Digital Camera World » wildlife photography

Photo Anatomy: capturing un-tamed moments in the wild

jmeyer — Sun, 12 May 2013 00:00:04 +0000

In our Photo Anatomy series on Digital Camera World we select pictures by famous photographers and explain point by point what makes them work.

In our latest instalment award-winning wildlife photographer Bence Máté reveals how he captured a rare confrontation between a hummingbird and a snake.

Shallow depth of field
By using a telephoto lens and throwing the background completely out of focus, Bence has concentrated attention on the bird and snake. The branch provides context and a frame.

Long lens
Bence captured this unusual stand-off with his Nikon D300 fitted with a 300mm f/2.8 lens. He was only able to fire off a few frames before the hummingbird flew away.

Supplementary lighting
Rain was falling and the light was poor, so Bence used two flash units – one in front and the other behind the action. The flashes enabled him to capture the motion of the hummingbird’s wings.

Restricted colour palette
The photograph uses different shades of green to striking effect. The bright green snake and moss, and the hummingbird’s mid-green plumage, stand out brilliantly against the muted, darker green background.

Expecting the unexpected
Bence was photographing hummingbirds in Monteverde, Costa Rica, when he noticed they had become agitated. He soon realised why: a side-striped palm pit viper was coiled on a nearby branch.

We Say
“Getting into the situation where you can photograph something like this is one thing, but this picture could easily have been ruined by the poor light. Using flash to supplement daylight gives wildlife images added impact, and allows you to work with faster shutter speeds.”
Chris Rutter, technique editor

DIY Photography Hacks: how to use your car as a mobile hide for bird photography

jmeyer — Thu, 09 May 2013 10:00:59 +0000

In our latest DIY Photography Hacks post we show you a simple way to bag frame-filling pictures of wild birds from the comfort of your car’s bucket seats. Find out how you can ditch the uncomfortable hides for good!

Image by Mark Hamblin

One of the most frustrating things about photographing birds is finding a way to get close without scaring them off. However, a tried and tested technique is to use some kind of portable hide, and what could be more portable than your own vehicle?

Using your car as a mobile hide is perfect for approaching many bird species and has the advantage that you can change position easily, quickly move on to new locations and have a warm, comfortable place to wait for the action to unfold!

So what do you need? Well a top of the range 4WD would be nice! But any vehicle will do just fine. The important thing is the support for the camera.

It’s possible to simply rest the lens on the glass of the open window, but this won’t provide much stability.

A beanbag (or perhaps a bag of lentils!) is a much better bet, or you can splash out on a purpose-built window mount with a tripod head to attach the lens.

This has the advantage of keeping the lens in position while driving. It can help to drape some camouflage netting over the window and lens barrel to conceal your face and hands.

There are some road safety issues to consider with this technique, so only attempt it on quiet roads where it’s safe to pull over.

It’s much better and safer if someone else is driving so you can concentrate on photography, with the added benefit that you can have your lens ready on the beanbag to start shooting as soon as the car comes to a halt.

How to photograph birds on the move the DIY photography way

Provide support
Use a beanbag to keep your lens steady and prevent camera shake. One that looks like two bags sewn together (www.wildlife watchingsupplies.co.uk) is ideal, as these have a gap that drops snuggly over the glass to form a solid platform to rest the lens on.

Be prepared to shoot
Before you approach, set your camera up. Set the exposure in Manual mode by taking a meter reading from a nearby midtone. An aperture of around f/5.6 is ideal, and use a shutter speed of 1/250th sec or faster to stop unwanted blurring.

Make your approach
To stalk roadside birds, reduce your speed to a crawl, and as you get closer, turn off the ignition (to prevent vibrations and noise) and coast into final position. Ensure you stop at the right spot, as starting your engine again may frighten the bird away.

9 creative photo ideas to try in May 2013

jmeyer — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 23:01:19 +0000

As part of our ongoing series to help you get more creative with your digital camera, each month we publish some fun, seasonal, creative photo ideas to help inspire your imagination. Along with some amazing images, we’ve also provided some quick photography tips by both amateur and professional photographers who are experts in these fields.

