Wildlife Photography with Jayaprakash Bojan by Cathay Photo and Olympus Singapore
Many of us would have seen Jayaprakash Bojan's award-winning photograph of a male orangutan forced to cross a river due to habitat destruction. Thus, when Cathay Photo organised a workshop with the Nat Geo grand prize winner, I signed up immediately.
The workshop was held in the morning at Cathay Photo's Peninsula Plaza outlet. Mr Bojan gave us an introductory talk on wildlife photography and his work. He divides photography into two broad styles - journalistic and artistic. He does not feel that it is meaningful to capture what hundreds of people have already done so. Thus, in his work, he showcases the animals in their natural environments instead of mainly framing portrait-style shots and is not afraid to challenge conventional photography "rules", such as shooting towards the light source. He also shared with us the tricks he used to evoke emotions in his conservation work.
After the talk, we headed to Gardens By The Bay for a short session of wildlife photography. Olympus Singapore brought some camera bodies and lenses for us to try. I borrowed the Olympus EM1 Mark II, 40-150mm F2.8 and a 1.4x teleconverter. A 300mm lens was available as well. However, Olympus did not bring sufficient lenses and some of the attendees who arrived later did not manage to borrow one.
When we reached Gardens By The Bay, it was late morning and most of the birds had gone into hiding to escape the heat. I managed to spot sunbirds, a kingfisher, a bittern and an Asian Koel. I was not used to shooting with the Olympus (could not figure out how to switch to manual focus or manual focus override). However, it was a great experience using the EVF as it eliminates the possibility of accidentally under- or over-exposing images since you can see the simulated image in the viewfinder. I definitely missed my Canon 70d and Sigma 150-600mm combination when we spotted a bittern though. The bird was tiny in my frame as my maximum reach was 420mm equivalent focal length on a full frame sensor. Here are some of my nicer shots:
I do not think this is one of my better shots but it is my first time shooting a Koel.
