Hi group,

here is another shot of that pretty Hannover Zoo lioness. By the way,
while most of my big cats are from Hagenbeck (Hamburg) and Hannover Zoo,
just a word about the photography conditions: In Hagenbeck Zoo, the cats
are prevented from having the visitors for dinner by a pond with almost
vertical walls. This means the distance for photography is usually about
10 to 30 metres. When taking the cat pix, I have no obstacles in my
sight but I always have to use the 300 mm lens - including problems such
as motion blur unless I have 1/500 sec or less of shutter time. Hannover
is completely different: The anti-cat-food barrier consists of walls
with thick windows. That provides easy-to-shoot, wonderful close-ups
with the short lens but causes trouble if the glass is stainy (as it
usually is). BTW, even if the glass is completely clean, you usually get
some artefacts such as halos - this is because the optical calculations
of the lens are made for the refraction of air, not the one of glass. As
to Hagenbeck and Hannover, both types of enclosures have advantages and
drawbacks but are far beyond the ugly steel fences that zoo owners used
to use years ago. Moreover, the cats seem to be in much better shape in
those newer enclosures, more playful, maybe even happier. More examples
to come - just stay tuned or hit my web page where all pictures I post
here are ready for download in case you didn't catch them here.

Greetings from Geesthacht -

Ralf

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