I recently had to be in Chicago, and decided to make a day out of it so I showed up early and went to Lincoln Park Zoo. As an avid zoo shooter I'd been wanting to check it out, but I'm just not that Chicago savvy, I tend to avoid the big city whenever I can because I plain dislike big cities. I'm a child of the suburbs. But I did the research and almost figured out how the bus system works in Chicago. I still don't understand it, but I managed to get where I needed to go. The zoo itself was an interesting change from my standard zoo, Brookfield. As a city zoo it's free. It got a bad reputation a few years ago because of a few animal deaths, but I was never certain if the reputation was deserved or if it was just some bad luck followed up by the usual pressure from radical animal rights groups that fail to see the big picture. I knew I had to go when I found out how many feline species they have. A new (for me) leopard species, a Pallas' Cat, a serval, a jaguar, a cougar (one of which was recently shot and killed in the city, something that shocked the heck out of me, I still can't believe a cougar infiltrated Chicago, not just that it COULD but that it would want to), plus my old favorite the snow leopard. Unfortunately I never saw the Pallas' Cat come out into the open, a shame because I really wanted to see that unique looking animal, it has a heavy, scruffy coat that makes it look like a feline barbarian. I never found the jaguar or serval (their building may have been closed), and the cougar was in a poor enclosure for photography. Just the same I got some outstanding stuff, and plan to go back for more. I want that Pallas' Cat, even if the enclosure also looks like another bad one for photography (a mesh barrier that's too far away to blur it with shallow DOF). I've included a picture of a snowy owl, a beautiful bird that reminds me of the Great Owl character from The Secret of Nimh (in a way it walked in a similar fashion), a dwarf caiman, and perhaps one of my better leopard pictures of all time, a picture of what may be either an Afghani Leopard or an Iranian leopard. The website says Iranian, the sign in the zoo says Afghani. Anyway, as you can see it was one of the most natural looking pictures I've been able to get of any leopard species. I'm shooting through what I think was a barred fence kind of like chain link but with somewhat thicker metal and a square pattern, but I was able to get close enough that at F4 the near fence almost completely dissolved. The only remaining hint of the fence is an interesting effect you can see in the bokeh, or blurred background. Look just to the ride of the leopard, you can see a weird sort of interference effect running vertically. It's present elsewhere, both vertical and horizontal lines. That's the remnants of the barrier I was shooting through. [This attachment has been purged. Older attachments are purged from time to time to conserve disk space. Please feel free to repost your image.]
Beautiful shots Dan. I am horrible at animal photography (and human photography). When I lived there I went to brookfield never been to Lincoln Park zoo. Unlike you tho I like the big cities. I am a city person and love using public transport.
Nice pics Dan! Maybe Ill have to make a trip there with my new camera. Of course I buy a camera a week after I get back from Disney so I'll be looking at places to practice. I also might make a trip to the Botannical Gardens!
nice shots, there was a baby jaquar in a zoo we visited on vacation but of course he never came within camera range once during our visit. love the leopard. not sure which is harder to deal with scratched dirty glass or fences thinking the glass...anyway guess "safety" comes before "photography" at zoos
Glass! Last year at AK I was able to get some good shots of the tigers by kind of focusing my lens through the space between the fence!
There's some bad glass that I won't even bother shooting through, unless it's to capture a funny or interesting scene knowing that it'll look terrible but at least you'll be able to see it. One is the lion viewing window at Brookfield. It doesn't look like scratches, it's so even and constant that it looks like it's been etched. On the other hand I know I can shoot through the glass viewing window for the snow leopards (at Brookfield again), oh BOY can I shoot through it. I can get some reflection problems, that can sometimes be dealt with in post processing, and it may result in some loss of sharpness, but the results are still worth it. And it's the only way I can get them, the other option is to shoot through a flexible mesh barrier but at a long distance. I don't have a long enough lens to begin with, and even if I did I couldn't blur it out. Well, perhaps if I had the 400mm F2.8, but... I still think the distances wouldn't work out. That same flexible mesh material covering the Amur leopard exhibit is no problem, I can get up close to it and shoot through it so that it blurs into nonexistence in the image.
Nice pics Dan! Did you get any pictures of the one armed monkey? I tried to get some pictures of him but Im only working with the kit lens and he was way at the top.
Great shots Dan! The white owl pic reminds me of another great white owl, the one from Harry Potter. That leopard shot is great. I can't believe how that fence seemed to disappear.
Lincoln Park zoo does make photography difficult since so many of the glass windows have the "sponge marks" on it. Stupid birds!
Oh yes, that was definitely out in full force. The soap marks on the glass I mean. They had signs up everywhere explaining that it was a peak migrating season, and that birds would be smacking into the glass if they didn't do that. I admit I didn't expect that, I would have figured migrating birds would be flying higher, not slaloming through a zoo. I did not notice a one armed monkey, but I was kind of pressed for time and rushed through the monkeys in general.
