TAKING BETTER ZOO PHOTOS

TAKING BETTER ZOO PHOTOS

DISCLAIMER
I’m not an All Knowing Photography Guru (AKPG), but I do have a passionate interest in my subjects (wildlife, usually) and in improving my photography. And like many of our group members, I’ve read, studied, submitted photos for critique, and tried to glean as much information from other photographers who do great work, to learn their secrets.

INTRO
This post is aimed at our less experienced members. If you’re a member of the Animal Photography group, you like animals and photographing animals. Chances are, you’ve taken a trip to the zoo to get a chance to capture some exotic animals that you may never have an opportunity to see otherwise. And, chances are, you may have been a little disappointed in the pics you took. Taking good photos at the zoo can be a challenge, but there are some simple things you can do to improve your photos and get more satisfaction from your photography. We’re not going to take casual snapshots – we’re doing this seriously. Most experienced photographers are very familiar with these suggestions, and may have many other great suggestions to share – feel free to add to these suggestions.

LOCATION, LIGHT, & TIMING
The first thing to do is Know Your Zoo. If you can, buy a season pass. A onetime trip to the zoo is not the best way to do photographic justice to the subjects there. Start out by going to the zoos web site and printing out a map. Map sure North is indicated so you can orient the map and get an idea of where the light will be at different times of the day. Plan your day and your shooting to catch the best light.

Get to the zoo as soon as it opens (and if they have an early-opening day, be there). The best light for photography will generally be early in the morning, the late afternoon, and early evening. Mid-day is just too harsh to do justice to your subjects. Take a nap in the gift shop between 11AM and 4PM, or go see a movie, and go back around 4PM. Fortunately, you brought your zoo map and have an idea of where the light will be best depending upon the time of the day. Follow the light.
If you try to take photos during the middle part of the day, you’ll get areas of harsh light next to dark shadows and you’ll get either get burned out, featureless highlights or noisy, featureless dark areas, plus washed out colors. Most zoo animals also seem to seek shade and nap during the mid-day, limiting your photographic options. Nothing makes for a dull photograph like a sleeping animal with its back to you.

It may be a good idea to leave the kids at home when you go on a zoo photography expedition. Nothing like having a photographer along on a family trip to bore and frustrate the life out of family members. And bore other people you will. Most zoo visitors walk from habitat to habitat, spend a few minutes, take a quick snapshot, and move along to the next animal. Not you – you’re going to pick only one or two animals for the morning, and only one or two for the evening. If you’re planning to get shots of every single animal there in a single day, you will not be pleased with your results. Do this mindfully – have a plan, and don’t go overboard. Plan to camp out at a habitat, catch the best angle, best light, and the best action. You might spend half an hour, an hour, or longer at each habitat. Wandering mindlessly is for tourists – you’re on a mission. Remember, Mindful photography, not snapshot photography.

HAND OF MAN
I’m picky. When I take a zoo shot, I don’t want it to look like I took it in a zoo. Zoo habitats are very obvious. The trick is to make it look like it wasn’t taken in a zoo. This is not easily accomplished. Whenever we have elements that are man-made and are unnatural to the animals environment in the shot, we call the Hand of Man (HOM). It’s getting harder and harder to capture images of wild animals without HOM, and it’s downright tough with zoo animals. But that’s what we’re trying to achieve – no HOM and no indication that this is not a wild animal. We’re trying to exclude bars, fences, fake concrete “rocks” and “cliffs” that immediate degrade the image quality.

While we’re trying to make an image with no HOM, we’re not going to present this as a wild animal – always disclose that this was a zoo image. It’s unethical to present a shot as a wild animal when it’s a zoo animal.

GEAR & SETTINGS
The gear you use can make or break your zoo shots. If possible, avoid using a compact camera. Because of the design of their sensor and lens, they have a huge depth of field (DOF), making it difficult to keep the obvious zoo habitat & HOM out of the shot. Most compacts also have a limited telephoto range and a limited range of settings.

A better option would be a bridge camera or super-zoom. These cameras have a longer focal length and usually have more sophisticated settings, allowing greater control of photographic elements.

The best option would be a DSLR – even an entry level DSLR will provide better image quality and much more control over camera settings than a compact or a super-zoom. A lens with a focal length of 200mm is the minimum you need. A 75-300mm lens should work well for zoo photography. Anything over 400mm is probably overkill for most zoo photography. The faster the lens, the better you’ll be able to control DOF. An f/2.8 lens will have a much shallower DOF than an f/6.3 lens, and having better control over DOF will result in better zoo photos.

