Face to face

Time for another image from my last visit to Dublin Zoo back in April as part of a Dublin Camera Club outing.  This particular photo was one of those occasions where I knew as soon as I had clicked the shutter that I was going to like the resultant image quite a lot.  What I like about it is that it captures a moment, rather than just being a straight portrait or snapshot of an animal in its enclosure, as many zoo photographs tend to be.

The lioness in this photograph is the same one I posted previously when discussing the visit (and indeed if you click through to the slideshow from that post you will see today’s photograph in there too).   Before I photographed her in her hut, she was up at the window of the enclosure (which I was glad to see was made from some very thick glass) and, as I admired her, three generations of a family appeared.

The youngest, maybe about 4 or 5, seemed to be a bit cautious of the lioness.  His mother was trying to encourage him to approach her and to help with this his grandmother moved right up to the glass and started talking to the lioness.

I was standing alongside with a wide angle lens on the camera and had a split second in which to grab this photo.  I deliberately framed to keep the woman’s head at the top left corner, and thus keep her looking down into the frame.

Sadly the lioness didn’t make eye contact, but I think the expression on the woman’s face makes up for this – it is almost child-like wonder at the sight of the lioness which suggests that this may have been her first encounter with such an animal.

My favourite element in the image is actually the smudge on the glass.  At first I wondered was it something on the lens or if that part of the glass hadn’t been properly washed, but then I realised that it was condensation from the lioness breathing out through her nostrils and for some reason I find that visual indication of the lioness breathing in and out is both enthralling and slightly unnerving.