One of the first animals you might happen upon when entering Scottsbluff’s Riverside Discovery Center is this beautiful bobcat. Like all cats, every bobcat has their own personality, and on the day I visited this one wanted nothing but attention. It saw me coming, jumped from its perch, and came to rub up on the fence and say hi. Unfortunately, this meant I couldn’t get a good photo. No good angle with the 400, and too close to the barrier for the 16-35 to blur it out.
I tried walking away a few steps and coming back. I tried waiting. But this little guy just wanted to be close to me. It’s moments like that where you put down the camera and just enjoy the experience, enjoy the connection you have with an awesome animal. But then how did the photo above come about?
After I did a couple loops on the main area of the zoo, I started to make my way back to the exit. Unlike with the squirrel monkey picture posted last week, I knew what I was going to get into and I came into it prepared. I wanted to use the 400, but I knew I would only get a couple shots once the cat saw me. I set the aperture to f/4 to up my chances of getting the right bits in focus. I manually rolled the focus distance to minimum because I knew I’d be relatively close and I didn’t want the camera to hunt more than it had to. I shot the habitat from a ways away to ensure I had the exposure set right. I even used the lens as a spotting scope to figure out where the cat was so that I could be ready as I approached.
And approach I did. Quiet as I could be. Camera’s up and ready and FLASH the cat’s off the perch and running toward me. I got four shots off between the perch and the fence. Two were in focus, and one had a decent enough pose.
I really like this cat.
The Zootographer 