Sheba 01b Jun 03 2012
I showed a partially processed version of this photo of Sheba to a video artist friend of mine and the first thing he said was "Wow. Reminds me of the National Geographic's Afghan Girl shot." This blew me away in that the first thing I thought, as I was tweaking the basic details of the image in Photomatrix a month ago was "Wow. This reminds me of the National Geographic's Afghan Girl shot." Needless to say when two visually attuned humans independently reach the same conclusion you know that a photo has transcended you the photographer.
After that moment of J.S. Bach-like clarity (i.e. "I don't write music. Music from God flows through me and I transcribe it.") I decided a bit more post processing was in order in particular the removal of the bits of dust, fluff and such that, she being a very electrostatic-ally charged creature, stick to Sheba's fur.
Also - about her eyes. Their color is as shot during the 3 image HDR sequence (250 msec or so total). Sheba's right eye, the one on the left side in the image is catching the blue of the sky while her left eye (right side of the image) is catching the orange of the light of the setting sun reflected off the wall in my apartment. Sunset light seems to be the perfect light for her. Thanks to High Dynamic Range the colors made it through to the final image.
A few cool observations jump out from this. First - she's looking in two directions at the same time - left and right. As someone who's art is visual I wish I could do that. Second, the back of her eyes are near perfect reflectors. With humans we see it as 'red-eye' and in cats at night we see these white-orange eyes floating in the blackness. As a huntress her eyes have evolved to not be blinded by too much light which makes complete sense given her ancient ancestors roamed the deserts of Africa.
Cats rock.
Oh, and here's a link to the classic "Afgan Girl" photograph shot by photographer Steve McCurry in December of 1984. Two beautiful females with the same expression. Pretty cool when you think about it.
After that moment of J.S. Bach-like clarity (i.e. "I don't write music. Music from God flows through me and I transcribe it.") I decided a bit more post processing was in order in particular the removal of the bits of dust, fluff and such that, she being a very electrostatic-ally charged creature, stick to Sheba's fur.
Also - about her eyes. Their color is as shot during the 3 image HDR sequence (250 msec or so total). Sheba's right eye, the one on the left side in the image is catching the blue of the sky while her left eye (right side of the image) is catching the orange of the light of the setting sun reflected off the wall in my apartment. Sunset light seems to be the perfect light for her. Thanks to High Dynamic Range the colors made it through to the final image.
A few cool observations jump out from this. First - she's looking in two directions at the same time - left and right. As someone who's art is visual I wish I could do that. Second, the back of her eyes are near perfect reflectors. With humans we see it as 'red-eye' and in cats at night we see these white-orange eyes floating in the blackness. As a huntress her eyes have evolved to not be blinded by too much light which makes complete sense given her ancient ancestors roamed the deserts of Africa.
Cats rock.
Oh, and here's a link to the classic "Afgan Girl" photograph shot by photographer Steve McCurry in December of 1984. Two beautiful females with the same expression. Pretty cool when you think about it.
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