -   ISO 400
I chose this image because again, I like the shallow depth-of-field, I like the composition of the branches of the tree and where the monkey is sat on those branches. I also like how the monkey is looking towards the camera but not directly at the camera because I feel this gives it more of a natural look. I think my inspiration from Andy Rouse's work has really paid off with this shoot.


Evaluation

I am really happy with the outcome of this assignment. I feel that I have managed to create some really strong images that link really well with my inspiration from Andy Rouse's work. I think I have found a style that I am  very pleased with for my images that I will use in my future work. I really enjoyed myself with this assignment because of the freedom we were given. I found photographing the animals really interesting as going to the zoo/safari etc, is something I really like doing in my free time. I am hoping and plan to complete some more wildlife photography in the future.
To gain the effect in these images, firstly I slightly up'd the contrast in Raw, then I adjusted the curves using an extra curves layer to adjust the blue. In some of my images I used a solid colour adjustment layer with the opacity approx between 20-30%. Then I used a saturation layer and desaturated the images a little.
If I could change anything about my shoot or images, I would have set out a little earlier to get there in time to book a ticket to view the pandas that they have there so I could have got some images of that. Also, I would go at a time when less children and families are about so that I don't feel like I have to fight through crowds of people to be able to just see let alone take photographs of the animals. I would also consider using a faster shutter speed which may mean I would have to increase my ISO, to see if I can get my images sharper as some of my images were quite blurry.