Here’s the section where I blather on about using a tripod. If you don’t like using a tripod, you may be tempted to skip this paragraph – DON’T! For all the same reasons I’ve already mentioned, a tripod is your best friend. Your photos will be much, much sharper. The tripod will force you to slow down and be more mindful of light, composition, point of view (POV), and it will allow you to keep the camera/lens aimed at your subject without making your arms numb while you wait out the animal. As helpful as a tripod is, there are some caveats: a tripod acts as a lure for young, energetic, inattentive, and poorly supervised children (of any age). They like nothing better than tripping over tripods, and they get extra points for causing your precious gear to crash to the ground. ALWAYS keep a firm grasp on the tripod and your gear. If a group of children gather near, lift and close the legs together and quietly move off to a safer spot until the danger has passed. That’s another reason to camp out – you’re taking your time so you can wait-out the tourists and get the best shots.

If your using a DSLR or more advanced camera with a PASM setting, use Aperture priority mode and try the widest aperture you have – the wider the aperture, the shallower the DOF (see below). Most lenses aren’t at their sharpest at the widest aperture, so check the LCD and make sure the background is sufficiently blurred if you crank down the aperture by a stop or two. If you don’t have a PASM option, switch your camera to Portait mode – you’ll achieve close to the same effect in portrait mode.

Use the lowest ISO setting you can to maintain a decent shutter speed (generally 100-200). Don’t bother with the camera’s built in flash. If you don’t already do so, consider shooting in RAW. I won’t go in to detail about the advantages of RAW vs. JPG except to say that RAW will likely give you much better image quality and latitude in post-processing.

If you have a more advanced camera, change the focus to Spot Focus, rather than Local or Wide. It’s usually best to use the Matrix Metering, but be sure to activate the Histogram and Blinkies to warn you about any under or overexposure problems.

Use Continuous Focus, not Single Shot Focus. Remember, this is Mindful photography – we’re not just going to hold down the shutter, but we can take a few photos in rapid sequence if there’s some special action we want to capture.

SIMPLIFY & ISOLATE
You may recall the forum post Simplify and Isolate. Simplify the composition and isolate the subject. It’s going to take some effort to do this, but at a zoo, you do have more control over the situation than you generally do with a wild animal. That’s why the hosts on Animal Photography generally hold photos of pets, domestic animals, and zoo animals to a higher standard than wild animals. That’s not to say it’s going to be easy or fast. That’s why you’re camping out in front of a habitat.

To SIMPLIFY THE COMPOSITION, wait for the animal to get away from any distracting elements – the fake zoo habitat, rocks, tree limbs, fences, bars, etc. No limbs or rocks or other elements cutting across the animal. No other elements in the photo that distract the eye from the subject. For a wild animal, you may want to include elements of the natural habitat in the photo, but not in a zoo photo (unless it’s an exceptional zoo habitat)

To ISOLATE THE SUBJECT, you have several options. Most zoo animals (and wild ones too) tend to behave in predictable ways. The more confined the environment, the more predictable the behavior can be. If you have an idea about the route the animal takes, use that knowledge to your advantage. Stake out a good spot with the best light and the best angle, get some catch light in the animals’ eyes, isolate it from the fake zoo habitat, and get a great shot.

If you’re using a sufficiently long lens, you can zoom in for a tight crop, doing either a portrait or a frame-filling image and exclude as much of the habitat as possible. Don’t be afraid to get in close (well, not physically) with the lens.

Use depth of field (DOF) to your advantage. The wider the aperture of your lens, the shallower the DOF will be. That way, you can keep the eyes and face in sharp focus, let the body of the animal fall out of focus, and hopefully you can completely blur the background. The faster the lens you use, the better you’ll be able to control DOF.

ANGLES & PERSPECTIVE
Most modern zoos tend to have the habitat at roughly eye level with the viewing public, and that’s a good thing, particularly for photography. We’re going to get the most connection with the animal when the viewer and the animal are at eye level with each other. If I have to shoot down on the animal to get a photo, I won’t take the photo (unless there’s a very compelling reason to make an exception). There are sometimes some advantages to shooting upwards at an animal (we want to emphasize its height, for instance), but for most animal photography, keep the perspective at eye level.

Keep the focus on the eyes of the animal (that’s why we switched to Spot Focus) – the eyes are the most crucial element to have in focus. If the shoulder or foot is in sharp focus, not the eyes, it won’t be a great photo. The animal doesn’t have to face you, but the eyes should be clearly visible. And for the love of all that’s good in the world – NO ANIMAL BUTTS – no shots from behind. The animal doesn’t have to face you, but it needs to at least present a side view.

