| Joined: | Wed Apr 18th, 2012 |
| Location: | United Kingdom |
| Posts: | 4204 |
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But as I said in my email to you Graham...it poses an interesting conundrum when it comes to wildlife photography. Where do you draw the line with regard to a natural shot?
If a free flying bird lands on a water bath in your garden...is it 'wrong' to remove the concrete bath for a branch to make it more natural?
We put food out to attract birds, then try to photograph them on a posing stick next to the food. Isn't that bending nature itself?
I personally feel that it's the finished photograph that matters, not how it was achieved.
Take for example Barrie....
Barrie was tethered to a block with Jessies in an open grass area with other hawks waiting for his turn at the free flying display. Crowds of people in the background, other birds, mowed grass etc. So I removed the Jessie's, cropped the post and replaced the background with a barn. I liked the final image because I had introduced BACK a more natural setting. Is that 'wrong'?
In this instance I was on the marsh in Norfolk trying to photograph spoonbills. You can see one in the background. Couldn't hope to get closer and not having massive lenses back then it was a nothing image. But on visiting a bird reserve with walk through aviary I was fortunate enough to have a spoonbill fly across in front of me. So the caged background was edited out and the bird superimposed over my marsh image. Was that wrong?
Well it was actually wrong in one way....Mike (my birding expert) pointed out it was not a European spoonbill (think it's Asian) and if that had been on the marsh the whole Twitching world would have been there too.
Should I have removed my patio from this natural visitor?
Not just birds. I have visited several breeding centres for big cats and wolves where chaperoned close access enabled the lens to go through the wire fences....being abruptly dragged back when the animals came too close. (I backed away myself from one approach and my rugsack came so close to the fenced area behind i was nearly grabbed by a snow leapoard poking its paw through to get me.
Does Where and How matter more than the result??
Last edited on Fri Jan 31st, 2020 07:49 by Eric
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Eric