Who it’s for
If you’re serious about it
A vehicle positioned for the photograph rather than the view, and someone alongside you thinking about the same opportunities. Bring the long lens.
If you just want better pictures
You do not need a magazine cover in mind. Come home with photographs that are a real step up from the usual holiday ones.
If you’re not really shooting at all
Binoculars are as welcome as a 400mm lens. If you’re travelling with a photographer you already know the patience it takes and you’ll likely spot things they miss.
The approach
My job
The photograph. Where the vehicle needs to be for it, not just for the view. What your settings should be doing and why. Where to put the subject and what to do with the space around it. Being set before the moment rather than during it. Whatever mode you shoot in, I will work with it.
The vehicle is set up for it. Gimbal heads and bean bags fitted, four guests and enough room that nobody is working around anyone else. A gimbal takes the weight of a long lens, so when a leopard is above you and you are holding 400mm at full extension, the lens stays where you put it and you can wait.
Your guide
Finding the animal, reading what it is about to do, and knowing this water well enough to be in position before something happens.
“We were born there with those animals, born right into the Delta. That is where our school is. That is where our university is.”
Joe, licensed guide in the Delta since 1992
How we work it
Tanzania. In the Delta it is a treeline rather than a hillside behind the animal.
A few frames
Not to show off the gear, but to show how the thinking works.
F5.6 · 1/1000 · 800MM
Cattle egrets going home to roost after the sun had gone. Most people slow the shutter in light like this to hold the detail. I went the other way and shot it fast for the silhouettes, because the shapes are the picture and the drama is all in the light behind them.
F8 · 1/1000 · 300MM
Handheld and close. Fast enough to freeze it, but stopped down enough to keep the environment around it, so it reads as a snake in a place rather than a snake on a background. Angled so it is looking into the clear space, which matters more the deeper your depth of field goes.
Focusing on the less obvious
She was lying on the ground beside the vehicle, and a full body shot from that angle is rarely flattering. So I went for the paw, with her face asleep behind it. It says calm, which is what she was.
Looking for emotion and connection
Not an obviously remarkable frame until you notice the light catching the cub’s paw. That is the whole picture: it turns a lioness lying down into parenthood.
F8 · HANDHELD · MACRO
Shot handheld, at f8 to find just enough depth of field. The subject was close and I wanted all of it sharp, but the background was noisy so it still needed separating. All of that going through my head alongside the eyes, which swivel independently.
Using the environment to create atmosphere
Black and white to push the dust, because the dust is the atmosphere. It also leaves the viewer asking the question I wanted them asking: what are they running from or to?
Before you arrive
Before the trip I’ll ask what you want from the photography, and what gear you’re bringing. I shoot Canon, but I’ll happily get familiar with your camera’s menu.
Most evenings we can look at the day’s images together if you want to. I edit in Lightroom and can help you work through yours: how cropping changes the perspective of an image, and how masks can accentuate certain aspects of the animal or the environment. My own style is to stay true to the subject. A good post edit workflow can really bring out the best aspects of your photos.
None of it stays in Botswana. The habit of watching before you shoot, and the pieces of behaviour you pick up along the way, come home with you, to the birds in your own garden and the wildlife on your doorstep.
Enquire
Tell me a little about you and what you’re hoping to photograph, and I’ll reply personally — usually the same day.