What about shooting through bars, fences, mesh, and glass? My first response is “Don’t bother.” You can sometimes use a shallow DOF and hope that by focusing on the animal that the bars/fence/mesh will be thrown out of focus. It just doesn’t work as well in practice as it does in theory. I’m going to stick with the Don’t Bother response when it comes to shooting through zoo glass. The glass is usually absolutely filthy – sure, you can bring travel sized glass wipes, and that might help, but zoo glass is not optical glass. Expect reflections and distortions when shooting through glass – even clean glass. Even worse is thick acrylic walls. The pictures will come out blurry – usually with some areas REALLY out of focus and some areas only kind of out of focus, but no areas actually in focus.

CONCLUSION
A word of warning – some zoos are not in the best areas of town. Carrying a load of expensive gear can make you an easy mark – whenever possible, go with others (maybe even other photographers for a field trip) for your safety.

I hope this makes some sort of sense. If not, I’d be happy to answer questions or provide further clarification. I’m sure some of our group members can do a much better job than I. I am going to suggest that we take the opportunity to visit our local zoo and try some of these suggestions. Let’s also do our next Challenge as ZOO ANIMALS and see how we do.

Snapshot Photography vs. Mindful Photography

Let me add my usual preface – I’m not an All Knowing Photography Guru (AKPG), but I do have a passionate interest in my subjects (wildlife, usually) and in improving my photography. And like many of our group members, I’ve read, studied, submitted photos for critique, and tried to glean as much information from other photographers who do great work, to learn their secrets.

The dictionary defines a snapshot (in the context of photography) as “a photograph that is “shot” spontaneously and quickly, most often without artistic or journalistic intent”. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing. A snapshot may allow you to quickly capture a scene or a subject that might otherwise be missed. That’s OK for capturing a memory or a moment. Snapshots can capture and convey great sentimentality.

Is it bad to take snapshots or be a snapshooter? Not at all. To each his own. If snapshots work for you, more power to you.

But to me (and many other photographers), snapshot can be a pejorative term, synonymous with bad lighting, bad composition, bad focus, and bad point of view.

If you want to improve your photography, take your images to the next level, or get more pleasing results from your photography, maybe it’s time that you move from snapshot photography to mindful photography.

Mindfulness is simply being observant, attentive, careful, deliberate, focused (so to speak) in the moment. Mindful photography (hmmmmm, maybe I should coin that phrase – consider it registered until otherwise notified).

Mindful photography, then, is a state of awareness that allows you to focus on the photographic process, not just pushing the shutter button.

When I run Mindfulness groups, one of the recommendations I make is for folks to slow down a little. Make everyday chores an exercise in Mindfulness. When you do the dishes, do them 3 times slower than you usually would – stay in the moment and focus on the process, not the outcome. When vacuuming, again, do it 3 times slower than you normally would – notice what’s going on while you do it.

When you slow things down a bit, will you miss some photos? Sure you will. You’ll no doubt have fewer photos that are poorly composed. You may have fewer out of focus photos. You’ll have fewer photos with feet, noses, antlers, and tails cut off. Maybe fewer photos of animal butts (not judging – if that’s your thing, fine).

Equipment (with 1 exception) is not an issue in Mindful photography – doesn’t matter if you’re using a disposable camera or the latest DSLR. It’s not the equipment, it’s the photographer and the photographic process. A Mindful photographer will generally get better images with a disposable camera than a snapshooter will get with the latest DSLR. It’s the photographer and the process, not the gear.

The one gear exception? I bet some of you can already guess what it is. A tripod. Yes, they’re heavy and cumbersome and unwieldy and generally a big pain in the butt – and frequently hideously expensive. And they’re worth every bit of inconvenience in the field. There’s no better way to slow yourself down than using a tripod for every shot you take. A cheap tripod (that will at least hold the weight of your gear) is better than no tripod.

I know, I know – I can hear the anguished cries now. “I hate tripods,” “I’ll never use a tripod,” “You must be some Gitzo shill.” But consider this:

By using a tripod, you can more mindfully consider composition. You can find the best light. You can position the camera/lens for the best angle for your subject. Your keeper rate will go up. Your backgrounds will be cleaner and less cluttered. And your images will be much sharper.

One more trait of the Mindful photographer: knowing when to not take a picture. The light is poor. The background is just too cluttered. There’s just too much stuff in the way. I won’t take the picture. I’ll come back another day, I’ll try a different position. And I’ll get the photo I want, not the one I had to settle for.

So, is it wrong, then to take a snapshot? Nah, digital film is cheap. There’s nothing wrong with it. But maybe you can slow down a little – consider the light, the composition, the point of view, and wait a few seconds (or minutes) before you push the shutter button. Do a little experiment and monitor how your photography changes.