This month our list covers fun projects like shooting long exposures, puddles, stormy seas and painterly plant portraits, among many other fun and creative photography projects.

On each page you’ll find a stunning image and an explanation from the photographer on how it was made.

If you attempt any of these photo ideas, don’t forget to share them on our Facebook wall!

01 Shoot creative spring light painting effects

Light painting photography doesn’t have to be restricted to the longer nights of winter. As spring arrives, why not make the most of the milder evenings with this clever twist on a familiar technique?

Simon Berger created his ‘Pouring Rain Noir’ shot after seeing a tutorial on steel wool light painting and experimenting with the technique. It was taken using nothing more than a tripod-mounted Canon EOS 5D Mark III, a willing model (Martin) and some burning steel wool.

“We used ordinary ‘0000’ steel wool for this shot,” says Simon. “To control the direction of the sparks, I rotated the  steel wool towards the camera and Martin, and the sparks bounced from the ceiling onto the umbrella.”

The technique is pretty simple. By placing steel wool in a metal whisk suspended at the end of a chain, igniting the steel wool with  a 9V battery and then spinning the chain, you can create impressive arcs of sparks using a long exposure. Of course there are risks, and it needs to be carried out well away from anything flammable.

“The umbrella we used was a really cheap one,” Simon says. “We had some bottles of water, but the shooting took place in a tunnel so there was no real danger of anything catching fire. I knew I wanted the sparks to look like rain, but I had no idea how to do it until I found this location. Then it just clicked.”

Get started today…
* Safety warning! Spinning molten steel wool at the end of a chain carries a high risk of injury. Don’t attempt it alone and make sure you wear goggles, gloves and suitable protective clothing. Protect the front element of your lens with a clear UV filter.
* Experiment with exposure times. Simon used an aperture of f/8 and shutter speed of 20 seconds at ISO200.
* Consider converting the original colour shot to black and white for added intrigue.

PAGE 1: Shoot creative spring light painting effects
PAGE 2: Shoot painterly plant portraits
PAGE 3: Shoot the beach during a spring storm
PAGE 4: Shoot zoo animals with environmental context
PAGE 5: Shoot reflections in puddles
PAGE 6: Shoot plane trails
PAGE 7: Shoot portraits with reflections
PAGE 8: Shoot water birds at your local pond
PAGE 9: Shoot images with motion blur

Photo Anatomy: black and white wildlife photography with instant impact

crutter — Sun, 21 Apr 2013 13:00:45 +0000

In our new Sunday series on Digital Camera World, we select pictures by famous photographers and explain point by point what makes them work.

In our latest instalment award-winning wildlife photographer Richard Peters reveals the techniques behind this striking black and white image of an owl.

01 Background
“A dark background helps your subject pop,” explains Richard. “I was shooting into the shade of distant trees, so it was already a dark green. Converting to mono turned it black.”

02 Preparation
Richard knew that a family of owls lived on an area of Sussex farmland. He photographed one of them from a one-man pop-up hide as it perched on old farm machinery.

03 Mono conversion
“Mono is great for making texture and detail stand out,” says Richard. “The rusty detail of the machinery and the dark background suited a black-and-white conversion.”

04 Getting close
Richard photographed the owl from distance using a Nikon D4 fitted with a 600mm VR lens with a 1.4x teleconverter. It was mounted on a Gitzo carbon fibre tripod with a Wimberley Mark II head.

05 Positioning
“For this shot,” says Richard, “it was important to position myself in such a way that I had a clean background, but also had good light on the subject.”

We Say
“Photographing birds in the wild can be tricky, but getting in position and staying there, allowing them to become comfortable, works far better than constantly moving around and following them. More co-operative birds are usually found in places where they are more used to human presence.”
Chris Rutter, technique editor

Professional Photographer to the Rescue: horse photography without the long face

jmeyer — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 23:01:11 +0000

In our latest Professional Photographer to the Rescue post our professional photographer, an experienced equine photographer, shares his best horse photography tips for taking equine pictures in a range of different styles.

