In the Field

Prowling the Shoreline. Great Bear Rainforest (northern BC coast), Canada. October 6, 2007.

What do you do in a rainstorm if you're an adult grizzly getting ready to hibernate? Hang out at the beach, of course! Actually, this adult female grizzly was prowling the shoreline in search of food when I captured this image. Judging by the size of its belly this bear clearly had been doing a very good job of finding food!

I shot this image with what is quickly becoming my favourite lens - Nikon's 200mm f/2G ED-IF AF-S VR lens. Not only is it fast (both in terms of light gathering ability and autofocus speed), but it is amazingly sharp and has phenomenal colour saturation and contrast. On the down side, the lens is definitely not cheap and, for a 200 mm lens, it's really big and bulky. By the way, only about 5% of this image was cropped off - this bear was REAL close!

Behind the Camera

Prowling the Shoreline. Great Bear Rainforest (northern BC coast), Canada. October 6, 2007.

Digital Capture; Uncompressed RAW (NEF) format; ISO 200.

Nikon D2Xs with Nikon 200mm f/2G ED-IF AF-S VR lens (300 mm equivalent with digital conversion factor) - handheld. VR turned to "On" and in "Normal" mode. AquaTech SportShield (rain cover) used to protect camera and lens.

1/125s @ f4; -0.67 stop compensation from matrix-metered exposure setting.

At the Computer

Prowling the Shoreline. Great Bear Rainforest (northern BC coast), Canada. October 6, 2007.

RAW Conversion to 16 bit TIFF, including first-pass sharpening and exposure compensation using Phase One's C1 Pro.

Further digital correction on 16-bit TIFF file using Adobe's Photoshop CS3 and LightZone 3. Minor tonal adjustments performed in LightZone (using the ToneMapper/Relight tool). Photoshop adjustments included selective saturation enhancement and selective sharpening for web output.

Conservation

Prowling the Shoreline. Great Bear Rainforest (northern BC coast), Canada. October 6, 2007.

Ten percent of the revenue generated by this image will be donated to Raincoast.

Species Status in Canada*: Special Concern (May 2002).

While Grizzly Bears (Ursus arctos) are not technically listed as "Endangered" in Canada, they have been extirpated from most of their historical range. Grizzly Bears are far more sensitive to intrusion/disturbance in their habitat than are Black Bears and are being increasingly forced into marginal habitat by human encroachment. The Great Bear Rainforest along the central and northern coast of British Columbia is one of the last strongholds of the Grizzly Bear in Canada, and even this population is coming under increasing pressure.

The Raincoast Conservation Society (and Foundation) is an effective and efficient organization that has been fighting for protection of this unique habitat. If you are looking for a meaningful way to contribute to the conservation of this amazing ecosystem, Raincoast will provide maximal "bang" for your conservation dollars.

For more information on the status of Grizzly Bears in Canada, go to: http://www.speciesatrisk.gc.ca and search under "Grizzly Bears".

*as determined by COSEWIC: The Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada