Posts Tagged ‘Wildlife photography’Make Eye ContactTuesday, September 13th, 2011 Just an idea for your next portrait photography session: work on making eye contact with your subject - work on making a connection with the subject.  Try this technique with animal photography, too. Explore the light, Explore all things Rick Sammon at www.ricksammon.info.  1400mm with the 5D Mark II done sharplyThursday, July 14th, 2011
Sitting in my living room, I suddenly heard an extremely enjoyable and melodious tone from outside. Hearing it repeated a few times over about 15 minutes was finally enough to lift my sorry carcass off of the couch and out onto the back patio. I discovered a male Purple Finch (he of the melodious tunes) along with a female partner going about the process of building a nest in the Spruce Tree just outside of the back door of my home. I ran to get my tripod (a Gitzo 3541XLS with a Jobu Design BWG-Pro Gimbal head attached) and set it up with my Canon 500mm F4L IS lens attached along with the 1.4x Extender II that is pretty much welded to the lens. I say welded because if you do much wildlife photography at all you know that there is rarely such a thing as too big of a lens. I took some shots of the joyful little singer but discovered that (and as is often the case with the little song birds) that he just wasn’t filling the view finder the way I wanted. And with that 1.4x teleconverter attached to the 500mm lens I was already shooting at the maximum minimum aperture for my 5D Mark II, F5.6; assuming I wanted to use autofocus. I have a 2.0x teleconverter too and thought briefly about just throwing that on and making the best of things with manual focus. However, I recalled an experiment I did a couple of years ago with my 500mm lens paired with BOTH the 1.4x and 2.0x teleconverters (also known as stacking teleconverters) which yielded a 1400mm focal length at F11 as the largest aperture. I was able to achieve really good results shooting with enough light and stopping down about 2/3 of a stop from F11. I set up the combination on the tripod. The main trick when you use a setup like this is focusing. And, if you’re going to need to focus on some sort of moving object, forget about it, it’s just too touch. But with a subject like this, who upon returning to the tree that his female partner is building a nest in (she does all the work; he just accompanies her on her travels lest her attentions wander to a rival) would happily choose a branch and perch on it whilst singing his little heart out. This would allow me the time required to manually focus on him. 
Purple Finch singing from the branch of a Spruce Tree - Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 500mm F4L IS, Canon 1.4x & 2.0x Extender II, @1400mm - Gitzo 3541XLS with Jobu Design BWG-Pro Gimbal Head But still, another problem. I don’t know about you, but my 45 year old eyes have a lot of trouble looking through the viewfinder and finding critical sharpness. It can look sharp in the viewfinder but that often leads to disappointment in the cruel light from my monitor while developing the images. So I used a trick I’ve used for my snowflake photography. I temporarily switched to “Live View” and then zoomed in a couple of times on the Finch’s head. That way I could dial in critical sharpness, switch back to regular shooting mode and then make my shots until the little feller decided to move. You’ll notice that I switched back to regular shooting mode instead of staying in Live View mode. Why? It’s all about the long-lens shooting technique that I use. This technique requires that in addition to draping my free hand over the lens to dampen down vibrations, I also jam my eye up against the viewfinder to help use even more of my body mass to help stabilize the lens. If you’re interested in the technique, you can read about it in a couple of previous blog entries in part 1 and part 2 of Making Sharper Images. So, if you’ve got one of the good primes in your arsenal of lenses (and I’d say most of the prime lenses from any of the major camera manufacturers qualify) and you’ve got yourself a pair of teleconverters, don’t hesitate to give the combination a try and see what you can achieve. I’m willing to bet you’ll be a bit surprised by the sort of quality pictures that can be achieved with the right subject, proper gear to support the equipment along with the technique I talked about previously. And yes, you’ll probably have to employ the three “p”‘s of photography; practice, practice, practice! 