Meet our professional photographer

Equine specialist Craig Payne has been photographing horses since the age of 12. He turned professional in 2007 and has an extensive knowledge of the subject, capturing both action shots of horses at events and specialising in portraits of horses and riders together. To see Craig’s full portfolio head to www.equinephotoshoots.co.uk.

Meet our apprentice

Ecologist and horse-lover Rebecca Hendry is from Yeovil, Somerset. She’s had an interest in photography for the past 12 years, although it’s only in the past few that she’s taken it to the next level. Armed with her Canon EOS 7D, Rebecca was keen to improve her photography skills to understand how to best photograph horses and riders together.

Technique assessment

Craig showed Rebecca how to rein in her shooting skills and get back in the saddle

What mode?
“Rebecca had been using Aperture Priority (Av) mode, but the most important thing about horse photography is the shutter speed as there’s lots of constant movement in the horse – even when it’s standing still,” explains Craig.

“For action shots you need a shutter speed above 1/640 sec and for portraits keep it above 1/250 sec, ideally, although this can be pushed if there’s less light. If the light is flat I take a few readings and put my camera into the Manual (M) mode. If the light keeps changing I’ll shoot in Shutter Priority (Tv) mode, although you need to keep an eye on the aperture setting and ISO value if you do this.”

Raw or JPEG?
“Although you can recover a lot more detail in a raw format file, you don’t have to shoot in Raw if you get the exposure right in-camera,” Craig advises. “A large JPEG means you can spend less time editing your images as your camera processes the image and applies a few basic edits, such as increasing the colour saturation and sharpening.

“I shoot at a lot of events where it’s important to get images to clients quickly, so I always shoot JPEGs, but if you’re not confident in getting it right in-camera then by all means shoot raw – or you could use  the Raw+JPEG option as a back-up until you’re more confident.”

PAGE 1: Meet our professional photographer and apprentice
PAGE 2: Horse photography tips for during the shoot
PAGE 3: Final tips from our professional photographer
PAGE 4: Shot of the Day

Decisive Moment: how nature photographers can make the most of it

jmeyer — Mon, 01 Apr 2013 23:00:40 +0000

Henri Cartier-Bresson famously coined the term ‘decisive moment’, but anticipating and capturing decisive moments doesn’t only apply to street photography. In this tutorial we’ll show you how you can make the most of decisive moments as they appear in nature to create landscape or wildlife images with more impact for the viewer.

Images by Mark Hamblin

Really great images that stand out from the crowd all have one thing in common – they capture a unique moment in time when everything has come together to create the perfect picture.

These images rarely happen by chance, however. Instead, they are a combination of good planning, persistence, anticipation, fast reactions, technical ability and sometimes a small slice of luck.

It’s these skills that will help you improve as a photographer and raise your images from the ordinary to the extraordinary.

Unfortunately, many photographers fall into the trap of thinking that if they take hundreds of images then they are sure to capture a few great ones.

And while this might be the case in some situations, it usually simply means that you have lots of mediocre images to wade through but none that really stand out.

Instead, you need to think in terms of quality rather than quantity and set out to produce a small number of images that capture decisive moments to make your pictures special.

These are the moments when the subject reveals something extra. It may be something quite subtle like a catchlight in the eye or the slight turn of the head, or conversely it could be explosive action, unusual behaviour or exquisite lighting.

It’s very unusual to just stumble upon decisive moments to photograph. Forethought and planning are crucial and will increase your chances of being in the right place at the right time.

And the more time you spend out in the field the ‘luckier’ you will become.

When photographing landscapes it often comes down to going the extra mile or taking a chance. This might mean pulling yourself out of bed at 4am to get to a location for a dawn shoot or hiking for a couple of hours in the dark.

