UK Wolf Conservation Trust, a photoshoot.

Having visited the UK Wolf Trust on their last open day, and as well as being a fan of wolves (check my url ;-) ), a photoshoot opportunity with the wolves there was a no-brainer. I joined a delegation of 14 photographers that were led on a shoot with Wild Arena. Since this is a photo specific trip, I pulled all the stops and brought all my gear out, including my softbox :P

The journey there was slightly expensive - a return trip on national rail, and to and fro on the taxis - a 25 quid trip one way! OUCH!!!!!

Weather was quite bad on the way there, with the rain coming down hard. Thankfully, I was equipped with my new bad weather toys from my journey up to scotland, so no issues there.

Our first photoshoot started out in a mild rain, rain that I've shot with before in my full kit without issue. However, the rain got *bad* part way through the shoot, and being the big idiot I am, I continued to shoot with the flash attached. The flash. Died. :P But not before I got one of my favourite shots of the day:

 Torak, Alpha Wolf!

This is Torak, the alpha of the MacKenzie pack. The image looks over processed, because it is. The histogram in this instance was perfectly centered, and extended just slightly to the left and right of middle grey :( It was raining THAT hard, so hard that at times, the wolves were almost only a blur, and through the viewfinder, just bokeh'd out grey-ness. It doesn't help that I had to fire at ISO1600 to get the shutter speeds I wanted to be at. It is, a technical flop, but something I will enjoy in my collection.

Apprehensive?

Given that most of us were having a hard time even seeing the wolves through the heavy downpour, much less actually getting a shot, we decided to call a time out and head in for coffee, tea and biscuits. A short while later, the sun peaked through and we headed out yet again. This time to visit the European Wolves.

Rolling around :) (Oh yeah I miss my flash here...)

Inclement weather having passed, we were then blessed with soft sidelit light. In my previous post, I had mentioned I didn't bother to shoot after noontime as the light was backlighting the wolves pretty badly. In autumn, and given the position we were able to be shooting in, it is beautiful. The D300 was also metering impeccably; highlights were well captured, and the highlight recovery in Bibble brought back the tiny overexposed areas. Dynamic range was good as well. Did I mention I love my D300? :>

Scenting the wind (or not, I'm just making up captions!)

Alba, survivor and fighter. I want to hug him.

Even though we were able to get much closer to the wolves, I had to rely mostly on my 300/4 + TC14EII combo - which is why early in the morning I had to push the 1.6k iso in order to get 1/500++ shutter speeds. Rest of the day, it was perfectly fine to use anything between 200 and 400, even in the shade, especially with the faster 70-200.  We broke for lunch, then headed out to catch the 3rd pack, the North American wolves.

Duma, food finding.

King of the hill!

This particular enclosure was double-fenced, and had holes cut out that easily accomodated my 300/4, as well as larger lenses such as the Sigma 150-500, and Canon 100-400s. Unfortunately, these holes are at human eye level, and not at wolf eye level, which is the eye level I prefer to be at. They are probably designed for shooting the wolves when they are on the top of a small mound.

Duma close-up

Still, it is possible to shoot through the twin fences. There is a slightly contrast loss, but in my opinion, goes away with a little bit of contrast boost in post. Duma's other packmate, Dakota was in a holding pen, recovering from surgery. :(

The light was falling pretty fast, and light levels were actually quite low at 3-ish, so it was back to higher iso for shots. Given that not all of us got shots from the Mackenzie pack, we headed back there again.

???? I can not remember who is Mosi or Mai :( Probably Mai, the beta.

This time with the light not so intense, I tried shooting some backlit shots. Unfortunately, this is not the strength of the 70-200, it flares quite badly even with the sun not directly in the viewfinder. The flaring is so bad, it's obvious in the viewfinder. GAH! 

As always, I can call upon the well and trusted 300/4 AF-S + TC14EII combo to deliver the goods, as seen above and below. Well so long as the shutter speed is fast enough :) Shooting in the same position, no lens hood, through fencing, no flare. Primes. Rock. Now all I need to do is find a way to afford the legendary 300/2.8VR.... hmm.... with Nikon making new DX primes, they should seriously consider making a 300/2.8DX-VR for amateurs! Lighter, stronger, faster... er... nevermind. Speaking of lenses, one of my fellow photogs was using a WHITE 70-200VR :> I hear it's not so rare in europe. As per usual, I demonstrate my inability to shoot just shots of the surroundings I'm in at.

Peek-a-boo, I see you...

Torak in the shade!

Random landscape shot while waiting for the taxi

On the way back, I realized that while I was crawling around in the mud, that same area I was doing so was also the same area that the wolves would be scent marking and doing er... stuff.... 0.o

Crap :P

Oh well :)