Photo Crit/Essay: Safari

[Eric DeWitt]

Hey guys, i posted these images inside another post up in the fly fishing section, but wanted to get the up here to get a bit more feedback from the other photogs here.

[Carter Simcoe]

Well you’re better than me so I’m not going to offer anything critical but I’ll add that the composition on this one is great.

[David Anderson]

All very nice Eric, I like the mix of detail & situations shots.

My favorite is the kids at the end because it’s a strong portrait of the one child in front but by going a bit wider and getting a bit of the other kids in you’ve given it greater depth.
(nice post prod. as well)

Are these shot for a magazine ?

www.dsaphoto.com

A picture is thousand words that takes less than a second while a thousand words is a picture that takes a month.

[Ben Cochran]

I really like #3, might of cropped it slightly different but I really like the feel from this image.. Also like 9 and 10 a lot and think that they make for very good stock photography as well. Seems that you had a great time over there. Thanks for sharing and I really enjoyed your images! 🙂

[Don Thompson]

All very nice. I also checked out the link to the others. One of my favorites was the one of the two giraffes, but I think I would have cropped the tree coming into the left hand side of the picture.

[Richard Bernabe]

Aside from the sickening feeling in my stomach seeing these beautiful animals killed, the photography is well done.

[Anonymous]

I really like #3 as well.

[Don Thompson]

While I personally do not hunt animals of any kind, I believe that as long as I eat meat, and I do, I cannot criticize any who does, as long as it is done legally. I assume that this is the case here or Eric wouldn’t be posting pictures of an illegal activity.

Edited by Don Thompson to add the following

Many would say that a fish is too beautiful to kill and eat, but I am sure many here do that, myself included.

[Anonymous]

While I personally do not hunt animals of any kind, I believe that as long as I eat meat, and I do, I cannot criticize any who does, as long as it is done legally. I assume that this is the case here or Eric wouldn’t be posting pictures of an illegal activity.

Edited by Don Thompson to add the following

Many would say that a fish is too beautiful to kill and eat, but I am sure many here do that, myself included.

Completely agree.

[Carter Simcoe]

As stated in the other thread the money and manpower put on the ground from these hunts is why the herds haven’t been completely destroyed by the poachers already.

[Eric DeWitt]

Thanks for the insight guys, i too would have like to crop some of the shots a bit differently.  The problem is that the vehicle would come to a stop, and you kinda would get what you get.  You try and stop at a good place, or creep forward, but most of the time the animals wouldn’t stick around long enough, or there wasn’t another shot that was more open.  I guess that is the reality of shooting wildlife, and makes me respect the guys that do this stuff for a living even more – it has to be really tough to fill a book with good shots.  Maybe in a national park where the animals are more tolerant of vehicles, it would be easier?

Carter, the ones with the sun in the background was a combination of lucky timing with the sunrise, and a few trial and errors to get the exposure right.  I think i ended up with the flash set at 0 EV, and the camera (background) -1 or more.  If i would have left the camera at 0, it would have been blown out for sure.  On most of those, i did a few test shots, got it how i wanted, then had to hand the camera off for the final shot.

The kids were fun to shoot, but quite shy, and i was almost out of my candy supply by the time we stopped by this village, so i was having a hard time keeping them in range, haha.

These weren’t shot for a specific magazine, but i may submit them to a few and see if they go somewhere when i have a spare moment or two.

Richard and Seafood, i’m not here to start any arguments and everybody is entitled to their opinions, but i do find it mildly hypocritical and a bit disappointing that guys who support the sport of fishing, where fish die for sport – and i don’t care what people say, even the best catch and release guys still kill a percentage of the fish they release – but don’t support ethical and legal hunting?  Guys, we would all be better off if fishermen/hunters/outdoorsmen stuck together on these kinds of issues because the activist groups don’t care which one they take away as long as they are taking something away.  

There was a good discusion about these types of issues in this thread:

http://www.itinerantangler.com/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1188512381

Feel free to read about how our hunting was conducted, and how hunting these animals actually helps support and protect them from overharvest, poaching, etc.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the follow up Eric.

[Richard Bernabe]

Richard and Seafood, i’m not here to start any arguments and everybody is entitled to their opinions, but i do find it mildly hypocritical and a bit disappointing that guys who support the sport of fishing, where fish die for sport – and i don’t care what people say, even the best catch and release guys still kill a percentage of the fish they release – but don’t support ethical and legal hunting?

But you did post these images and asked for our opinion. I gave an honest answer. The photography is well-done, but the subject matter turned me off. By all means, don’t take it personally.

[Author]

Posts