Snow monkeys (2)

Saad, you could also look on the bright side of humanity and motherhood, if you chose to. Remember, many living things

including humans have the ability to choose, thankfully.

Fred G.

Yes Fred, I am very aware of your saying,how I could forgot that and a surgeon, a layer,and an architect

(me and my brothers) have raised by a mother who doesn't know how to write her own name devoting

her total life,efforts, and health to her family,and she put us in place where we can't rewards her small part

of what she did.

Thank you for lighting the bright side.

Robin Smith.

I might say exactly as you've said if Iam wearing your shoes,

but unfortunately I am wearing a teared, tightened, and a

bloody shoes.

My regards.

I suspect that people often have described an occurrence in nature as cruel, for example, a pride of lions bringing down an antelope. But such descriptions are out of place, inasmuch as cruelty is a practice limited to human beings. It is an intentional act.

Well, if you are trying to say that human sensibilities should not be used when describing "nature red in tooth and claw", then I agree.

I think - human sensibilities, and 'human conscious insensibilities' as well.

I've lived through a few cruel winters! ;-)

Great shot Alain - However, I think you make it look too easy! After hiking a mile up the mountain to Jigokudani Park, probably in deep snow, you need to be there well before the doors open for a prime spot on the narrow ledge around the small pool of warm water. It's wall to wall photographers and tourists. Portraits with a telephoto lens allows you to exclude the visitors, but the steam rising from the pool swirls about and always seems to be at it's most dense when the subject is at it's most alluring. Wide angle shots to place the monkeys in their environment will require a lot of cloning out of people, and then there are all the reflections in the water of their brightly colored jackets. Oh, and then be prepared for your head to be used as a stepping stone as the young monkeys chase each other about. A wonderful, but challenging, experience.

Thanks to the Elves for having chosen an image in my portfolio, and thanks to all the PN peers who took the time to leave a comment before and after the image gained its POW status.
I'll start from the end, with Rick's comment. I watched your images shot in Jigokudani hot springs right after coming back from Japan... and told me that I really should have seen them before. Although I had read and seen on the net that shooting with a (relatively) wide-angle lense could give wonderful results, I mainly shot with my 70-200mm and 500mm when I was there. Back home, I really loved when watching the thumbnails the few images shot with a wide-angle, but the DOF often was too narrow to get all the monkeys in focus (as can be seen in the 1st image of the folder).
As Rick's image shows, shooting in Jigokudani is not really a wildlife experience. I spent 1 hour in Jigokudani the 1st day (not more as I was travelling with my wife and our 10-month daughter) and 8 hours the 2nd day. As it was Chinese New Year, there was an especially high number of tourists (nearly 150-200 persons at peaks I would say). The 2nd day, I could only be in Jigokudani at noon (because of her Majesty the Baby =). It was already crowded. To sum it up, the easy part is that the monkeys are bathing very close and are used to the human presence, but the tough part is (as Rick explains) that finding the good conditions to shoot requests time and patience. You need to take many factors into account (other photographers beside you, tourists around the pool, movements of the monkeys, curtains of steam that sometimes hide the scene).
Michael and Robin: I wasn't the threat here. It was maybe other tourists. But of what I observed when spending so many hours there, the threats mainly come from other macaques, especially some strong single males (and maybe other females).
Honnestly, altough I like this image, I was quite surprised that it was chosen by the mysterious Elves. I clearly prefer the first image in the "Nature II" folder for example. I'm not completely satisfied of the picture above because it looks a bit overprocessed to me. The face of the mother looks oversatured, and I'd better brighened a bit the region of and around her eyes. And as Supriyo and Endof Days note, the rock in the bottom right corner is distracting. But...
... the image posted above is already an important crop of the original image. I got rid of about 75% of it. Cropping it even more as Endof Days suggests would alter too much its quality (even with the 5D mark III + 70-200 2.8L II combo), and I personally like that it lets some room in the point of gaze direction (sorry for my English). I guess that this ephemeral scene would have been perfectly captured with the 5D + 500mm combo but changing and then manipulating this lense in the crowd was amazingly long and uneasy.
Concerning the background and its lack of information: that's a matter of taste I guess. The steam here makes a rather good neutral background in my opinion, as would do a plain background in a portrait studio. But of course I can understand it can be bothering for some.
Thanks again to all of you for your comments and support. I've learnt a lot from PN peers and really appreciate to go on!
Alain

I did not suggest that it be cropped more. I suggested that the image would have worked better shot tighter as a portrait.

I do agree that you have many better photos, some of which are stellar, in this same folder.

Erratum concerning Rick's photos: you have such amazing images (especially Antarctica) in your portfolio that my brain kept the idea that

you have many pictures of Jigokudani here on PN. You have only one. But what a photo! It renders perfectly the closeness between

monkeys and humans (not only in Jigokudani).

Hi Alain, I like the shot as it is, I would not clone the rock. This is certainly not a studio shooting where you can have control over everything.

I think very often comments like those about the rock in this photo are not a matter of how to accomplish it at this point but a matter of rethinking the overall vision. It's suggesting what would have worked in this picture not necessarily because this picture can somehow be fixed but as something to influence future picture-taking. I always consider critiques I get not necessarily as just being about THIS photo, but about having an effect on my photography in the future, if I get constructive critiques that ring true for me. Though it happens, I will more rarely get a specific suggestion to adopt for the particular photo being critiqued and more often get a suggestion I will put to future use.