Go ahead, punk.. + reposts

Is the face sharp, or is it just the mud that makes it look a little hazy, can't decide. Shame the ox-pecker is half obscured and i would try to do something about the bright green upper LHS. Apart from that lovely shot, you really have captured, as you say, their natural beligerence. There is something about buffalo i love to photogrpah them as well

Thanks, Phil. On my monitor, and on the original shot before downsizing, the nose is sharp, and so are the hairs on the back behind the face. I therefore assume that it is the mud giving a false impression of haziness on the face.

David

This would be great in 3D. Even in 2D it stands out. Wouldn't like to meet it on a dark night.

David i don't think you need 3d it looks one mean beast ,those ears look like they have seen better days.

Keith,

A wonderful close up portrait of this magnificent beast! I also wondered about sharpness, but there's so much texture it's hard to tell. Depth of field is an unavoidable compromise in such a situation. I agree the hair behind the head looks sharp, as do parts of the horns. The oxpecker too is sharper than you might expect at f5.6. Maybe a little head movement?

Thanks for the comments, but I still think there is nothing wrong with the sharpness on the face. Here is a close up so that you can judge for yourselves.

David

A nice portrait and too bad the oxpecker is heavily obscured.

As for sharpness, I noticed it when it was first posted but wanted to see what other commenters had to say. I think that the focal point was near the bird as those hairs and the bird are quite sharp - there also appears to be some motion blur around the eyes and head. The image is far from tack sharp but still a pleasing shot

Saw one of these behind bars two feet away the other day and that was bad enough !
Mean looking critter. Ideal 3D subject
JohnR

Iam sorry David I am still worried about the sharpness, did you take a few of it, where was the focus point (a red square in view nx) out of interest

OK, here is another one in the series. Possibly this one is marginally sharper on the nose, but the belligerent effect I was after was better on the one I posted originally. The ox-pecker makes this one amusing, but amusing was not the effect I was after. On both versions I can see individual hairs under the chin. When the original image is of the whole animal that is plenty sharp enough as far as I am concerned.

David

I like that, the comical ox-pecker and the less than amused bovine! lovely. I take your point but the eyes and face look much sharper on this one, but look you have the tiff and can view it large so only you can really tell I am viewing a down sized, low res cropped JPEG so you are more likely to be right .... look foward to the next shot ... (use USM ) only joking sorry ... my wife says i am not funny just offensive i should listen ....

I think you perfectly captured the essence of an African Buffalo's attitude David; the look they give to humans is both disdainful and challenging at the same time. Congratulations!

On a completely different level, I also really like the shot you posted here with the Oxpecker, as it begs for a caption along the lines of "You mess with him, you mess with me!" ;^)

The second image appears much sharper at this resolution (compare the eyes). It's also an absolute cracker!!