Peeping Leopard

[Mrudul Godbole]

Hi All,

This is my first Leopard sighting photograph taken in Nagarhole last year. It was a very lucky sighting and I had nearly missed him the first time as it hurried back in the jungle. But after waiting patiently for around 40 mintues, it came back and peeped through the bushes. It was a lovely experience. Through the lens I felt the green eyes staring at me from a very close distance :). This is a near full frame, just cropped a bit for composition.

Canon 50D, 100-400mm lens IS USM, f14, ISO 100, 1/40

comments and critiques welcome..

[Kiran Ghadge]

thats amazing shot..perfect frame, would love more contrast and saturation, also I feel one stop less exposure would have better.

[AB Apana]

Nice one Mrudul, love the expression. Agree with Kiran regarding the saturation / exposure. Not sure of what PP you've done but have you staurated the upper left shoulder and head of the leopard?

Apana

[Mrudul Godbole]

Thanks Kiran and Apana. I have worked a bit on the exposure and saturation.Let me know if this looks better.

[Kiran Ghadge]

This looks good, but I feel there is little blue cast on background and some part of foreground....

[AB Apana]

Yes, this does look better. Not sure about the cast, but I am poor at detecting casts that are very subtle.

Apana

[Murugan Anantharaman]

nice image of the leopard...the leaves to the right are a tad too bright and distracting i feel...nevertheless a lovely image

[Mrudul Godbole]

nice image of the leopard...the leaves to the right are a tad too bright and distracting i feel...nevertheless a lovely image

Ya the leaves were his hiding ground :), so couldnt avoid them.

[Aditya Panda]

Good one Mrudul. I like the composition and the sharpness is retained well considering that you shot at 1/40th of a sec. But, why did you stop down so much? f/14? Was it necessary? Personally in such a situation I would have used the widest aperture to blur the b/g and f/g or I would have stopped down to a maximum of f/8 if I wanted my lens to perform at peak sharpness. That would have helped me retain speed. Also, in your PP, you could correct the exposure a little more. Seems a tad bit overexposed.

But overall, a very pleasant image. Thanks for sharing.

Regards,
Aditya

[Mrudul Godbole]

Thanks Aditya.

Yes I should have changed the aperture. I realised it later, that the aperture setting was high.It was a very unexpected sighting on the road. Being my first sighting I just clicked without checking the details :).

[Bibhav Behera]

Lovely image... agree abt the f number. the expression is nice... thanks for sharing

[Sagar Patil]

Hi Mrudul,
This is something unusual angle. Fabulous action captured. Let more shots come, thanx for sharing this.