Sometimes it’ll pay off, sometimes it won’t, but you can’t catch a glorious sunrise if you’re asleep in bed. To capture these unique moments you have to be in position, set up and ready to go.

Capturing the decisive moment with wildlife relies as much on patience as anything else. There can be long periods of inactivity during which you may have to stay still for hours but remain ready to react very quickly to an event that might only last a few seconds.

PAGE 1: What is the decisive moment in nature?
PAGE 2: Reacting quickly to the decisive moment
PAGE 3: 7 top tips for capturing the decisive moment in nature
PAGE 4: Decisive moments – photographing birds in flight

9 creative photo ideas to try in April

jmeyer — Sun, 31 Mar 2013 00:00:36 +0000

This month our list covers fun projects like shooting out of focus, experimenting with humorous still life photography, wildlife long exposures and looking for faces where they don’t normally belong!

On each page you’ll find a stunning image and an explanation from the photographer on how it was made.

If you attempt any of these photo ideas, don’t forget to share them on our Facebook wall!

We’d love to see how you get on.

01 Shoot twilight portraits

Now that the clocks have sprung forward, evenings arrive at a more civilized time. Make the most of this opportunity by shooting low-light portraits in the fading light of dusk.

The soft light and cool color temperature at this time of day can add incredible mood to your pictures.

Although the quality of light might be softer, it will also be lower. This means that your pictures may be blurred unless your technique is spot-on.

You’ll need to select wider apertures and higher ISO settings if you’re shooting handheld, and you’ll need to be accurate with focusing if you’re forced to use the widest aperture on your lens.

Select a focus point that corresponds with one of your subject’s eyes, or use the centre AF point and lock the focus on their eyes before recomposing.

To emphasise the cool, blue quality of the light, use the Daylight white balance preset. If you rely on Auto White Balance to make adjustments, it’s likely to try and warm the scene up too much, removing some of the mood as it does so.

Of course, you can always shoot in raw and make adjustments later – although dialling in the Daylight white balance will give you a more accurate impression of colour on the rear screen.

Get started today…
* Use focal lengths of 50mm and above to create more flattering portraits.
* Shoot in Aperture Priority, but keep a close eye on the shutter speed in the viewfinder – it needs to be the equivalent of 1/focal length of the lens for sharp handheld pictures (so 1/50sec for a 50mm lens on a full-frame camera).
* Use the camera in continuous drive mode, and fire in short bursts in order to capture any change in expression from your subject.
* The soft light of dusk can lead to low contrast pictures – you might want to boost the shadows and highlights later using Levels and Curves.
* Consider using an off-camera flash with the power dialled down in order to add a catchlight to the eyes.
* This style of portrait works equally as well early in the morning, with the advantage that you won’t be working in fading light.

PAGE 1: Shoot twilight portraits
PAGE 2: Shoot still life photography with personality
PAGE 3: Shoot a film noir style
PAGE 4: Shoot quiet landscapes
PAGE 5: Shoot out of focus
PAGE 6: Shoot faces in unusual places
PAGE 7: Shoot pictures of weather
PAGE 8: Shoot wildlife with long exposures
PAGE 9: Shoot baby sheep

Photo Anatomy: how Tim Flach made this amazing animal portrait

jmeyer — Sun, 17 Mar 2013 02:00:14 +0000

In a new series to run every Sunday on Digital Camera World, we’re going to select pictures by famous photographers and explain point by point what makes them work.

In our first instalment we look closely at an amazing animal portrait by Tim Flach, from his project More Than Human. Here’s how he achieved this dramatic image.

Image copyright Tim Flach

Proximity
Tim was around 6ft away from this adult leopard panther when he photographed it at the Institute  of Greatly Endangered and Rare Species in South Carolina, USA.

Light on dark
“I used a key light on the left, and an edge light on the right, to give form to the animal’s shape,” says Tim. “I positioned the lights  to give some catch to the eyes.”

Tight crop
Tim used a Canon EOS 5D Mark II with a 100mm macro lens. He cropped in tightly on the animal’s head, using the black background to emphasise the texture of its fur.

