Advertisement
Advertisement
Read Next
Photo Of The Day By Joshua Moore
Today’s Photo Of The Day is...Photo Of The Day By Harry Lichtman
Today’s Photo Of The Day is “Winter...Photo Of The Day By Heather Nicole
Today’s Photo Of The Day is “Cheesy...Photo Of The Day By Laura Schoenbauer
Today’s Photo Of The Day is “Follow...Advertisement
Featured Articles
Read More
Beyond Visible Light: Color Infrared Photography
For a different look at color photography, try these shooting and processing tips using infrared digital capture.
Read More
Ultra-Compact Super Telephoto
Field testing the AF-S NIKKOR 500mm f/5.6E PF ED VR lens, a super telephoto prime that's priced within reach of more photographers.
To access this content, you must purchase Outdoor Photographer Membership.
Read More
Depth Of Field In Macro Photography
In macro photography, depth of field is especially important to ensure the details of your subject are sharp. Use these 5 tips to get the best results.
Read More
The “Normal” Lens
Mastering composition with standard focal length lenses.
To access this content, you must purchase Outdoor Photographer Membership.
Read More
Lenses For Wildlife Photography
When it comes to selecting lenses for wildlife photography, the first thing most photographers look for is focal length—a long lens that can reach out and cover great distances, bringing animals in for close-ups—but other features are also incredibly useful.
Read More
Processing Fall Color Photos In Lightroom Classic CC
Understanding the difference between Lightroom’s Vibrance and Saturation sliders can dramatically improve your results when processing fall color photos.
To access this content, you must purchase Outdoor Photographer Membership.
Up Close with Endangered Animals
Endangered Black Howler Monkeys feeding, Belize
We are in the middle of a major worldwide extinction event, with vast numbers of plants and animals disappearing because of habitat loss and the pressures of climate change. But there are still places where even endangered animals continue to thrive. Such a place is the Community Baboon Sanctuary in Belize. This non-government sanctuary was created in this small Central American country nearly 20 years ago, a private effort to slow – or stop – the disappearance of the Guatemalan Black Howler Monkey (known locally as the “baboon”).
When I first came here in the late 1990’s, the monkeys were still rare, and becoming more so. But in a few small villages, landowners made a simple bargain; they agreed to protect forest corridors and avoid cutting trees, leaving a home for Howlers. On a global scale, the area was small, some 20 square miles. But in the intervening decades, the monkey population has multiplied many times over. Now there may be as many as 500 animals, living wild and free, in this island of protected forest.
I went back last week to see how they were doing, and to try and get pictures of this primate – still rare everywhere else in its range. Almost from the moment I arrived, I could hear monkeys. Not just one or two, but multiple groups calling from virtually every point on the compass. Howler Monkeys announce their territories with their powerful, coarse howls, and by the sound of it, there were scads of them. As strict vegetarians, howlers don’t need much land, just a variety of trees and fruits to feed their families. In fact, I spent a week with a single, small troop of four monkeys, and they never wandered more than a few hundred yards in any direction in that time.
To get this shot of a foraging female, I had to overcome the dappled light so typical of the rain forest interior, a chaos of light and shadow that is nearly poisonous to photography. To overcome that unappealing light, and highlight the monkey’s feeding, I put on a flash.
If it seems counter-intuitive to use a flash in the middle of the day, I can say that it is one of my most effective tools for all my rain forest photography. The trick, of course, is to dial back the strength of the flash (using exposure compensation of -1 or 1.5 stops) so that it does not entirely overpower the ambient light, but simply fills in the deep shadows (a real problem with an all-black animal!). This creates a quality of light that appears largely natural, but in fact is a carefully-balanced mix of ambient and artificial. The flash also allowed me to stop the animal’s motion in the dark forest interior, creating a picture that would have been largely impossible with natural light alone.
Photo technique aside, the pleasure for me in this picture is simply capturing a rare animal in a private moment, wild and unafraid, and most important…thriving.
Guatemalan Black Howler Monkey, Belize
© Kevin Schafer 2014