The image was taken on top of Mount Simien National Park, in Northern Ethiopia. It depicts a gelada baboon silhouette backlit at sunrise. In recent years I have conducted several trips to this region, to portray the endemic fauna that inhabits these mountains. Political instability unfortunately makes travel in this area increasingly complex and risky.
The idea was to position myself so as to have the sun as much as possible behind the animal, to
emphasize the silhouette made more marked by the long hair that grows on the head and neck of
male geladas. The terrain in this area is however extremely steep, and I was on top of an escarpment
with a vertical drop of almost nine hundred meters. Consequently, the movements were extremely
risky, and every move had to be planned with great caution.
In post-processing I increased the vignetting a little in order to concentrate the observer's eye on the center of the image where the silhouette of the animal is present. I also darkened the blacks by about one stop and used a little selective dodge on the mane and teeth.
