Trogon Photo Tours

October 2014 Newsletter - This month's newsletter discusses wildlife photography contests and images that have done well in them.  It includes links to a few of the bigger contests.   Jan van der Greef, who I have planned month long tours for in Ecuador, Argentina and South Africa was a runner up in the bird photography section of the BBC Wildlife Photographer of the Year contest this year with a shot that was taken on a private tour with me in Ecuador. Our own Ken Archer had 2 shots awarded in the 2013 Nature's Best Photography Contest. 

Sword-billed Hummingbird (right) and Collared Inca photographed by Jan Van der Greef August 2012 at Guango Lodge, Ecuador.  Canon 1D Mark IV, 300F2.8 lens, 1/250 F16, iso 400, 580ex plus 6 Nikon SB Slave Flashes, artificial background.  This shot was taken by Jan on our tour together, it's full frame.  When Jan first showed it to me we were both disappointed that the full Inca wasn't in the photo.  But this year he decided to enter it in the BBC Wildlife Photographer of the Year contest and it was one of the runner ups in the birds division.  It is a very unique and dramatic image due to the point of the Sword-billed's beak being right in the throat of the approaching Inca.  The full selection of this year's winning photos can be viewed at WPOTY.   This is the largest wildlife photography contest in the world with more than 42,000 images entered.  The judging in this contest this year in particular in my opinion tended to value images that are more abstract but unique and innovative rather than being necessarily great action or behavior shots.  There are a few second curtain synch flash shots in the birds gallery.    Although I would certainly put Jan's photo in the great action and behavior category.    I didn't enter this contest this year, I have in the past few years before that and made the final round of judging but not been awarded.

Herring Gull photographed by Jan van der Greef in Norway.  Canon 1D Mark IV, 70-200/2.8 with 1.4x extender at 115mm 1/6 F14, iso 200.  This image placed 2nd in the Birds Category of the 2011 BBC awards.  It has been a pleasure guiding for Jan and planning trips for him.  In addition to being a great photographer, Jan does important medical research.  I recently received his book, "Reflections of the Inner Self, Dreams and Visions of Nature".  It has many of his excellent photographs including many artistic blur shots like this Herring Gull and also plenty of sharp, more typical nature shots, particularly of predators like eagles, owls, wolves and bears.  But it's not just a nature photography book, it is somewhat of a philosphy book with lots of deep thoughts and ideas.  Angie received the book while I was in South Africa and enjoyed not only viewing the photos but reading and thinking about the text.   To view Jan's website where you can also preview his book see www.janvandergreef.com .

Coyote photographed by Ken Archer, October 2011, Yellowstone National Park.  Canon 1D Mark IV, 600mm non IS lens, 1/1600 F6.3, iso 640, Gitzo tripod, Really Right Stuff Ball Head.  This image by Ken Archer and another image of a Black Bear mother and her two cubs were both honorable mentions in the 2013 Nature's Best Photography Contest.  By the way Ken was also a first place winner in the landscape category years ago in this contest.  This is the other really big nature photography contest which rivals the BBC contest in terms of size and prestige The winners in the 2013 contest were much more what you would associate with typical great nature photographs, either excellent portraits or great action/behavior type of shots with sharp focus.  

Nature's best puts only the top 15 or so award winning images on it's website, not like the BBC which puts all awarded images on the site so you won't see Ken's 2 images there but you will see the top winners there.   So the 2 different contests often choose very different types of photographs.  To see the gallery see Nature's Best.  This super image also finished 2nd place in wildlife in the Share the View Denver Audubon contest another big photo contest.  But on www.naturephotographers.net it was not even a weekly editor's pick when entered in 2 different galleries.  So as you can see different judges are going to view the photographs very differently. 

