Gorillas At the Zoo

[Tee Why]

Los Angeles Zoo recently opened it's gorilla exhibit, so our group went for an outing. The enclosure lets you get fairly close which was nice and they have a baby gorilla as well.

1. Glenda, the baby.
http://tomyi.smugmug.com/photos/253224011_LjRPY-M-1.jpg

2. She has a sack.
http://tomyi.smugmug.com/photos/253222198_Zk7s3-M-1.jpg

3. See how big daddy, Kelly's hand is?
http://tomyi.smugmug.com/photos/253223466_imkMY-M-1.jpg

4. Here is the father, Kelly, a male silverback. Eating some leaves. He was shy and hung out in the back most of the day.
http://tomyi.smugmug.com/photos/253220657_oeZyS-M-1.jpg


5. This is Evelyn, Glenda's Aunt.
http://tomyi.smugmug.com/photos/253219107_BZdgf-M-1.jpg

6. Trying to hitch a ride.
http://tomyi.smugmug.com/photos/253216808_xagcH-M-1.jpg

7. Sniff sniff.
http://tomyi.smugmug.com/photos/253223063_Y6NRz-M-1.jpg

8. More Evelyn
http://tomyi.smugmug.com/photos/253217145_fDyJ8-M-1.jpg

[ChrisJ]

Good stuff, Tom. The first one is classic. No B&Ws?

[Awais Yaqub]

Loved the 1st one ! amazing photos

[Elaine]

Wonderful animal portraits! :clap I especially like 1 & 7.

[Tee Why]

Good stuff, Tom. The first one is classic. No B&Ws?

I may experiment with b/w's later, but just saw this in color in my mind.

[RandySmugMug]

very impressive work

[Phyxius]

Ohhh, I hope Ann sees these, if not I'll have to PM her the link when I get back...

Nice shots, I especially like number 1. :thumb :thumb

[JenGrace]

Number 1 isawesome. Really captures a special moment. :thumb

[raptorcaptor]

Nice captures!

[Harryb]

Excellent set :clap

[saurora]

Awesome set, Tom! Number 1 is adorable. :thumb

[Tee Why]

Thanks all. I guess no.1 is a winner. I got lucky with that one. There are two unhindered spots where you can view the gorillas without any plexy glass and there is a moat like space between the guests and the animals. They made step like indentations on the gorilla side of the moat, so the baby came down very close and was eating. I was shooting at ISO 250 and getting about 1/30 sec and realized my slow shutter speed so increased to 640 then to 800.

I zoomed my bigma out to 500mm for a tight headshot and got 1/100sec wide open in AV mode of 6.3. If you follow the shutter speed rule I should have shot 1/800 since 500mm on a 1.6x crop has a fov of a 800mm on a full frame. But careful holding really helps. I don't like to go above ISO 800 to keep noise down.

Chris, I tried a b/w version but like the color one more. When I saw the shots, I previsualized them in color.

[Ann McRae]

Excellent. Really lovely shots of magnificent animals. As you may have guessed from Christina's post, I'm rather fond of primates, gorillas in particular. Really admire 'Leaky's Ladies', probably the best known is Jane Goodall. I kept Christina and Nick W in the primate building in Calgary so long, Skippy left the zoo thinking we had gone to the car!

But I digress, great shots and thanks so much for sharing them. I enjoyed them all.

ann

[ChrisJ]

Chris, I tried a b/w version but like the color one more. When I saw the shots, I previsualized them in color.
Yep, understood. I went there with the familiy in early November and took a few shots and only kept one B&W conversion. I tend to think in color, though, first.