Mamma Mia ! REPOST

Adorable with the cub hiding behind the mother like that... fantastic detail and a nice scene. I'd try to recover some detail selectively from the water - there should be plenty there

The adorable cub sneaking a peak from behind it's mum makes this a delight to look at Anand :^)

If you can indeed recover some detail in the water's surface as Luke suggests I think this would definitely enhance the image as a whole. One of my first thoughts upon opening this one up was, "It's a shame there's not more space about mum's head", then I read what you wrote about cropping out the grey sky. As unfavourable as grey skies can be, I think I'd prefer to see some in and have more separation between the top of her head and the top of the frame.

Cute shot! I love the poses, especially the cub's pose where he's just peeking out from behind the mom. It also looks like there is some great sharpness. It looks so cool with the bears wet fur!

Cool poses Anand, particularly the small cub! I echo Luke's comment about trying to tone down (i.e. recover detail) in the water. As is it distracts a bit from the subjects.

Good suggestions, already. I like the eyes!

Hi Anand,

The pose is great (for both ma & the cub) and technically you've pretty much nailed this one. It does feel tight on top to me, so if you have any room at all up there (before hitting those grey skies) I'd consider bringing some of it back. Regarding the background water - I agree that toning this down and attempting to retrieve some detail out of that zone is a good idea, but it will be impossible to totally overcome the hurdle this naturally-occurring bright zone represents (and you certainly couldn't have done anything about it!).

Cheers...

Brad

Thanks a ton for all the suggestions. I most likely would never have noticed the bright regions in the pond. Thanks for pointing it out !

Here is a quick rework. At this point i cant get any more detail in the pond without loosing the natural feel to the image.

edit:: grrrr.. i should have toned down the highlights selectively. The glow on the face seems lost I will keep working on it and shall post an update if i manage to do any better.

Another nice one Anand, especially with the less than ideal weather. I prefer the tighter crop in order to remove the grey sky. You've discovered the joy (lots of brown bears at close range) and pain (lousy weather) of shooting in SW Alaska! Well done.

Anand - what a great image! The look on that cub is adorable, and the mom's face (particularly in the original as you noted) has a wonderful quality to it. I have to say as an aside you truly get the best results with that lens I've ever seen...maybe it has something to do with shooting it at 135mm! Seriously?!?!?!? You must have smelled her breath at that distance!

The detail is great, the pose is great, both subjects' eyes are great...nicely done! I for sure think this image is worth the time to get the most out of the water AND the most out of the bears. Perhaps you might play with adding a little canvas on top and clone some OOF background trees in to add some breathing room above the bear but eliminate the sky?

Nicely done!

Love this Anand, the cub peekin' around mom's side is just adorable..
The tech's look excellent, I'd be proud to call this mine
PS - I prefer the original post, seems to put more emphasis on the mom & cub IMO.

The rework on the water is great Anand, but yes doing the brightness reduction only on the water would have been better and leave the bears unaffected.

Thanks once again guys

@Joseph: I love wet grey weather

@John: They got to within 5 metres Here they are about 7 metres away. The close proximity may explain the sharp performance of the lens. I shall post some super sharp stuff at 300 mm later . I just love that lens, so versatile and so small for what it does.

I tried another quick rework on the original jpeg. I like the intimacy of the original crop, so am sticking to that for now.