Wildlife Photo Competition 4 2017 : Results

Judges Comment
Beautiful northern light and a striking low angle really put these walruses into their environment. It is a magnificent shot, nicely exposed with sharp detail, it rightly jumped straight into 1st place. Very well done, you win this round.
Photographers Comment
Thank you very much for choosing my picture as the First Prize! I am a nature and wildlife photographer in Florence, Italy. This photograph was taken in Svalbard Islands, on a summer night at around midnight. In this region walruses have been near to extinction because of hunting till 1952, when they were protected by law. Since then their number has progressively increased and nowadays they are relatively common. These two males belong to a small group of about 20 individuals. The photo was shot with a Nikon D800E and Zeiss 21mm f2.8 lens, entering into the cold sea water to obtain a picture of the animals in their environment.
www.marcopoggioni.com

Judges Comment
How sweet is this and such a real wild encounter. Well done but be careful, mother is watching you!

Judges Comment
An extraordinary and beautifully lit studio style image which has something rather unnatural about it. That front horn and those facial wrinkles seem too perfect to be real. Is this stuffed, made of wax or a digital creation? In any case it represents a black rhino and has been cleverly mastered. Let us know how you did this.
Photographers Comment
Thank you for the honor. I’m Sarel van Staden, an automotive photographer located in South Africa. I developed a lighting technique I use to do car fine art photography and it was this same technique that I used to light this stuffed rhino during a commercial shoot on a game farm.
www.photowise.co.za

Judges Comment
A nice composition and strong contrast make those colors really pop and give this mandrill a pretty serious though very smart appearance.
Photographers Comment
The picture was shot in the Gabon rainforest, one of the few places in the world where mandrills live in the wild. The male mandrill is the most colorful among monkeys. The chicks ara pale blue, and their color increases with sexual excitement. The photograph was shot with a Nikon D3S paired with a Nikon 70-200mm f2.8 lens.
www.marcopoggioni.com

Judges Comment
Well it is a well known spot for grizzly fishing but you have timed this perfectly earning a well deserved mark of excellence.
Photographers Comment
A brown bear with shaggy, brown fur is about to catch a salmon in its mouth at the top of Brooks Falls, Alaska. The fish is only a few inches away from its gaping jaws. Shot with a Nikon D800 in Alaska, USA, in July 2015. ISO 400, 300mm, f/9.0, 1/1000 This image won the Sunday Times/Audley Travel Big Shot competition in January 2017, was National Geographic's Photo of the Day on 2 August 2017 after being chosen in their Daily Dozen and was among the editors' favourites for Week 10 of their Travel Photographer of the Year competition. "Timing is everything in photography, and this image is a great example of that. Excellent use of your 300mm lens to capture this moment right here. I love how you composed the image and went with a medium frame and didn't get too close or tight on the bear. There's some nice spacing around the subject and this makes for an excellent wildlife image." Matt Adams - Producer, National Geographic Your Shot
www.nickdalephotography.com

Judges Comment
Beautiful autumn light for this lovely badger in a tranquil and wild setting. I love this photograph, well done.

Judges Comment
This is an original zoomed photograph of orca fins in a cold blue Arctic sea. Looks like a happy family out for the day. Nice chilling atmosphere, i hope your boat was rigid.

Judges Comment
This round’s fun photo… But wrong lens for this kind of macro shot!
Photographers Comment
Many Thx for Mark of Excellence. Thanks to the judges. My name is Werner Schmäing, come from Germany. We have a little Rescue Station for sick or orphaned wild animals. This young deer come 9 month after we take them back in the nature to us and say "Hello". The Pic is made with a Canon 5D III, Lense are the 135 2.0 L.
https://www.facebook.com/Wildtierhilfe-Schelderwald-1654972274779898/

Judges Comment
I love the real wild feel of this african buffalo and am intrigued by what seems to be a several second exposure with flash, well done. I imagine you are behind a solid wall and not peeping out of your tent :-)… Please fill us in with shooting info.
Photographers Comment
The image was shot in South Africa. Close to a waterhole a hide allows to take pictures without disturbing animals that come to the puddle to drink. During the night two low intensity led panels light the scene (continuous light doesn't disturb animals like flashes can do). To take this picture I waited for the buffalo, lighted off the leds, and during a 10 second long exposure I manually swhitched on and off the lights for a short time. The camera I used was a Nikon D800E with a Nikon 24-70mm f2.8 lens at f5, ISO 1250.
www.marcopoggioni.com