nature photography
Misty Moodiness
There is, in my opinion, no better place to blow the cobwebs away and relieve you of the daily stresses and strains, than a walk in the woods. Couple this with completely still, misty, ”golden” conditions and you have the perfect tonic. As a professional photographer, I am always on the look-out for exciting (commercial) images and occasionally lose touch with why I love nature photography so much. Those four hours I spent, a few days ago, wandering and losing myself in the intoxicating solitude, reminded me so and was one of the most rewarding forays I have ever had. Oh, and as I retraced my steps along that woodland path, a fox walked across it, right infront of me!
Stripped!
The 2009 wildlife Photographer of the Year recipient, José Luis Rodríguez, has been stripped of his title. Why? Evidence has come to light that the wolf pictured jumping over a gate was in fact a ‘model.’ Much has already been written about this, with particularly interesting views on Niall Benvie’s 3-way blog with Andrew Parkinson and Paul Harcourt-Davies. I won’t go into too much detail other than that the investigation first came to light in the Finnish magazine Suomen Luonto where they show striking similarities of the background between the winning image and that of the Cañada Real Center zoological park near Madrid and a tame wolf named Ossian. It was in fact other Spanish photographers that brought it to attention as they didn’t want the reputation of others tarnished.
The competition rules clearly state ”Images of captive animals must be declared. The judges will take preference to images taken in free and wild conditions.” The photographer claimed it was a wild wolf and indeed still does. Many had suspicions over the authenticity of the image, an overriding factor being that it was jumping over the gate as opposed to creeping through it, which would be much more normal behaviour for this notoriously shy species.
It’s a great shame that this has happened in the most prestigious wildlife photography competition and to be honest I’m surprised this hasn’t happened sooner. There seems to be an overwhelming desire these days by many wildlife photographers to succeed, whatever the cost. Whether it be by digital manipulation, using wildlife models (passing them off as wild) or photographing schedule 1 species without a licence, such as a kingfisher at the nest. Now, I’m not condemning the use of captive wildlife or falconers come to that. Indeed it is common practise to use them and you could argue that by using a controlled animal such as a jaguar or golden eagle you don’t disturb it in the wild. But it’s when it is passed off as being wild or when manipulation in the computer is such that it is no longer a true representation of what was seen that I feel the line has most definitely been crossed. Ultimately we can only look to ourselves and reach deep inside to our own ethics and morals before even thinking about entering a ‘dodgy’ image into a competition in the hope that no-one will ever find out. It absolutely baffles me. I’ve been photographing wildlife since I was a boy because I love to be outdoors and experience nature’s wonders first hand. If I happen to get anywhere in a competition then that is simply a bonus. When it becomes the sole purpose of your work, then I feel its time you choose something else to photograph.
Autumn stroll
The last week has been a complete wash-out, photographically. I don’t need glorious wall to wall sunshine to feel inspired but a glimmer would be nice! Even on the dreariest of days I force myself out, even if it’s just to give me a break from the computer. I’m quite lucky in that I can hop in my car and in less than 10 minutes be in woodland. It’s good for the soul and always gives me inspiration for new images. It’s also important as a nature photographer I think to keep regular contact with what’s going on out there. This is particularly true in the spring when it seems that each day something new appears, whether it be a bird or a flower.
I’ve had a bird feeding station set up in a local woodland for the last 6 weeks but hardly anything is turning up at the moment, a testament to the mild weather we have been experiencing of late. I understand it’s due to change in the next few days. I’m hoping for goldfinches this winter and with niger seed feeder in situ I have my finger”s crossed that they notice it.
The image below is a reminder of the wonderful autumn we had here in Kent. I went out one afternoon for a stroll to some private woods I have access to and as usual took my kit with me. Leaving it at home only means one thing…that a great photo opprtunity will be missed! As it turned out I had quite a productive few hours, shooting some tiny mycena sp. fungi amongst others and this. I liked the feeling it gave of being at a junction. Left for the woods or right along a hard track. You can guess which path I chose! The colours, light and depth cried out to be shot as a panoramic. One of the most useful pieces of kit that I have purchased over the last 18 months is a camera leveller made by Acrotech. Having read various reviews I opted for this model and have found it to be indispensable for this kind of work. It’s beautifully made and makes levelling the camera a breeze. They were then stitched using PTGui.
Wader roost
The forecast didn’t look promising but I decided to go anyway knowing just how quickly it can change here on the north Kent coast. A few weeks ago I headed off to a wader roost I know of and since there is public access there was no chance of me erecting a hide. I therefore kept myself patially hidden some distance away and shot a few general scenes. Some with the 300mm and others with either the 1.4x or 2x attached. The camera was mounted onto a tripod and due to the sometimes slow shutter speeds I used to convey movement I would often employ the mirror lock-up.
I chose to only tweak levels and curves a little in an effort to retain its painterly quality.