Purple Finch singing from the branch of a Spruce Tree - Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 500mm F4L IS, Canon 1.4x & 2.0x Extender II, @1400mm - Gitzo 3541XLS with Jobu Design BWG-Pro Gimbal Head
You can find out more about Paul at his website and blog: Paul Burwell Photography Follow Paul on Twitter here: link Check out Paul's Wildlife Photography Academy Workshops here: link Selling wildlife photography; cute sellsTuesday, August 24th, 2010 When I was first getting involved in professional wildlife photography, one of my mentors told me something I’ve made a point of remembering. What he told me should be obvious, but like much of what should be obvious, it isn’t always that obvious until someone points it out to you. And what was this pearl of wisdom and insight that I received? It was simply, “Cute Sells”. I know a lot of wildlife photographers love capturing images of predators capturing and then ripping apart their latest kill. And don’t get me wrong. Those are exciting shots that graphically illustrate the harsh realities of the natural world. But ask yourself, is the average person going to want to look at that sort of image as a print on their wall, on a greeting card or even a calendar? I’ll tell you that regardless of what you might think, the answer is no. You’ll find the occasional person interested in that sort of graphically real image, but the vast majority of people don’t want to be reminded of the harshness of a wild life. So then, let’s consider the sort of images might qualify as cute for a wildlife photographer. I’ll tell you the first one. And it is darned obvious and that’s why I’ll point it out. Baby animals. Much like human babies, it is very difficult to find a baby animal that a lot of people won’t consider cute. Babies (human and animal alike) tend to have proportionately large eyes and it seems we humans are instinctively drawn to these features. So, we’re programmed in one form or another to babies and when you can get a photograph of a cute baby animal, your chances of selling it go quite a bit higher. (You can click on the images to see larger versions)  Sleepy Raccoon Kit peering out of a hollow log- CA Another thing that makes baby animals compelling wildlife subjects is that baby animals tend to be a bit playful and clumsy. And if you and your camera can capture some of that playfulness or clumsiness, you’re on your way to creating a cute image that has sales potential written all over it.  Playful Bobcat kitten on top of a rocky hill - CA  Black Bear cub peering over the top of a tree Here’s another truism. Interaction between cute subjects makes a big difference. What does this mean for a wildlife photographer? Consider different types of interaction. Interaction between a baby animal and its parent is compelling. The average person loves to see one animal being cared for by another. Another type of interaction that is compelling occurs when a two or more siblings are interacting and playing with each other. Just like its compelling to see one animal exhibiting playful behavior, I’ll argue that the cute factor goes up exponentially when there is more than one baby animal involved in the playing.  Common Loon with chick on its back swimming on a lake  Pair of Red Fox kits play fighting in some tall grass Find an animal exhibiting a behavior we typically associate with humans (also know as anthropomorphism; that’s your big word for the day today) and you can create an image that will have the cute factor working in its favor. When we see an animal exhibiting a behavior we typically associate with our own species it helps create a connection between the viewer and the image and that connection will help make the image more salable.  Black Bear standing and leaning against a tree - CA  Polar Bear Chillaxin' So, if you want my advice, heed the follow. If you’re a wildlife photographer who is interested in selling your images, invest your time and effort into looking for and making cute images. |
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Top Ten Annoying Things To Say To A Wildlife Photographer
Tuesday, June 1st, 2010The other day I started to think about things people have innocently said to me about my photography that have annoyed me. Now, I know that most of the comments were meant without any malice and were well intentioned. I get that. But, that doesn’t stop them from bothering the heck out of me. I’ve taken the liberty of compiling the top offending comments into a top ten list, presented in the traditional descending order for your reading pleasure. I also decided to annotate each of the comments with my own thoughts which would not normally remain safely ensconced in my brain.
Female Black Bear and her cubs walking on a trail
Northern Pintail flying over a golden pond
Black-capped chickadee perched on the branch of a pine tree – Converted to simulated oil painting to garner some artistic merit
Stalin and Nikolai Yezhov, before retouching.
Stalin and Nikolai Yezhov, after retouching.
Long tailed weasel looking for baby gophers
Sectored Plate
Yellow-headed Blackbird singing from on top of a bullrush
If you’ve ever been in a situation where you heard some innocent comment or question about your photography that just bugged the heck out of you, take it in stride.
I hope some of these comments gave you a laugh!
You can find out more about Paul at his website and blog: Paul Burwell Photography
Follow Paul on Twitter here: link
Check out Paul's Wildlife Photography Academy Workshops here: link
Tags: Commentary, Paul Burwell, Wildlife photography
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