Here’s to Mindfulness.

Self Critique

SELF-CRITIQUE

Jay Ryser jayryser.com

This article was originally written for members of the Animal Photography group on redbubble.com

One of the great tools for improving your photography is submitting your photos for an objective critique. When you first start this process, it’s also a great tool for building frustration tolerance, building humility, and tolerating perceived criticism. Submitting photos for critique is not for the thin-skinned, but once you move past the perceived personal attacks, it’s an excellent way to improve your photography.

Remember, the Animal Photography group is dedicated to an extremely high quality standard for submitted images, and we have an extremely high rate of rejection. There are basically 3 ways to reduce the rejection rate:
• Reduce the quality standard for submitted images
• Improve the quality level of submitted images
• Decrease the number of submissions that don’t meet the standard

Since I would like to maintain the high quality standard for this group (don’t we have enough groups on RB that cater to snapshots of cats?), I thought doing a little work on improving the quality of submitted images would be appropriate and at the same time have members self-critique their images and only submit A-level work. Before you check that box to submit your image to Animal Photography, it’s time to do a little mindful review of your work.

Let me say again that I’m not an all-knowing photography guru (AKPG), and I don’t think my own photography is better than everyone else’s – I’m amazed at the quality of work by many of our members. What I will say is that I have a passionate desire to improve my own photography, and I’ve tried to pick up as much as I can to improve it. When I review my own work to decide if it’s worth submitting to the Animal Photography group (and I only submit 1 photo every 2 months or so, as I don’t think the majority of my photos meet the quality standard), here’s the process I follow for self-critique:

1. TECHNICAL
a. Exposure – this is a basic question. “Is this image properly exposed?” Are highlights blown out (big patches of white, areas of the sky or bright patches of fur lacking any detail)? Are there deep black shadows or black areas completely lacking any shadow detail? Check the histogram. I don’t usually check my pics in the LCD too often, but I do check the histogram on a regular basis, just to make sure I don’t have hot spots or areas of overexposure or real dark, featureless areas. Light is Right, Dark is Left on the histogram – if you’ve got a spike on the right hand side, you’ve got some overexposure. A big spike on the left hand side means underexposure. In our fox area, the lighting can be a little weird at times; bright sunny areas mixed in with deep shade, so exposure can be tricky. I’ll usually take a frame before the action starts just to check the histogram of the area I’m in for exposure weirdness. If I have some spikes to the right on the histogram, I’m likely to blow out the highlights of the white fur areas of the fox, so I might then dial back 1/3 to 1 full stop of exposure to compensate. You can also set your display blinkies so that overexposed or underexposed areas blink when you display the picture to show problem areas. That way you can make adjustments quickly to prevent exposure problems.

b. Focus – is the focus sharp, or do you lose detail when looking at the image at a larger size? There are some amazing details on animals – teeth, fur, scales, eyes, feathers – the list goes on and on. Rendering the image in sharp detail provides that WOW factor. A soft image loses impact. A little bit of sharpening can go a long way to an image with impact

c. DOF – we’ve already discussed Depth of Field in MOVING BEYOND AUTOMATIC MODE, PART 1 & 2. We can use the aperture of the lens to blur backgrounds and better emphasize the subject.

d. Obstructing Elements – do you have elements running across the subject, obstructing the view of the subject? We see photos submitted where most of the animal is obscured by some object – tree limbs, branches, grass, plants, rocks, bits of other animals. Sometimes that is acceptable and there is a valid reason for its inclusion, but most of the time it’s just bad composition

e. Stability – how steady was your shot when you took the photo? Did you take the picture with just 1 hand? Were you holding the camera out at full arm’s reach to set up the shot on the LCD? Camera shake is a major contributor to poor image quality. The longer the focal length, the blurrier the image. Use a tripod. Seriously, the tripod is a photographer’s best friend. Not only will your images be much, much sharper right out of the camera, but using a tripod will force you to slow down, consider the image a little more, and make better decisions about how to take a better photo. Even a cheap tripod is better than no tripod. Just make sure it can safely support the weight of your kit. A lot of photographers blame their lens when they get blurry photos, when it’s camera shake that’s the problem. They buy a more expensive lens, and are frustrated that their photos are still blurry. It’s still camera shake. Use a tripod.

