Best Photo of ZooChat 2021: The Nominations

It's that time of year again! This is the competition to see what the best photo uploaded to the ZooChat gallery in 2021 is! I will receive nominations in this thread here, then there will be a second thread with a poll, similar to ZooChat Thread of the Year competition.

Rules for nomination:

1) Photo must be posted on ZooChat and have been taken in 2021. If the date taken (not date uploaded) is not listed in the caption, please click the tab under the photo that says "information." This will give the camera info including date taken. (Photos uploaded in 2021 were not necessarily taken in 2021).

2) Submit one photo and one photo only. Please provide a link to the photo. (Multiple photos count if uploaded as one photo - such as a photo collage).

3) Please do NOT nominate your own photo.

Deadline to nominate photos will be January 9 2022.

 

My nomination is "Ready to Strike" by @Ding Lingwei:


Ready to Strike - ZooChat

 

I'd like to nominate 'Chinese desert cat (Felis bieti)' by @YuanChang:


Chinese desert cat (Felis bieti) - ZooChat

 

I’d like to nominate ‘Common kingfisher’ by @Stefan Verhoeven


Common kingfisher - ZooChat

 

There have been so many fantastic photos posted this year! A lot of my favorites have been taken by @Therabu, who only joined us in 2020. It was really difficult picking just one, made slightly easier by wanting it to be a zoo photo (since this is zoochat, after all). I've chosen this one because everything about it is perfect, both as a species photo and as an art photograph. The composition is outstanding, in particular. Even though the whole mass is mostly made of the same colors and shapes, everything draws you to the subject of the photo.


https://www.zoochat.com/community/media/phyllopteryx-taeniolatus.557129/full

 

@birdsandbats How is it decided what photos get nominated for the vote? Is it just every photo that someone nominates in this thread?

 

Yes.

 

I'd like to nominate 'King cheetah', by @Arizona Docent

 

I had a hard time choosing between several of @Julio C Castro's tiger photos but I ended up choosing this wonderful shot of Jillian!

https://www.zoochat.com/community/media/jillian-the-sumatran-tiger.554929/

 

I was waiting for this thread to appear. I will nominate this photo from @Stefan Verhoeven


Motion blur wildebeest - ZooChat

 

INSTRUCTIONS FOR EMBEDDING PHOTOS IN THIS THREAD:
It took me a while to learn how to do this so I think it might be helpful for others who are not sure. (At least one person has already uploaded a link without the photo visible in this thread and if they can edit their post to include the thumbnail it would be helpful). This is best done on a computer, not a phone.

1. Open this thread

2. Open a second window with the picture you want to nominate.

3. To the right of the picture where it says "share this media" click inside the third box down, the one that says Share BB IMG Code. This should highlight the link in blue. Right click on this and select copy.

4. Go to the window with this thread and right click in your new post and select paste. This will show the same long code but when you click "post reply" it will show up as the entire photo.

5. Go back to the window with the photo and click on the top bar with the web address (http...). Then right click on that highlighted link and choose copy and go to this nomination thread and right click under the link you have already added and click paste. This will put the web address (URL) under the photo code. When you click "post reply" it will show up under the photo as a link to the original photo.

 

This photo was uploaded in 2021, but taken in 2015, therefore breaking Rule 1.

 

I'd like to nominate this photo of a California condor taken by @Julio C Castro.

https://www.zoochat.com/community/media/california-condor.552155/

 

Haha I can’t believe I didn’t notice that. It’s been disqualified.

 

I’d like to nominate this photo of a Sumatran tiger by @Julio C Castro

https://www.zoochat.com/community/media/joanne-the-sumatran-tiger.524751/

 

by @Therabu

 

Anyone looking around for a photo to nominate might like to look at @Joseph G's media.

 

I'd be surprised if anyone has seen every photo posted here in 2021, I certainly haven't so this has to be a subjective selection. But I would have been very proud if I had taken this one . . .
https://www.zoochat.com/community/media/javelina-chase.519821/full?d=1615615074
. . . as @Arizona Docent did.
I apologise for only posting the link, but I cannot find the BB code.

 

I nominate "Wild Costa's Hummingbird" from Julio C Castro



https://www.zoochat.com/community/media/wild-costas-hummingbird.525073/

 

A couple of notes before the vote goes up:

-First of all: I don't think the listed EXIF data for any of these photos is accurate, as it always says the date taken is the same as the date uploaded. This unfortunately makes it impossible to tell when a photo was taken unless the user who uploaded it noted in a comment or in the description. For now, I wont disqualify any photos for this and just assume any photo uploaded in 2021 without a date listed was taken in 2021.

These two photos are almost the same and were even uploaded by the same user at the same zoo. There is a limit of 10 options in a poll, and as this has caused me trouble in past, so I was going to try out a new voting system this year. But I assumed I was going to get a lot more photos nominated, and the new system won't work this few photos. In the interest of time, I think it will be easier to simply cut one of these almost the same Tiger photos. Using a random number generator, I'm picking the first one. Sorry @Animals R AMAZING!.

The vote will be up sometime over the next day or so.