First 'formal' animal photos

[KimIP]

I'd love some critiquing on these 2 shots I took. These guys were at the zoo, but I wanted them to look as if they were more like portraits, not zoo photos.
Thanks!

Kim

[pnommensen]

I really like the parrot :-)

I believe the mouth region of the monkey/gorilla is a little bit out of focus. Great pics overall!

[Phillydog1958]

Not much wrong with either

[newyorker]

Like the Parrot... can you pls tell me how did you get the black background?

[Angel_A]

The parrot is beautiful, great photo

[KimIP]

newyorker: I shot the photo of the parrot with a flash, with dark trees in the background. Fortunately when I went to process it on my computer, I was able to darken the trees even more to where they were almost completely black. The spots that weren't black I filled in with the clone tool. It was pretty time intensive while working around the edge of the parrot, but I managed to do it. I'm sure there must be an easier way, but I'm just an amateur so I'm probably the wrong person to ask.

Thanks everyone for the compliments. pnommensen: I agree, the monkey could use a bit more focusing around his mouth area. Maybe next time I will get a better shot. =)

Have a nice day1

[JFSanders]

Small aperture, fastest sync speed you can use, rear curtain flash fill on subject will kill the ambient and provide a black background AS LONG AS THE SUBJECT IS NOT NEXT TO THE BACKGROUND. That is to say if there are bars or tree branches etc. next to or in the same plane and within the range of the flash they will also show up in the photo.

Nice parrot but the top of his head is a little hot. Monkey pretty good but the mouth is blurred as was said previously.

Jim