In the Field

Conquerer of the Obstacle Course. Great Bear Rainforest (on northern BC Coast), BC, Canada. September 29, 2011.

And yet one more enviroscape shot of a rare Spirit Bear in its preferred terrain - this one showing its physical superiority over humans by effortlessly conquering a log jam which would frustrate any two-legged pursuer - with or without a camera.

One of the challenges of producing a decent enviroscape (a shot which includes enough habitat features to show your subject within its chosen terrain) is balancing the inclusion of enough key habitat features with minimizing the number of true distractions. In some terrain (think of virtually any animal in a desert setting) this is no problem. But, more often than not, our furry and feathered friends prefer to avoid being seen, which means they like to inhabit areas with enough cover to hide them and in what we as photographers think of as "messy" scenes with distractions.

Spirit Bears are found only in a few areas within the Great Bear Rainforest, a habitat absolutely chock-full of distractions. One way to simplify these scenes and produce pleasing enviroscapes is to use longer focal length lenses to "sub-sample" a smaller (and hopefully "cleaner") portion of the field of view. And, it also helps to shoot with wider apertures to reduce your depth of field (or DoF) and use selective focus. In this shot I knew it was essential to soften up the background while keeping the subject (and foreground) sharp enough to "pop" out. So it was f5 on a 400mm f2.8 lens!

A more complete discussion surrounding the question of "Subject Size - Just How Big?" - including my thoughts on animalscapes, enviroscapes, and active portraits can be found right here on my "A Few Key Techniques" page.

NOTE: This image was captured during one of my photo tours into a region of British Columbia known as "The Great Bear Rainforest". I offer both instructional photo tours and "photo op only" photo tours into the Great Bear Rainforest each spring and autumn. If you're interested in participating in one of these trips, just check out the Photo Tours page of this website!

Behind the Camera

Conquerer of the Obstacle Course. Great Bear Rainforest (on northern BC Coast), BC, Canada. September 29, 2011.

Digital Capture; RAW 14-bit format; ISO 3600.

Nikon D3s with Nikkor 400mm f2.8 VRII lens - supported on carbon fibre Gitzo 1348 tripod with Wimberley head. VR on and in "Normal" mode.

1/500s @ f5; no compensation from matrix-metered exposure setting.

At the Computer

Conquerer of the Obstacle Course. Great Bear Rainforest (on northern BC Coast), BC, Canada. September 29, 2011.

RAW Conversion to 16-bit TIFF, including first-pass/capture sharpening using Phase One's Capture One Pro 6. Three exposure variants covering a 1.8 stop total range, from -1.5 stops below original capture (to tame some of the bright reflections on the water surface and the shiny portions of the logs) to 0.3 stops above original exposure (for a few shaded regions on the bear).

Further digital corrections on resulting 16-bit TIFF files using Adobe's Photoshop CS5 and Light Craft's Lightzone. Photoshop adjustments including compositing (layering and masking) the exposure variants using both luminosity and manual masking techniques, selective colour saturation and desaturation, and selective sharpening for web output. Final tone tweaking performed using tonemapper/re-light in Lightzone.

Conservation

Conquerer of the Obstacle Course. Great Bear Rainforest (on northern BC Coast), BC, Canada. September 29, 2011.

Ten percent of the revenue generated by this image will be donated to Pacific Wild*

The "Spirit" or "Kermode" Bear is a rare genetically-based colour variant of the common Black Bear (Ursus americana). It has been estimated that less than 200 Spirit Bears exist today. Because the Black Bear is not considered under threat as a species, the Spirit Bear suffers from having the same conservation designation (it should be acknowledged that in British Columbia - the jurisdiction of greatest Spirit Bear abundance - hunting of these white-coated bears is not permitted). For reasons that are not fully understood, the Spirit Bear occurs with greater frequency in a relatively small geographic area within The Great Bear Rainforest of the central and northern coast of British Columbia. In this area 10 to 30% of the bears possess white coats. Unfortunately, this globally unique habitat is under development pressure, especially from the forestry industry. If this unique environment is altered, we may lose the wonderful genetic anomaly known as the Spirit Bear.

*Pacific Wild is a non-profit conservation organization that is committed to:

1. Defending wildlife and their habitat on CanadaÕs Pacific coast by developing and implementing solution-based conservation strategies. Pacific Wild supports innovative research, public education, community outreach and awareness to achieve the goal of lasting environmental protection in the lands and waters of the Great Bear Rainforest.

2. Working with a diverse array of communities, First Nations, groups and individuals to ensure that biodiversity protection is at the forefront of land and marine use decisions.

3. Mobilizing a concerned global citizenry to achieve large-scale wildlife protection.

Natural Art Images supports the efforts of Pacific Wild and encourages you to do the same.