Sword-billed Hummingbird and Chestnut-breasted Coronet photographed January 2013, Guango Lodge, Ecuador.  Canon 5D3 , 300F4, 1/200 F22, iso 400, 580ex at 1/64 power, 6 Nikon SB Slave Flashes at 1/16 power, Gitzo tripod, Wimberley head.  This is my best image of the Sword-billed Hummingbird defeding it's territory against another hummingbird.  I haven't entered this into either the BBC or Nature's Best because it's a good sized crop - more than 50% of the original has been removed and their guidelines state that if you crop it should either be minimally or moderately.  But I did enter it in the 2014 NANPA (North American Nature Photography Association) Showcase contest.  It placed in the top 100 images in that contest.  I was excited to hear that for the 2015 Showcase I will have 7 images in the top 100 NANPA Showcase.   This is the only contest that I enter every year.  To view the 2014 NANPA contest photo winners (all 250) see Showcase .  The Showcase has a wide variety of winning photos.  One thing I would note is that there are a few images of birds where only part of the bird is showing or a small part of the bird has been clipped that still placed well in the contest.  If you had posted one of these photos on a nature photography critique site, like www.naturephotographers.net it's very likely that many of the comments would have said something like "great shot but too bad about the clipped wing".  The message from this is that the image isn't all that good because of the clipped part.  Well if the image is strong enough and composed well despite the clipped part it can still be a great award winning image - see Jan's and the other images in the NANPA Showcase (Secretary Bird, Rockhopper Penguin, etc).  That being said I have learned a great deal from other photographer's critiquing my work on www.naturephotographers.net and other critique sites so the positives of being on those sites have greatly outweighed any negatives but I do think you have to filter the critiques to some extent and understand if you are posting something different it may or may not be well received. 

Pampas Fox photographed at Rincon del Socorro, Ibera Marshes, Argentina.  Canon 7D, 500F4 1/200 F7.1, iso 500.  This is one of my favorite shots and I had entered it into a few photo contests but it had never placed.  I was thrilled to have lined this fox up against the setting sun and I laid on the ground to get a low enough perspective to do so.  I also posted it on www.naturephotographers.net and received mostly very favorable comments.  But a famous photographer commented that it was a cool shot but that it would have been better with a lower perspective and the fox's head higher up in the sun, he said perhaps I should have dug a trench, he may have been joking about the trench part.  He also commented that he thought the colors would be better if the reds were less magenta and the yellows less intense.  At first I was a little bothered with the comment about not being low enough.  It had been difficult to line up the fox in the sun period and I was already on my stomach, so getting lower wasn't an option and I don't think it would have made much difference if the fox were just slightly higher in the sun as it's face was already outlined by the sun. Building a trench wasn't something I would have had time to do in that moment, perhaps it could be tried in the future if you were coming back there but there would be no guarantee the foxes would be there again or that they would line up in the right spot in front of your trench.  But I thought about the comment about the colors and that it might have some merit.  

So eventually I got around to working on the colors, going for less pink, more red and yellows.  And I entered it into the 2014 NANPA Showcase.  It wasn't a big winner but it did place into the top 250 which is better than it had ever done before.  Also I think it's more like I remember the original scene with the reddish sunset.  So this is a case where I filtered the critique, took the useful part and after being initially a bit bothered about the lower perspective comment didn't worry about that.  

Hoatzin photographed January 2010, Sani Lodge, Ecuador.  Canon 1D Mark III, 500F4, 1/250 F4, iso 1000, handheld from canoe.  This is my favorite image of a Hoatzin.  I have only entered the national Audubon Society bird photography contest 1 year.  This shot despite the barely clipped toe managed to finish in the top 100.  Part of the reason I hadn't entered this contest again is their contest rules previously gave them the ability to use your images (even if they didn't place) in their publications, calendars, promotions etc without the photographer getting compensation or the right to say they couldn't use them.  I have heard that Audubon has since seen the error of their ways and now their is a box you can check or uncheck allowing them to use the images or not without compensation.  This is something to watch out for in photo contests.  Unfortunately, there are quite a few contests out there whose main goal is to collect a lot of images that they can use for free in the future. Audubon is a great organization in general, I have been involved with them in some capacity for over 30 years, I don't think in there case it was their main motivation for the photo contest.  To view the 2013 top 100 Audubon images see Audubon Contest   Some of the same photos that are in the NANPA contest gallery are also in the Audubon top 100.