Post challenge: Wow, a 6.5 and still only 34th! Some absolutely stunning images in this challenge, and I feel good to be anywhere in the top 50. Thanks for all the votes and comments, everyone!
Oh, and since one person asked about the light, this was taken in late afternoon. The late afternoon winter light has been nice lately.
Taken at the Children's Pool, La Jolla, California. Winter is pupping time for the harbor seals. The seals come up onto the beach and hang out for a couple of months to have pups. The Children's Pool in La Jolla is a small chunk of beach where a surf break was built in 1931 to provide a swimming area for kids. It also provides an excellent place for the seals to nest, and since the early 1990's, the seals have taken over the beach, especially during the winter pupping season. Nobody knows why they suddenly started using the Childrens Pool. Because of the ummm...seal poop, the pool has been closed to humans for a number of years. The seals are protected by federal law, but a small, committed group of people have taken it upon themselves to chase the seals off the beach at regular intervals, in order to reclaim the beach for people. Another small, equally committed group of people has taken it upon themselves to protect the seals by chasing the people off the beach. This has led to numerous fights, arrests, lawsuits, and general mayhem.
When I was there, there were about 100 seals on the beach, and another 200 people watching the seals from safe (to the seals) places.
Taken with a 80-200mm lens at 200mm with a 1.4x teleconverter from about 50 yards. Other than the usual raw conversion, crop, resizing, and sharpening, I darkened the sand with a multiply layer at 50%, and used curves to bring the color back up in the sRGB version.
Statistics
Place: 34 out of 218 Avg (all users): 6.5136 Avg (commenters): 7.7391 Avg (participants): 6.4906 Avg (non-participants): 6.5298 Views since voting: 1842 Views during voting: 365 Votes: 257 Comments: 24 Favorites: 1 (view)
Excellent shot. Nice control of the exposure. Looks like this might have been a difficult shot to not blow out the highlights with the direct sun. I like the warm golden tones this shot has. Probably taken in the early morning? Very cute and I like how it is looking back over it's shoulder at you. Good luck with the challenge!!!
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