2. AESTHETICS
a. Composition – is your subject dead center in every image you take? Do you take every photo in landscape orientation? Are there too many elements competing for attention in your photo? Are there distracting elements that pull the eye from the subject? Generally speaking, the simpler the composition, the better the image. One of the basic rules of composition is called the Rule of Thirds. Subjects placed dead center in the frame tend to be a little boring. By placing your subject according to the Rule of Thirds, you can make a better composition. Imagine a Tic-Tac-Toe grid on your image. The grid intersects in four places across your image – a third of the space from each corner of the image. Place your subject in one of those intersections, and you’ll usually have a stronger image. There are many other options for composition.

b. Foreground & Background – are your subjects stuck in a tangle of branches? Is it difficult to tell where the subject is because there’s so much grass, plant-life, rocky outcrops in the way? Do your images have fences and buildings clearly visible in front of or behind the subject? The cleaner the fore or background, the stronger the image will be. Many times, I can’t get a clean shot of an animal – I don’t take the picture. I’ll approach from another direction, I’ll change locations, I’ll return a different day. I’ll even tidy up an area just a little to get a cleaner shot when I return (no major landscaping, just removing some tall grass). Or I’ll use a shallow DOF to isolate the subject from the background. Also keep in mind that a brown animal without much detail against a brown background can make for a weak image.

c. Point of View – were you looking down on the animal to take the photo? Do you see more of the animals back than anything else? Do you always take photos from the same perspective every time – standing up holding the camera at eye level? You can create a much more powerful image by keeping the camera at eye level with the subject. This means sometimes flopping yourself down on the ground for that low perspective to keep eye level with the frog, dropping down on a knee to keep eye level with the coyote. Keeping at eye level provides a more intimate connection with the subject.

d. Hand of Man – do you have fences in the BG of every shot? Are cars and people visible? Is the subject wearing a collar? Wearing a hat or sweater? The Hand of Man doesn’t just refer to a literal hand in the shot, but ANYTHING man-made or unnatural to the animal. That can also include obviously man-made zoo habitats. Again, isolate the subject from any HOM elements.

e. Clipped Parts – are your subjects missing feet or ears in the photo? Is part of the head obstructed? Does the beak continue off the frame? Or the tail? Having ALL the subject in the frame creates a stronger image – clipping off parts weakens an image. Use the zoom on your camera/lens to pull back, or walk back a few feet, and make sure you’re not cutting anything off. That applies to “virtual parts” as well – the subject may have its feet and part of its legs in the snow – include enough room in the shot to account for these “virtual parts.” This also applies to reflections – if you have a reflection of the subject, include the entire subject and reflection.

f. Color – do your images appear a little flat? Washed out? Muddy looking? Lacking color and impact? Bland colors make a bland image. Assuming the exposure is OK, you can sometimes boost color a little in post processing – a Levels or Curves adjustment maybe, a bit of Saturation – just don’t over-do it.

3. VALUE OF CRITIQUE
a. Reviewing and deleting poor images – do you keep every shot you’ve ever taken? Is your hard drive filled to capacity with photos you never plan to use, or have no real use for? Do you ever look back at photos from a year or two and wonder why you ever thought they were good? It’s time to be more ruthless when evaluating your photos. In post-processing, one of the first things I do is review that batch of photos and weed out the obviously bad ones – poor focus, I’ve cut off ears or feet, blown highlights. I can’t do anything to make salvage them – they just need to go. That saves me a lot of hard disk space too. There’s no reason (other than sentimentality) to keep bad images. One of my rules is to not review and process images the same day I’ve spent several hours at 14,000 feet – I’m just too loopy to do a good job.

b. Start grading your own images – do you think every image you take is a photographic masterpiece? It was said that Ansel Adams considered himself fortunate if he took 1 really good image every year. He may have been a little too critical of his own work, but it does illustrate the point – be your own worst critic to improve the level of your work. Rate your images from A to F. Immediately delete all the images that receive a grade of C or below. Post your B images to RB or other sites. Post them to sites that provide honest critique. Save you’re A images for Animal Photography.

c. Importance of Objective Feedback – we can lack objectivity about our own work. We know how hard we had to work to get that shot – we had to get up at 4A.M., drive an hour, then hike another hour uphill to be able to get that shot. It’s our baby. Someone else objective can look at it without the emotional attachment and give honest feedback that we can’t currently see ourselves. THAT’S the feedback we want, that we benefit from the most. Learn from that feedback.

d. Places for Critique – before you visit these sites, lurk for a bit to get the lay of the land. Read the feedback from others, and then start commenting on the work of others. Then submit your own work – don not take the feedback personally. Learn from what others have to say – it’ll make you a better photographer.
Nature Photography Network
NatureScapes
Outdoor Photographer

And you can post images in the Animal Photography Forum under PHOTO CRITIQUE as well