Visualisation
“We put some milk on the animal’s paw to get the licking action,” Tim says. “I had to visualise what I wanted beforehand as there was little chance to change the set-up.”

Freezing movement
Tim used a flash duration of 1/3000 sec. “I used a fast flash speed to freeze the movement of the tongue and allow us to explore its textures,” he says.

Professional Photographer to the Rescue: animal photography tips for any species

jmeyer — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 01:00:57 +0000

In our latest Professional Photographer to the Rescue post, our professional photographer shows our apprentice some simple animal photography tips that are relevant for any type of species you want to shoot, whether in the wild or in your local safari park.

Meet our professional photographer

Professional photographer Ben Hall is from Stockport. He’s been taking photos of predominantly British wildlife for ten years, supplying his shots to the RSPB, photographic publications and as stock to Getty Images. He also runs monthly wildlife photography workshops. Check out www.benhallphotography.com.

Meet our apprentice

Dave Chapman is a supermarket trading manager from Worthing. He’s been using a DSLR for over four years and enjoys shooting motorsports and landscapes, but his passion is wildlife photography. He asked for our help to improve his animal shots.

Technique assessment

Before heading off, Ben suggested ways Dave could increase his success rate…

Try switching to Av… 
Ben advised Dave to take control of his shooting mode to improve his results.  “Dave was relying on his camera’s P auto shooting mode, so I encouraged him to shoot in Av (Aperture Priority) instead,” says Ben.

“By shooting in Av he can set wide apertures to blur distracting backgrounds and make the animals really stand out in his shots. His camera can then take care of the shutter speed, which will change dramatically today because the sun keeps going in and out.”

Increase your ISO… 
“When photographing wildlife it’s more important to have fast enough shutter speeds and freeze an animal’s movement than to keep the ISO (light sensitivity) down for fear of noisy images,” advises Ben.

“Don’t be afraid to put your ISO up to around 400 or 800 to get faster shutter speeds for sharper, more dramatic wildlife shots. It barely matters because, even at that high level of ISO, you’ll still have minimal graininess thanks to Canon’s brilliant digital sensor technology.”

PAGE 1: Meet our professional photographer and apprentice
PAGE 2: Animal photography tips for during the shoot
PAGE 3: Final tips from our professional photographer
PAGE 4: Our professional photographer’s recommended gear
PAGE 5: Shot of the Day

Wildlife photography made easy: how to shoot in iconic locations

jmeyer — Mon, 04 Mar 2013 01:00:40 +0000

In the final post in our series on wildlife photography made easy, we thought we’d do something a bit different. Every photographer dreams of shooting the world’s most iconic photo locations. Here’s how to make the most of your once-in-a-lifetime trip to make sure you don’t waste any photos and opportunities whilst there!

The photography skills you’ve built up shooting local wildlife will be invaluable when you get the opportunity to travel further afield.

Whether you’re taking pictures of penguins in Patagonia or meerkats on the African plain, you’re far more likely to create more impactful shots if you get eye-level with your subject, use wide aperture settings to soften distracting backgrounds and spend long enough observing the animals to anticipate when they’ll do something interesting.

Naturally, being on the spot when the light is at its best will transform an image, but in national parks and other wildlife ‘honeypots’ you’ll often only be allowed access to the animals during certain periods, and this may not coincide with ideal conditions.

If light levels are low, increase the ISO to give you the necessary shutter speed to prevent an animal’s movement and camera shake leaving you with fuzzy images. When faced with grey skies, compose your shots so that these aren’t in the frame.

Equipment choice can often drive you mad at the best of times, but it can be a real headache when you factor in long-haul flights and other forms of transport.

Travel as light as possible without leaving you short on focal length. An all-round travel kit could include a telephoto zoom in the 100-400mm range, plus a wide-angle zoom and a fast macro lens.

PAGE 1: Wildlife photography in iconic locations
PAGE 2: Don’t forget the basics of wildlife photography
PAGE 3: How to protect your gear