Indian leopard – Looking back – TATR, Agarzari Buffer zone

[Subhash Shrivastava]

Canon SX60 HS, 1/125, f/5.6, 121 mm, ISO-200, cropped from bottom and Left for presentation.

Clicked in TATR Buffer, Agarzari zone. Near Amritzari area, on 28-Jan-2015. There were three panthers who had crossed the road, from Mohurli buffer into Agarzari buffer in early morning, besides there was a tiger /tigress on the prowl. Whole jungle was reverberating with alarm calls so strong that you expect a big cat jump out from any bush. At 6:05 AM, when it was still pitch dark, the alarm calls were mesmerizing and transcendencing.

TATR buffer is highly dense, far more than the Core and the visibility is restricted to the narrow safari tracks as seen in the image. So the only photography chance is directly in the front or back and I was in my car :(. It was just a pure luck that I could get one panther in the frame while two went into the thickets.

[Shyamala Kumar]

Beautiful sighting.Lucky you could manage even this image, if you were driving.We had planned a safari in this zone but in the last minute we went to another buffer zone where we did not sight anything.

[Sabyasachi Patra]

Lovely sighting. Good that you could grab a shot in that fleeting moments. I tried working on your image and reduced the highlights. Editing on a small jpeg has got its pitfalls. However, you should get an idea.

Wish you had more space at the top and less at the bottom to avoid the bright highlights. Just scroll down your window or hide the bottom bright portion and you will see that our attention then goes to the leopard. Was it possible to zoom a bit more or is this the maximum zoom?

[Mrudul Godbole]

Nice to see a leopard sighting from TATR as we mostly get to see tigers. Good you got it looking back at you. The re-post looks better with the highlights toned down. Three leopards in the same place, was it mother and cubs? Nicely captured. Thanks for sharing.

[Subhash Shrivastava]

Thanks for your review and feedback.

Shyamla m'am; this zone is rich in bisons, deers and other animals, with some tigresses also. Mohurli buffer zone is Waghdoh male's inner castle, but alas he proved elusive to us. What stories about him, he is the king of whole of Mohurli and Agarazari zones, guide said that the earlier male just vanished without fight when the big daddy moved in from core zone.

Sabya sir; you have caught my worrisome veins. I am tired of blown out highlights and purple fringing in this camera. I was shooting in spot metering mode as i had suspected that the animal will be in deep shade. Is this the problem, sir. Should i be shooting in evaluative mode mostly, I am not able to get this answer myself.
The zoom is less than half of the full range :) though the image is cropped. I reduced the zoom as I knew that I was too happy for shooting :)
Sir, is there any easy way to correct the highlights in PP, I use GIMP for PP and I am not able to get help in it.

Mrudul m'am, that's what must be the case, I would like to assume that it was the mother who looked back and i clicked, but I am not sure. I could not make out much difference from the built, i must have stopped about 100 mts from them. This leopard was the last one to go into thicket. I am not sure whether it was a curious cub or the protective mother.


With Regards;
Subhash

[Mrudul Godbole]

I normally photograph in evaluative mode, and would suggest to use that. We use Adobe Lightroom which is a paid software for processing images. In that you can correct the highlights using a slider. You can download the latest Lightroom software for a free trial. You can also use Canon's DPP (Digital Photo Professional) software which comes in a CD along with the camera.

Also while photographing, you can review images in the LCD and check if there are any blown out areas and adjust the exposure compensation accordingly. This you can do mostly if the subject is comfortable and gives you ample time to photograph :).

[Roopak Gangadharan]

Nice to see this from Tadoba. I can imagine the scene and the effect it has on wildlife lovers.

In the last few years Tadoba has emerged as a highly favored wildlife destination, almost everyone I speak to seems to have gone there and sighted tigers. It is a surprise that they allow private vehicles inside the reserve?? or is it only the buffer? there is a lot of talk on how effective community owned nature conservancy models are based on its success around Tadoba. what is our take on this after visiting Tadoba ? were you able to see / experience this at any point? I ask this in particular as you say the buffer in Tadoba seems more dense than the core.

TFS
Roopak

[Sabyasachi Patra]

Purple fringing happens when the subject is against the light ie. in areas of high contrast. It is not easy to pack every bit of goodness into a compact zoom lens and still have it in such a small package. So there has to be some compromise somewhere.

In the softwares like lightroom, there are lens corrections built-in. So if you select the lens used and the correction applied, then the purple fringing etc can be taken care off.

A lot of people use spot metering thinking that that will help them. Unfortunately, spot metering is based on a small area in the centre. That area varies from 3% in some cameras, in some others it is 9% and more. In the professional models it is around 1%. So basically even after selecting the spot metering you get the meter reading from a concentrated area in the centre. Then the camera will try to pull it down to middle gray. So you get a darker image. Learn to use evaluative. It is easier. These days evaluative is so good, one doesn't need the manual exposure.

[Subhash Shrivastava]

Dear Roopak, thanks for sharing your views & queries.

Private vehicles are allowed both in core and in buffer, in core it will be a big handicap in sighting and photography hence it's not a preferred option. The chances of sighting the animals in buffer are extremely less and photography almost nil hence I decided to cut down on gypsy cost for my buffer safaris, though I ended up getting some nasty long scratches on my new xuv :(. In total I had 7 safaris (3 BUF, 4 COR).
As one guide put it, Buffer is far more dense as it has not been developed like core yet, developed means wide clearings on both sides of the roads for animal sightings & clicking and pastures as in the core. In Buffer the visibility is hardy more than 10 feet from roadside, there was a huge male bison with its back to me hardly 15 feet from me and we can only see moving black patches. I am referring to Agarzari buffer here, as Mohurli buffer size is far less (most of it is core)

Coming to wildlife management, I would say that I was pleasantly surprised, and, listening to guides and drivers, can virtually visualize the spreading of tigers to new areas year on year. A tigress with 2 cubs has made Mohurli lake as her area this year and I used to hear the alarm calls early in the morning as MTDC resorts are at its shore. Almost all the vacated villages and most of the buffer zones are having the resident tigers now, though that's an another question till what time Buffers are saved from the creeping open cast coal mines, which might get sanction under the new dispensation, our new Env. minister takes pride in singing the number of clearances he has granted. We may hear horrors as Chandrapur sits in a prime mining and industrial belt.

Having said that, Roopak sir, we may find the forest staff of TATR, one of the most motivated and professional ones, though tourism may be taking its toll , but now it is a necessary evil to safeguard the core area.

Sabya sir, I have been using Spot metering linking it to the AF area, hence trying to bring the AF area to optimal exposure, but blowing out the sunny patches outside AF area . As suggested by Mrudul and you, I may start using evaluative mostly, With Nikon P510 it was always evaluative (pattern), for some reason never faced purple fringing (or too much blowout HL) with Nikon P510, though I had other major issues with it. As you said at the end of it is tradeoff and settling down :)

With Regards;
Subhash Shrivastava,