COOL Characters

First of all, any image of a mother grizzly with twin cubs would be an absolute treasure for me. I have only seen a few solitary grizzlies in the wild. I have a few images that are only so-so. This image,at least for me, is not quite as compelling as some of your other posts. While the scence shows a great habitat shot, I wish that the mother and cubs had been on the other side of the log looking in your direction. Also, the colors in this shot look a littlle muted to me. Overall, a nice capture that I would gladly have in my portfolio.

A magical setting Bill ! I really like the image. Just wish they had turned around for you

The Cool Characters shown here ...Yearling Cubs . What I personally like about this image is the behaviour of the two cubs - one Alert like Mom and the other warily looking small - totally reflects how they acted all the time and their personalities. We had the bold guy (a young male) and we had the cautious one (a young female). Their personalities were Evident always!
The days were filled with constant rain and the bears coats were always wet , as seen here , with their reflective wet fur.

I like this. The lighting portrays a typical rainy, cool day. Personally, while I agree with Jerry, I would be happy that the bears, especially Mamma bear, were looking the other way!

I like the setting, the action and the muted colors give that rainy feeling. I agree that the image would be more powerful if there was eye contact.

Hi Bill. I really like the way that dead tree cuts diagonally across the frame with the bears on that diagonal line, nice, nice composition. Don't terribly mind the fact that the bears aren't looking at the camera, you have two in profile so that's pretty sweet, 'hough said about that.

I find that the colour balance seems a bit too cool to me. I might just be seeing the effects of a sensor being pushed a little more than it prefers (iso 2800). I don't know if this is one of those things that can be completely resolved in post-processing or not??? IBrad may be able to "shed some light" (pun intended) on this. I haven't been too successful in my efforts to "fix" the ills of high iso.

Hey Bill,

You did a good job here in what were tough circumstances - super low light and with bears that clearly hadn't read about how they should arrange themselves - and where they should look - to please photographers! I like the diagonal provided by the log and how the bears are interested in something in the distance (but it would have been nice if the direction they are looking was slightly more in your direction). To be honest, I'm not really thrilled with the crop - I'd prefer more room above the bears, which would functionally lower them in the frame (thus getting them more out of centre vertically).

On the WB: It's my experience that the first generation of Nikon's FX cameras (like the D700 here) had quite low noise at moderate to high ISO's, but really struggled with white balance and tonal range above about ISO 1000. While you can obviously tweak WB during post-processing, it's pretty much impossible to bring back tones (and hues) that weren't recorded by the sensor. I think in this image the narrow range of tones (and hues) is evident. More recent full-frame cameras (from both Nikon and Canon) do a much better job with maintaining dynamic range, tonal depth and colour depth at high ISO's (and don't end up having that "shot at high ISO" look to them.

I think I have a shot taken with a newer camera during this same sequence...if I do I'll post it to show folks what I mean...

Brad

Nice scene here Bill - agree with Brad's thoughts and would try and even warm up the WB here as there's a lot of cyan and green coming through in places I wouldn't expect them to?

Lots of good discussion here...The only thing I would add would be that in most all circumstances I think it is best to have the action of wildlife coming into the camera, rather than away. Here the movement of mother is away from us and we have minimal eye contact with the babes. It is a relative factor, meaning this is not a negative as shown, but that a strong image could be even stronger.

Hello Guys

Appreciate the Excellent Feedback!:)

The Bears facing Profiled & away made me think of the Alertness this Mother Bear was,... always looking & seeking for a Troublesome bear or Anything that would jeopardize her twin cubs well being. With the wet and overcast dark conditions my D700 did a great job to capture these guys so well! The Dynamic range with D700 drops off at this higher ISO and some Tones & Details are not viewed as crisp and well toned as this scene was seen at time of the shooting.
We were able to shoot up to close to 10PM most days , this Adventure is similar to a Marathon, where we were in the Boat from early morning each day. I am Not complaining ... But was Very Pumped the whole Amazing Time!:)

Cheers

Bill