An Attempt at Animal Photography

It's been a while. I've  been busy with life, meaning getting on with my daily routines, trying my hardest yet to be a hands on mother and working my way being well-attached to my little girl and between and midst those things, nursing some dark feelings and thoughts that I can only surmise as depression. Big word.  But that's a different  blog post.

Photography, among other things, feels to me like a lover I am falling out with, I think this comes with having a world view of a tired old woman seeing not much of a purpose on most things. The gnawing feeling of triviality and superficiality while looking at all these images in the social media and elsewhere. But I'm trying to wiggle that away, especially that there is a photography course I have to complete this term or at least try to.

Luckily, some days I win.

I took these photos at a zoo here in Oriental Mindoro in hope that I can get good shots for my wildlife photography bonus assignment but it turned out I should do away with catching cages on my frame so as to give an impression of wild(kaya nga wildlife e). I only read up the complete instructions after, that means I'm also not reading much. Thus, consider this as just a warm-up to the real thing.

I think animals are harder to shoot than humans because you can't instruct them to pose, you have to be patient and wait for the odds to favor you. Like tigers I think there's a technique to enrage them for the fierce look but I'm both afraid and clueless to try. 

They're easier to shoot in a way, because unlike humans, you can't expect complex emotions from their eyes or from their faces.

But I discovered that like humans, there's kind of quiet loneliness in the way they look and unlike humans, they can stare and stare.

I tried to tinker with the Manual mode of my D5100, but it's not easy to get the desired aperture, shutter speed, and ISO.

I also tried to apply all the concepts I've learned like DOF, rule of thirds, etc. but overthinking slowed me down. I guess it will take a lot of practice to know them by instinct. But we gotta start somewhere, don't we?