Wood Frog Courting + answrs

Gallery: WildlifePosted March 16, 2014282 views11 comments

After 3 days with temps in the 60s the Wood frogs were singing like crazy in the runoff control pond next door. They went silent during a slow approach, but the urge to procreate had them up and singing within about 10 minutes of me sitting down behind my tripod at the pond's edge. Reflections of the sky and trees added some interesting color, especially as waves moved through. In this case, the waves coming in are from another frog calling. (5D3, 70-200 f2.8 + 1.4ET @ 280mm, 1/250s, f/8, iso 800, tripod and polarizer rotated to maximize the reflections)

Comments

11 comments

Comment posted by Max Waugh on March 16, 2014 at 5:56 PM

Mark, I like this. Did you selectively bump the contrast and saturation on the frog at all? The head really pops against the water nicely, but in the larger version it almost seems too bold on my monitor.

Max

Registered on September 26, 2008, 428 Posts, 2329 Comments

Comment posted by Gary Gulash on March 16, 2014 at 5:59 PM

I really like your choice of composition Mark, the frog is great but the water and waves really add a lot. Both views look very similar on my monitor, very pleasing.

Registered on January 28, 2005, 879 Posts, 12098 Comments

Comment posted by Rick Cloran on March 16, 2014 at 8:30 PM

Well done. Nice comp and colors. The ripples definitely add to the image. It took me a minute studying the larger version to figure out that the third round object reflected is the back of his other eye.

Registered on April 6, 2004, 119 Posts, 1989 Comments

Comment posted by Brad Hill on March 17, 2014 at 8:43 AM

Hi Mark,

Like the others I like the composition and colour here. But what caught my eye even more was the interesting outline (raised like a standing wave) in the water around the frog. Nicely seen and well done.

Cheers...

Brad

Registered on May 29, 2007, 431 Posts, 6061 Comments

Comment posted by Mark Seaver on March 17, 2014 at 10:12 AM

Thanks for the compliments. To answer specific questions;

Max, I didn't bump the saturation of the frog specifically. However, I've been testing out some of Mark Metternich's raw processing ideas and because of the way Adobe adds saturation as you darken colors, there is an overall bump in saturation. I'm still wrestling with how much or how little of that to keep.

Brad, the outline around the frog is the raised meniscus of the water. It shows up nicely when you rotate the polarizer to maximize the reflections (as opposed to "normal" use of suppressing the reflections. I posted some test results showing the effect in the Flora forum in December 2012)

Oh yeah, we got at least 8 inches of snow last night!

Registered on January 23, 2011, 1103 Posts, 17270 Comments

Comment posted by Morkel Erasmus on March 17, 2014 at 3:41 PM

This almost has an abstract quality to it - I like!

Registered on March 22, 2011, 385 Posts, 2068 Comments

Comment posted by Balan Vinod on March 18, 2014 at 4:29 AM

Mark...this is a fantastic canvas in the first place...beautifully done ..

Balan Vinod

Registered on March 20, 2006, 889 Posts, 2312 Comments

Comment posted by Lorna Taylor on March 18, 2014 at 11:07 AM

Fantastic, love the Bg and the detail ,Nicely captured Mark !

Registered on November 12, 2010, 254 Posts, 3083 Comments

Comment posted by Lon Sharp on March 19, 2014 at 12:04 PM

I like this quite a bit. My only suggestion would be to lower the contrast in the reflection of the eye, 'cause for some odd reason that reflection seems more intense than the actual face and I think it would be better as secondary interest. The gradations of color in the water are a pleasing.

Registered on December 9, 2007, 258 Posts, 9892 Comments

Comment posted by Howard Cheek on July 3, 2014 at 6:26 PM

Excellent supporting info/story behind the shot, very nice work Mark.
I especially like those reflected colors and the water ripples there

Have a great 4th

Registered on July 24, 2008, 1201 Posts, 10758 Comments

Comment posted by Nancy de Flon on December 5, 2014 at 8:42 AM

Wow, that's a great image, Mark. I like the way the frog is half in the blue part of the reflection and half in the other color. And the way the direction of the frog's body is at diagonals with the lines created by the waves.

Registered on June 28, 2010, 61 Posts, 284 Comments