Of fur, feather and scale

Shot in my back garden whilst I was taking a break from mowing the lawn yesterday (30th August '08.) Market Drayton UK.

PAL DV type 2 AVI 720x576 > Pinnacle 11 edit > MPEG Streamclip resizing/deinterlacing/encoding.

I am fortunate in that this Monkey habitat is within 6 miles from where I live, so visiting on impulse is a viable option.

This visit, which took place in early August, was the first occasion when I took along a video camcorder, and I'm sure pleased that I did.

One gets the impression that the visitor is the attraction here because your every movement is being closely observed by these Barbary Macaques, this is more evident in the 'Monkeyin around' video.

However, when the residents have had their fill of observing their guests, they settle down to some serious fun as seen here in this video.

There are no cages here, the 140 Macaques roam freely within their 60 acres of forest amongst the pedestrian visitors, making the whole visiting experience unique in its intimacy.

I would have preferred using a tripod here, but the pathways are narrow and the visitors are many, quite apart from that consideration, things tend to happen very quickly with these lively residents, so the camera needs to be ready for an instant swing into the action. I can't afford another Canon XH-A1 yet, which is the ideal solution, one mounted and one in hand.

The Monkey Forest programme is committed to the preservation of this species. To date (August 2008) the programme has collectively released around 600 of these Macaques back into their natural habitat in Morocco Algeria.

The 'old' man at the very end of this video was photographed by me in August 2005, he came and sat down beside me, that brief encounter was an amazing experience. He was around 33years old the attendant informed me, I haven't seen him on subsequent visits. I wouldn't be able to cope with a negative answer, so I am reluctant to ask 'the' question.

I much prefer to assume that the old guy has a place behind the scenes, and is enjoying a peaceful retirement from public appearances.

The 'info' staff at Trentham are obviously undertaking their work with enthusiasm, they are to a wo(man) very knowledgeable of the Macaques, and enjoy passing on their knowledge to an inquiring visitor.

Please, if you like this video click on the heart, that will give me a link to you, then I will come and visit your user area. Also, feel free to leave a comment, any feedback, whether positive or negative in content will be gratefully received.

I am in no way associated with the Monkey Forest or any member of staff. These comments are purely from the perspective of a happy customer.

Music by Kevin MacLeod Incompetech.com, issued under Creative Commons license.

4Moorhens2 assisted with some presentation aspects of this video, for which I am eternally grateful.

Thanks for reading.

Moorhens, mallard ducks and water lilies, Buntingsdale and Moreton Saye near Market Drayton UK, 29th and 30th June '08. The drakes are not looking at their best!

Moorhens and mallard ducks at Moreton Saye, near Market Drayton UK, 15th and 19th July '08.

Sony DCR-HC51E PAL miniDV, edited with Pinnacle 9 and deinterlaced/encoded with Windows Media Encoder 9. 25 fps 1280x720 WMV.

Boy! did this take some sorting out.

Why is it that the Pond 1 video was quite acceptable, and this took many renders and submissions to get it half decent. I found that the scenes were heavily pixelated, even though I originally used the same render settings as Pond 1?

Anyhow, this is the best of a bad bunch of uploaded efforts.

This video was not at all planned. I was shooting the Moorhens and saw a ripple in the water at a distance.

I had been on site for around three hours, and noticed that the ripples were gradually coming towards me. Using the XH-A1 as a monocular I discovered that I was the honoured guest of two magnificent Carp, they were asking for a framing, so I obliged.

The camera had difficulty on occasion with focussing, which is understandable due to the nature of the auto-focus system. I switched to manual focus but could not get on with the 'spongy' delayed reaction of the servo, so I switched back to auto-focus and let the cam take control.