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| 'Serengeti Sunrise' |
After laboriously and lovingly checking out, individually, all 20,000 photos taken during our three weeks in Tanzania, I've made a pointless attempt at choosing my ten favourites.
It is very unlikely that anyone will agree with the order of these photos, and it is quite likely that I will change my mind next time I look at them. However, I've tried to give a rationale for each decision...
Number 10 - 'Le Bisous'.
As finding the painted wolves (African wild dogs) was our main objective, including at least one photo of them is obligatory. They play and hunt at dawn and dusk, with very little movement in-between. Therefore lighting levels for photography are challenging (as is most wildlife photography).
I've included two shots of them in the top ten. This first one has little action, making it easier to get good definition/detail.
This was taken late in the day, just before sundown, so the ISO had to be set high at 3200 with a shutter speed of 1/500, just fast enough to get good detail. The noise due to the high ISO was easy to get rid of.
The photo shows two young males taking a break in the middle of play-fighting to kiss each other's cheeks ('le bisous' in French). In actual fact, this was a prelude to an attack. There was an injured hyena (bitten by a wolf attack) trapped in a bush next to them and they were waiting for it to attempt an escape. Unfortunately for the dogs, the attempt was made only when five other hyenas arrived.
The battle commenced. As it threw up a cloud of dust, and as all contestants moved with lightning fury, getting a good photo was impossible. Very impressive to see though...
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| 'Le Bisous' |
Number 9 - 'Passing By'.
These two Palm-nut Vultures are much more photogenic than the average vulture. Average vultures are sadly lacking in all self-respect and regularly attempt to win the 'ugly awards'.
Being relatively slow moving, they were easy to photograph in motion.
I like this photo because it seems to show one bird inspecting the undercarriage of the other. You can almost sense its disapproval...
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| 'Passing By' |
Number 8 - 'Necks at Dawn'.
There are very many giraffes in Tanzania. Hunting of them is banned and anyway, hanging their head on a wall would be tricky.
Despite seeing them everywhere, it is difficult getting any action photos. They gallop in slow motion, they pose like multiple telegraph poles. To catch them fighting as they are in this photo is a rare opportunity. They swing their long necks in an attempt to bang their horns against their opponent's chest. Severe injuries do occur.
It now seems likely that, although their necks may have evolved additional length to access leaves in trees, the extreme elongation may well be due to this method of fighting, he with the longer neck winning due to the greater force, thus being the one to reproduce. This would also explain why the females have shorter necks.
In this photo they both kindly took a swing at the same time..
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| 'Necks at Dawn' |
Number 7 - 'Peekin'.
We saw few leopards this time, and this one we glimpsed for only a short moment.
She was in trouble.
At the foot of this tree was a pack of lions intent on killing her. This shot shows her peeking around the large branch that she had taken refuge on, to see if we were prepared to help.
We weren't.
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| 'Peekin' |
Number 6 - 'An Up and Under'.
These two lionesses were part of a pack of seven. They were on the move, lionesses racing ahead while the large male was dragged reluctantly behind, knowing that was the only way to get his just desserts.
As they ran, the young lionesses were playing, dodging in and out of each other's path. Lots of movement, difficult to track, great result.
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| 'An Up and Under' |
Number 5 - 'Necking'.
This is the second of the two photos of painted wolves. It shows them in full action during their intense play-fighting.
They were in the shade with a bright background. Every photographer's nightmare. This was taken at 1/800 of a second, just fast enough to freeze the action, but the resulting noise was difficult to edit out.
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| 'Neckin' |
Number 4 - 'Bee Hunt'.
This photo of a little bee-eater is the first of two shots requiring a special technique called RAW-burst. It was taken at 1/3200 of a second, nearly but not quite freezing the motion of this extremely fast moving bird. An effective focal length of 800mm meant tracking was really tricky.
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| 'Bee Hunt' |
Number 3 - 'Roll-up'.
A similar shot to the previous one, but this lilac-breasted roller was closer and the lighting was better, Taken at 1/4000 second meant almost no motion blur.
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| 'Roll-up' |
Number 2 - 'Dawn Raid'.
These two ground hornbills were easier to capture in motion due to their larger size and slower movement. The big problem here however was the lighting. To capture detail of the bird was not difficult, but the sky was comparatively way too bright even at dawn to get any detail in the sky. Thus I had to take two photos, one of the birds taking off, then another immediately after, exposed for the sky. Then glue the two photos together...
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| 'Dawn raid' |
Number 1 - 'Self-Portrait'.
This photo, which, for obvious reasons, is called 'self-portrait', is a rarity. It is not uncommon to see lions in trees, but it is VERY unusual to see an adult male doing so. Especially this guy who appears to have eaten an entire wildebeest. None of the guides in the camp had seen this before in their entire careers.
Also, this is exactly how I feel after having spent three weeks in a truck, on a bed or at a dining table...
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| 'Self Portrait' |
Special Mentions:
Although there are many other photos I'm pleased with, this little guy deserves a special award for flashing:
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| 'Flashing' |
Also, no collection is complete without a dawn/dusk photo.
Here is one capturing a marabou stork puncturing the sun.
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| 'Sun-burst' |
You may also notice a sunset panorama sneaked in at the top of this page.
And finally...
And a final finally...
The full story. Three weeks in Tanzania contracted down to a mere sixteen minutes...
