Wildlife on Tap

I like many others have a great passion for wildlife, there is something about watching wild animals in natural habitats working their way through life, encountering and overcoming daily problems.

Whilst I am not a great fan of Zoo’s I appreciate their importance in the protection of endangered species and in some cases reintroducing animals into the wild. They also offer a great opportunity to see, get close to and take photos of animals that they would not normally see.

There are also a large number of animal parks dotted around the UK that in my opinion offer a better life style to the animals, giving them more space to roam and are less controlling over their activities. They also offer much better opportunities for photographers to get more natural shots.

From places like Richmond Park in London to The Monkey Sanctuary in Loo there are hundreds of great parks to visit. You can find a fairly comprehensive list here.

Below are a few shots I have taken, mostly at parks local to me.

  
  

Macro Eye

 

 

I really like shooting macro shots of eye’s and making the eye’s detail jump out. One of the best ways of doing this is with selective colour.

 

This shot was taken with my Sony A200, Minolta 100mm macro lens @ f18. The below diagram shows the setup.

I made a background copy layer in Photoshop, added a layer mask and painted out the eyes. Once done, I selected the eyes and upped the saturation, vibrancy and contrast. Job done.