Watchful
This amazing female leopard ensuring the surrounding bush is free of predators before coming down from the safe haven of the tree. Image taken in Sabi Sand Rese...
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This amazing female leopard ensuring the surrounding bush is free of predators before coming down from the safe haven of the tree. Image taken in Sabi Sand Reserve in South Africa
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Oct, 2015Views
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Top Shot Award 22
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Same photographer See allBehind The Lens
Behind The Lens
Location
This photo was taken in the Greater Kruger National Park in an area called Sabi Sands.Time
As can be seen in the photo this image was taken well after dark, but the story stared much earlier in the afternoon, when we first spotted this leopard with a small great duiker in a tree. Some 3 hours later, as the sun set and darkness fell things got really interesting as the leopard decided to make its was down the tree, but danger was waiting as a number of hyena's had gathered around the tree, and she had to pause a moment to decide on the approach to avoid the waiting hyena clan.Lighting
Most wildlife photographs will always tell you that the most difficult time to photograph animals is at night, nothing is on your side and animals are unpridictable. Do you use flash or spot lights, both could lead to blowing out parts of the image. For this image I choose to use just a spot light, directed away from the leopard, but still reflecting light on the subject.Equipment
I am a Nikon man, this image taken with a D4S with an ISO setting of 2000 using a Nikon 80- 400 lense @ 155mm F5.6 1/160 sec hand held.Inspiration
Photographing leopards is on all wildlife photographers bucket list, they are just azaming creatures. To photograph them at night having spent 4 hours and hundreds of images later to nail this one is just an awasome experinaceEditing
Always use Lightroom, this image has been entered in a number of world completions, which means editing with a great deal of care. So in the image a lot of the background is blacked out using just exposure control, which gives the perfect black night affect.In my camera bag
Wow, ok the list is long, 3 bodies D4S, D810 and old faithful D3S. Lenses 600mm F4. 400mm F2.8, 80 - 400mm, 80 - 200mm F2.8, 24 - 70 mm F2.8, 14 - 24mm F2.8. SB 900 flash unit. TC 1.4, 1.7 and 2.0. Gimbal and tripods.Feedback
Patience, and than more patience, it is not uncommon to wait 3 to 4 hours to get the perfect image. Learn something about animal behavior, it will help in the planning on the image, and most of all remember you are in their home so respect them at all times, you can always get the image next time.
