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Humpback Fingerprint

Individual humpback whales are identified primarily by the shape, coloration pattern, and scars or predation marks on the underside of their tails....
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Individual humpback whales are identified primarily by the shape, coloration pattern, and scars or predation marks on the underside of their tails.
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Canon EOS 7D

settings

Aperture f/7.1 ISO 400 Shutter 1/1000 Focal Length 300/1

location

Alaska, US

upload_date

Oct, 2020

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Awards

Fall Award 2020

Peer Award

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Behind The Lens

Location

This photo was taken in the waters of SE Alaska on one of numerous trips taken with Captain Dennis Rogers at yachtalaska.com. Many of Dennis's cruises are photography and/or research-oriented, including a lot of time with humpbacks and other Alaska marine life. This is a humpback whale's tail, framed and tuned to reveal details of the markings on the underside. The marks, scars, notches, shapes, and color patterns are combined to identify an individual whale. No two tails are alike. I can't remember whether we were able to identify this one, but after 6 or 8 trips I can even identify one or two by sight!

Time

This photo was taken in June of 2011 in the late afternoon. That time of year, the days are very long and rain is frequent.

Lighting

You take what you can get when you're on someone else's boat with other photographers snapping away. You just don't have much choice other than to play with camera settings. And you have to be primed for short exposure times to catch these moments. It's not unusual at all for there to be very flat light--so flat that even the full-color digital photos look almost black and white/greyscale.

Equipment

This was taken on my Canon 7D set to ISO 400, 300mm (Canon EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 IS USM), f/7.1, and 1/1000 secs. No tripod (not very useful with constant motion), no flash. A good sense of balance and a steady hand are invaluable! Anticipate problems because there are no camera stores within at least several hours motoring!

Inspiration

Love of whales inspires many of my shots, but also the desire to help with research on them so that we can understand them better. This picture was taken for fluke ID purposes on a research trip with our great friend, Dr. Adam Pack, a researcher at the University of Hawaii at Hilo. Under a research permit, we're allowed to approach the whales more closely than we would on a purely recreational voyage. It's a pure joy to be allowed to participate!

Editing

This photo was taken long before I started using camera RAW format, so it's a jpg. I initially just did some basic cropping and tuning, but more recently I reapproached the edit after learning much more about post-processing. It's a close crop converted to black and white and processed specifically to bring out the tail features. The original sky was very flat, so I popped in some clouds to give the picture more depth.

In my camera bag

My equipment varies with the purpose, location, and conditions just like most photographers. On this type of trip, I go with my Canon 7D, 2 kit lenses, and the Canon 70-300 lens plus polarizing and/or neutral density filters. I try to take at least three camera batteries and rotate them through charging cycles. I've done storage several ways, but with today's large-capacity memory cards I can get away with just 2 or 3 and copy them over to an external hard drive in addition to keeping the photos on the cards.

Feedback

Not that I'm by any means an expert, but I would say that if you're doing wildlife photography for the first time, plan to learn something about your potential photo subjects beforehand. Having learned through repetition and from experts about sea life, now I can better anticipate when a breach is about to happen, the signs of a bubblenet feeding beginning, spotting signs of nearby whales (watch for whale blows, sea lions, and birds). And don't forget to put the camera down and use memory-chrome so that you really experience what's happening. I probably have at least 10,000 photos of whale body parts (especially tails), so I'm able to sometimes stand back and let the other photographers have at it while I think "Been there, done that" and can just enjoy the show!

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Humpback Fingerprint

Individual humpback whales are identified primarily by the shape, coloration pattern, and scars or predation marks on the underside of their tails.... Read more

Behind The Lens

See more amazing photos, follow WunderWorld

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Individual humpback whales are identified primarily by the shape, coloration pattern, and scars or predation marks on the underside of their tails....
Read more

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Earn coins, get amazing rewards. Join for free.