Giraffe Family, Ivy Safaris, South Africa

A family of giraffe in the wild. Any comment or critique will be

welcome.

Absolutely wonderful! I love the way you caught them all looking at you!

very nice B/W with good DOF.

Hello Charles,

This is a delightful shot. The tones and exposure are great and the layered background dissolving into the distance is perfect.

 

Yours is a small portfolion but the quality is priceless.

 

Very best wishes. Peter

Beautiful! I love the expressions you captured on all three of the giraffes. Not an easy feat! Cheers! 7/6

Well done.

 

How do you do that framing cut to show shadows??

 

Steve

Excellent Shot

Superb! 7/7

Wonderful! ....however i think can see signs

of dodging especially round the neck. If they are not there this shot will be perfect

Nice capture, wonderful expression.

Very nice and quite... funny.

Thats a great shot Charles, I wish it were mine.

Very well done.

 

DK.

Jealous - and thats all I can say!

Congrats.

Perfect

Outstanding shot. Cheers, Sondra

Giraffes are a favorite of mine and you've captured them beautifully here...excellent timing and perfect placement of the three giraffes in the image. Looks great in B&W, although I think that the image could benefit from a bit more contrast

 

 

Thank you all for your kind words and constructive critique, it is much appreciated. I will work on the details, especially the dodge/burn and the contrast before I print and frame this photo.

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The composition is not bad. The use of black and white is all right. At best it is a personal documentary photo from an interesting and probably well-planned safari. Tourist photographs are valid forms of expression, but they are not great photographs. They are not the sort of photographs that go beyond a mild tourist's interest in his or her subject.

There are millions giraffe photographs. What does this tells about giraffes that we do not already know? Absolutely nothing.

What about the aesthetic qualities of this photograph? I said the composition is not bad. But is now that great either. I find the confused tangle of the baby giraffes not particularly appealing. Again it is not that bad. But it is a minor demerit that removes the photograph from the category of fine art.
In the end you have to ask whether the photographer cares anything about giraffes.

If you want to take meaningful pictures of giraffe you have to study giraffes. You have almost become a giraffe. This is not to be gotten from a wham-bam safari tour.

Ivy,
It is a remarkable image. Like the black and white, and obvious you were at the right time, camera ready. The only confusing thing are the two giraffes at the right side. Whose head is on whose neck? It is a bit hard to distinguish. Overall a beautiful image, congratulations
Herman

If a nearby vehicle stops, most wildlife (especially prey species) will watch fairly intently. That's what Charles has captured. Personally, I just don't find anything remarkable about the scene, something that would have me printing this to hang on my wall. I find myself hoping the nearest giraffe doesn't bump its head on the upper part of the frame. The two lower corners (especially the right) are confusing; I don't know if that is true out-of-focus vegetation close to the camera or if it has been "mushed" for artistic / aesthetic reasons, and I suspect the latter. The necks of the two giraffes on the right, especially the middle one, appear to show the effects of some kind of processing; I can't figure out why the texture or detail of those areas doesn't look like the texture or detail of the heads.

I'm sure this was the thrill of a lifetime for Charles, and this photograph will undoubtedly bring back those memories for him. But having not been on the trip myself, this photograph just doesn't do much for me. A photograph that would be striking to many viewers who were not there at that moment would come from being at the right place at the right time, the result of luck and/or persistence and an attribute that applies to many wildlife photographs. This just wasn't the right place or the right time for that kind of photograph.

I like the black and white and I like the depth of field here. I also like the eye contact made by the giraffes. I also like the fairly sharply defined triangle formed by the giraffes as opposed to all the randomness of the foreground foliage and the background.

It's a fairly simple photograph, and I think a lot of people try to over-analyze a shot like this...to nitpick every little technical and compositional element they can find. There's a tendency in photo critique to try to force a photograph to say or be more than it is...to make it be what we want it to be...or even to downplay its effectiveness because it hasn't been shot or processed the way we would do it. To me, this one is a "nice shot", even a "fun" shot, made by a competent photographer who doesn't give us a lot of other examples of his work to look at.

I like it and I think he did a good job with it.

I think we often start to nitpick things that might not matter if the image was working overall.

I probably never think this way, but, oddly, my first reaction was to wonder if this wouldn't have been better in color. My second thought was like Stephen's, is there too little room at the top but I do think if other things were stronger, that would be moot. Also, the frame around the image--the faux matte--is just wrong. I am not crazy about this electronic framing presentations, but the photo would have to be lit from below, left, to get this effect. It is just odd.

As to the composition, the giraffes make a nice triangle and eye movement isn't bad, but the reason I thought color is probably because the image just feels so flat. I was thinking some contrast might get introduced if the foliage was maybe green and then the color of the animals might pop a bit.

I don't mind the OOF area in the near frame (lower right) and think it, again, would be less an issue if there wasn't something to grab onto here otherwise.

Anyway, it isn't an awful photograph but it isn't one that really can grab you. I think it could be better if tweaked or maybe in color and I do see it as a nice memory from the trip.

Can't argue with the nits: framing a little tight on top, and constucted mat, etc., but they are nits. The eye contact and the 'gentle' tonality are key strengths that make this excellent IMO.