Commons:Featured picture candidates/File:Dacelo novaeguineae - Vogelpark Steinen 01.jpg

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File:Dacelo novaeguineae - Vogelpark Steinen 01.jpg, featured

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Voting period is over. Please don't add any new votes.Voting period ends on 1 Sep 2023 at 16:24:27 (UTC)
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Laughing kookaburra; Bird park Steinen, Steinen, Baden-Württemberg, Germany
 Comment Hello Poco a poco, you wanted some information about this photo. It was taken in Vogelpark Steinen on a very hot, sunny day. The aviary in which the animal sat faced north (i.e. the rear wall was the south wall, see also Google maps). Because of the heat, the animal sat in a relatively dark area. There were two difficulties with this: the light and the aviary grid. I managed to place the lens so directly in front of the grating that the head area was not covered by aviary wire or had a blurred area caused by it. This was only possible in a single camera position. With this camera position, however, the light was so weak that the exposure time would have been too long. So I used an external flash. I have the impression that many Wikimedians think that taking pictures in the zoo is relatively easy (the animal is there, you just press the shutter button). I do not agree with it. In relation to the field, zoo photography is not simpler, but different. How often do you come to an enclosure and not a single animal is to be seen. And if it can be seen, the background is usually unacceptable. In addition, the lighting conditions are often extremely unfavorable, so that additional light is required (flash), which then casts unnatural shadows if the animal sits too close to an aviary wall. So even in the zoo it is not easy to get good pictures of animals. It gets even more complicated in the aquarium. The panes are often scratched and overgrown with algae, which makes a photo impossible, the panes reflect and mirror the light and the animals are usually surrounded by a blue, annoying fringe. In my opinion, a good aquarium photo is at least as difficult as a good outdoor photo. It took me a long time to get acceptable ones, because in addition to a clean, unscratched pane, you need a certain distance and angle of the photo to the aquarium pane and a certain distance of the animal to the aquarium glass. Therefore in my opinion good zoo photos are also not easy, but require a lot of know-how. Best regards --Llez (talk) 08:35, 26 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, Llez, let me now answer with a bit more of time. I do it in English although, to be honest, I feel more comfortable in German (as you can see in my Bable infoboxees), as you surely do, but this is fine in the case somebody else would like to follow this conversation. Firstly, I have never said that it is easy to manage a high quality image in a zoo. I managed 3 but it is over 10 years ago (this one in a butterfly house in Spain, this one in a zoo in Germany and this one from a zoo in Vietnam). In fact, I will try to take down the FP status of those images or would be happy if somebody does, I am not proud of those images, even if it is a while ago. I believe that taking pictures in a zoo is fine if we have no good material from their natural habitat of the species on Commons, but when that's the case, there is no reason for me to give the FP status to a picture taken under cautivity. That's neither good for the animal, nor for our free movement. Sorry for being so clear here. Regarding the difficulties of this or that shot. Well, again, a good shot is never easy but I'm pretty sure that if not a bird in the first station, a sea lion next to it or a reptile in the next station can be shot properly. It's a matter of good skills and equipment (which you definitely have), time/patience and a bit of luck. But, what I don't buy is the effort of going to the aquarium around the corner (in my case Sea Life in Munich) vs taking 2-3 flights to get to a place like Anilao in the Philippines, famous for nudibranchias and getting into the water 3-4 times a day to capture animal life even risking my health (diving has risks, I also hurt myself, specially the legs, with sharp coral). Let alone the weeks of preparation for such a trip, the special equipment and the money to acquire it. You can only tell me that an aquarium is as difficult as an outdoor picture if you have tried both. I take over 1000 pictures per dive and will upload at the end a dozen maybe, that should also give you a hint about the difficulty, even after having dived a lot of times. I don't use flash for different reasons (I can elaborate on that if you like, but a bit off-topic), but in the meanwhile I believe that the quality of the images is improving significantly, at least, that's the feedback I've been getting and the reason why I was asked to talk about it in a recent session of the CPUG. The pictures I haven't uploaded yet are even better, I'm pretty sure about that. And as said, if you feel that the quality is not good enough you don't hurt my feelings if you oppose. That's the way it should work here. Best, Poco a poco (talk) 14:32, 27 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Confirmed results:
Result: 13 support, 0 oppose, 1 neutral → featured. /Basile Morin (talk) 01:49, 29 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]
This image will be added to the FP gallery: Animals/Birds#Family : Alcedinidae (Kingfishers)
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