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Just a Growin' Boy #2
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Just a Growin' Boy #2

by Peter Cross

Gallery: WildlifePosted May 15, 2012128 views3 comments
Another morning check of the local nature preserve found Barney in about the same area as my last visit. Here we have him 5 days later and it looks to me like his secondary tines are just a bit larger than before. He's seems to be a bit more tolerant of me and after staring me down for 5 minutes, he decided I was okay and resumed feeding and moving around. On the way in I found a small group of deer near the building and took a few shots in pretty poor light. When I looked at them on the computer, I found that one was in fact a buck. Because it's left ear was split, I knew this was an old buck I thought was on it's last legs about 6 weeks ago. He looked really terrible. Guess he recovered from whatever was bothering him. His antler growth, however, is way behind. It will be interesting to see how he developes. For this image, I choose to leave it as full frame as cropping wouldn't help it. I did decrease the exposure a little to keep a few light spots under control a bit. Usual sharpening for the web. Wild animal not baited, called, or other wise affected. Comments and critiques welcome and appreciated. Thanks for past C&C's.

Tech infor
Canon 60D with EF 70-200mm f/4L @168mm with 1.4 TC = 235mm.
1/250th @f/6.3 and ISO 800
Tripod

Comments

3 comments
Comment posted by John Tobias on May 17, 2012 at 7:41 AM
Peter, I like your image of 'Barney' in his habitat. I hope you can continue recording his antler development. Thanks for sharing.
Registered on September 12, 2009, 2120 Posts, 6455 Comments
Comment posted by Vincent Grafhorst on May 17, 2012 at 12:56 PM
Quite an interesting habitat setting here Peter. Difficult lighting situation by the looks of it, but what I do like about it is the spot-lit eye/head; this makes the head the clear focal point of the image. I am curious to see how this guy will look in his prime with large antlers.
Registered on February 24, 2006, 504 Posts, 7203 Comments
Comment posted by Peter Cross on May 17, 2012 at 8:05 PM
John and Vincent,
My intent is to keep photographing Barney and any of the other bucks on the preserve to see how the development of their antlers progresses. I think it will be quite interesting. The lighting is a bit tricky on these. The dappled effect can be great when I'm able to get a point of light onto the subject area. I've several others from this series where it misses and isn't anywhere near as interesting. I also didn't like the big light area in the BG but it was there and I had to accept that.
Registered on April 3, 2010, 271 Posts, 1342 Comments