Joe and Mary Ann McDonald's

Wildlife Photography

March-April 2005

Photograph of the Month

A Gallery of the Best Images We've Seen...


Howie Garber's image of a Chinese fisherman using cormorants is our choice for the top image for this dual-month's gallery. Look for this to
win some contests! You can see more of Howie's images at his website, wanderlust images.


More of Howie Garber's work -- Chinese fishermen; panorama of aspens; panned grizzly

Anita Ray shot this blenny fish while diving; Mike Robinson did these studies of a big horn ram.


Dave Northcott shot this grooming lion on our Tanzania photo safari.


(
see end of text for submitting images)
As many of the visitors to this website must know, we lead photo tours and teach photo workshops. On these, as part of the trip or experience, we usually have a slide show evening (or two, or three) where our participants show their best images. Every few years we host a Kenya Reunion, for past participants, (and this year that will be combined with a Falklands Reunion), where participants will show off their best work. Via email, and sometimes through regular mail or FedEx, we'll receive jpeg images, or actual prints, of our participants' work, and sometimes, especially via email, the work of people we don't even know but who have visited the web site.

Well, the reason for this preface is this: We've seen some absolutely stunning images. Some of these have been made by pros, or semi-pros, or people who hope to sell images in the future. More often, though, these images have been made by folks who just love to take pictures and who are producing outstanding work. We see these images, as do, I suppose, the photographer's friends and family and, perhaps, club members or work associates, and that's as far as those images ever go. Yet it seems a shame that the viewing should stop there. Which got us thinking ....

We decided to profile the best of the images we receive via email and to post those images on our web site. These posting are our way of saying, 'Great Job!,' and of recognizing wonderful images and the photographer's that make them. We anticipate getting a bunch of jpegs for this, and our plan is to simply post the best image, or the top 2-3, or, perhaps, with smaller images, the best 10 or so. There's no contest for this, no prizes, just the reward, if you will, of seeing your images posted on a fairly well visited website. The images will be 'up' for approximately a month -- the usual time I leave for changes of the web site, unless I'm traveling and the website stays static for two months or so (as when we go to Africa for 9-12 weeks). In the latter case, then, an image may be posted for as long as 12 weeks.

Photographers whose images are posted will be credited, with, perhaps, information pertaining to the photo. This might include where it was taken, or what it is, or how it was shot. I'll be the editor here, and my decisions on the text content, other than the credit, may be changed or different, depending upon the image.

Images will be posted at 72 dpi, probably at an image size of 5x7 or so, although that may differ for the image and my arbitrary, subjective decision on that matter. There will be no watermark or other image protection -- I don't do that with my images on the web, but I figure that at 72 dpi no one can download the images and do anything meaningful with them (short of, perhaps, a screen saver). So, if an image is 'lifted' it is 'lifted' at 72 dpi, and I have no control over this.

For submitting any image, I'm going to have them sent to my personal email address. Because of the volume of images sent, I WILL NOT be acknowledging receipt of the images and I will not be informing the photographer if he or she will be in the Gallery. If time permits, I will try to notify those that are in the Gallery that month, but I cannot guarantee this. Images that I know will not be posted will be deleted shortly after receipt. Further, if you have a website or email address, I will not be posting links or email addresses. The gallery is not for sales generated from this website, it is meant to be a portfolio of visitors images.

What we're trying to do here is give photographers who do not publish, or who are frustrated in not being published, a chance at some recognition. We'd love the world to see some of the great shots that have been taken, and that's what the gallery is for. Certainly, we welcome pros as well as amateurs, friends as well as strangers, but we're attempting to simply post great work.

So, to submit, send a jpeg file of 72 dpi with an image size NO LARGER than 5x7 to hoothollowjoe@acsworld.com Images received in any given month may not be posted until the next web update (see home page for the time the site is current).

For ALL OTHER correspondence regarding our photo tours, our workshops, our one day seminars, the products that we sell, questions about our equipment reviews --- virtually everything else, please refer to our normal business email address, hoothollow@acsworld.com I will not be responding to any of these emails at the preceding address, only the one referred to in this paragraph.


Contact us by e-mail: hoothollow@acsworld.com

Or FAX us at: (717) 543-6423.

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