Favorite Photo, August 1 | Blog.JimDoty.com

Arctic Fox, Columbus Zoo, Ohio. August 1, 2012.

August is a slow photography month for me. It is just not the month I am inclined to pick up a camera unless some portrait photography is involved.Â But I decided one day to head for the Columbus Zoo and practice my wildlife photography skills.

My favorite image for the day is a portrait of an arctic fox. The challenge was I had to shoot through thick glass and a wire mesh. I got as close to the glass and mesh as possible and used a wide aperture to hide the wire mesh. It worked. It also helped that there was no sunlight on the glass and that the glass was clean.

Polar Bear, Columbus Zoo, Ohio. August 1, 2012.

It was my good fortune that one of the polar bears was going for a swim, giving me a variety of photo options. The sun came out too which I think helped this image. This is my second favorite image of the day.

Bobcat, Columbus Zoo, Ohio. August 1, 2012.

My third favorite image is a portrait of a bobcat. The sunlight shining through green leaves caused some white balance issues. I had to do some tonality adjustments with Adobe Camera Raw to remove the green cast (see the link below)..

Timber Wolf, Columbus Zoo, Ohio. August 1, 2012.

I had some nice light for a photo of a timber wolf. This is my fourth favorite image for August 1.

I had a lot of fun and four nice animal portraits is not a bad day. When you have nothing else to do, head for your local zoo and have fun. Go in the morning when the animals are more active.

I make it clear that my zoo photos were taken at a zoo and I label the photos as such, but I still like to make them visually pleasing and hide the zoo trappings as much as possible. Zoos with natural looking enclosures help, as do selective camera angles, long lens focal lengths, and a wise choice of lens apertures to minimize depth of field. The Columbus Ohio Zoo is one of the better zoos in the country for photography.