Giraffes x2
Oct, 2017Views
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Awards
Winner in African Animals Photo Challenge
Peer Award
Absolute Masterpiece
Superb Composition
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Superior Skill
Outstanding Creativity
Magnificent Capture
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Behind The Lens
Location
This is a composite of several different photos. I took the giraffes separately at the San Francisco Zoo.Time
It was in full sun in the middle of the day. One thing I've been wanting to do is learn more about photoshop. Lighting has not been a forte of mine, so playing with light in photoshop is intimidating. I know it's not perfect, but I was pretty happy with this on my first attempt.Lighting
The lighting in this was from three different photos. One of the landscape, one of the sunset and then the two giraffes. They were not all the same time of day, so it was quite tricky. As an artist, it's easy to pick apart your own work and to try re-working it over and over and over, never really being satisfied with it. That is probably true with this one. So I finally just called it done. I would probably darken the baby giraffe on the left side more if I were going to work on it some more. Shadowing is difficult for me.Equipment
These were handheld shots, all on my Canon 5D Mark III. No flash. The giraffes I actually shot with a 70-300 EF lens.Inspiration
As a company, we wanted to start doing some fantasy mini sessions with kids and putting them in an environment that is bigger than life with wild animals. It was easy to buy templates, but we felt we wanted to create our own imaginary images. I have a similar one I added a little girl, a tent and a hot air balloon to. It's a lot of fun to play with images in photoshop. I'm inspired by so many photographers on ViewBug and hope to grow my skills in this area.Editing
With composites, most of the magic happens in post-processing. Though I have to take the original images, it's the art of blending them, figuring out the shadowing and lighting, and deciding what elements to bring together that is the challenge.In my camera bag
I despise flash photography but have grown to know that it is sometimes needed. So I now always carry a flash with a Gary Fong diffuser, a 50mm 1.8 EF, 70-300mm EF, 24-105mm EF, and a 70-200mm 2.8 EF and my Canon 5D Mark III.Feedback
Don't be afraid to try new things. And if (when) you fail, try it again. Or try it another way. Practicing is the only way to get better. And I have found throughout my career that I learn so much more from my failures than I do from any of my successes.