It was very windy so as a result the clouds kept moving until eventually the sun appeared and lit the scene with dark, brooding clouds in the distance. The tide was still rising and the roost consisting of knot and dunlin couldn’t settle thereby giving me several chances of getting lift-off and landing shots. The sun would appear and disappear over the next hour or so and as the day dew to a close the weather improved further until as if on cue the tide receded exposing the huge ‘bird-table’ that is the mud-flats as the sun was setting.
Grey Seals
I spent a wonderful few days photographing grey seals last week. Referring to the previous post, I have been searching for a new site since the other, well known one has become too popular for my liking. I had no previous experience with this new one so decided to just go and see for myself. There was a window of good weather forecast last week in Norfolk so I packed and went. Sometimes you can prepare too much and since the weather can never be fully guaranteed I tend to just go and see how it goes. I arrived at the site Wednesday afternoon and walked to the where the seals were which entailed a walk of about a mile. However, I wanted to work on the edge of the colony to avoid disturbance which required a further half mile. I didn’t do much that afternoon as the light was quickly fading and much of the beach was cast in shadow by the enormous sand dunes. But it was good to know where to go and what to expect the following day. It was getting dark and I hadn’t booked any accommodation. Before I left however I wrote down a couple of phone numbers of B&B’s I had found on the net and booked into one just around the corner from the beach. Perfect. I’m not a great lover of these I have to say. A small part, well a large one actually, sort of resents spending £50 a night when all I want is somewhere to lay my head. For this reason I would usually use a tent, regardless of season. However, most campsites shut down during the autumn and winter except for a few, largely in National Park areas so I had no choice. I guess I could have slept in the car which I have done during the summer months but in the autumn and winter when it gets dark around 4, that leaves a rather long night of doing nothing. I’ve also had some wonderful experiences camping, none more so when in March of 2008 while in the Peak District, a storm very nearly had me looking up at the stars instead of nylon! In the end however I was quite glad of the accommodation for after the first full day I was exhausted. These seals were more skittish than those I had previously encountered and had me crawling along the sand and making wide detours climbing the dunes so as not to disturb them. They are after all very sensitive at this time when females (cows) are giving birth or lactating and the males (bulls) are competing for space near a female so that as soon as she finishes lactating he can mate with her.
Cow and pup
What I liked about this location is the different perspective the terrain offered me.
On the equipment side I tried to carry as little as possible. One camera, a Nikon D300, 300mm f2.8 AFS VR, 1.4x tele-converter, 12-24mm and flash unit. For support I toyed with taking the beanbag instead of the tripod but due to the uneven terrain I opted for the lightweight Manfrotto 190 with the large but low profile Gitzo pan and tilt. This in the end proved to be the best choice. Low angle with great stability. I took an 8gb and 2x4gb cards and at the end of the day downloaded them onto a portable Smartdisk Flashtrax. For clothing I didn’t have to dress too warm since the beach was well sheltered by the towering dunes. I wore waterproof leggings which were useful against the sometimes damp sand, thin, thermal gloves and hat kept me comfortable. After that first day, boy did I ache. I’d spent close to 7 hours crawling around getting my body and head into very awkward, un-natural positions. I just hoped it would be worth it. Come the evening a nearby pub kept me fed and watered and a comfortable bed made me reasonably fresh for the following day.
It was a glorious dawn. As I walked the mile and a half to the seals I could hear the call of geese leaving their roost for their feeding grounds. Norfolk being very flat is in many ways similar to the North Kent Marshes where I do much of my photography. It has a feeling of wildness and big skies The final morning was reserved for pups, in particular the continuation of locating one on the edge of the colony on its own away from other seals, where I could slowly crawl up to it to get a wide-angle shot showing its habitat. Through scanning with binoculars I eventually found one, fitted the body with the 12-24mm and polariser and slowly, very gingerly made my way. I kept a constant watch for any signs of stress by the pup but it took no notice whatsoever. Rolling over, sunbathing, occasionally scratching its nose. Adorable. After 15 minutes or so I got to within a meter and obtained the images I was hoping for. I have to stress that getting the image was just a bonus. I had left it to the final day of searching before I was satisfied I had located a suitable pup. If it had shown any signs of distress, I would have backed off immediately.
I hardly saw a soul during my stay and only one other photographer who turned up as I was leaving. I will most certainly return. Perhaps later in the season when the pups are a little older.
Seal Circus
I have only been to this location once, in 1992. Those of you that are familiar with seal photography will know where Iam talking about and for those of you that don’t, all I will say is that it is on the Lincolnshire coast. Please read on to find out why I do not give it’s exact whereabouts. Back then, it was hardly known of and indeed all I wanted to do as a 22 year old was photograph grey seals that autumn. I understood through popping into my local library (this was, after all before the days of the web) that they come ashore from October to February to breed and give birth along the Norfolk and Lincolnshire coast and further. So, I first wrote a letter that summer to the Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust who gave me the address of the warden who I also then wrote to. All this communication by ‘snail-mail’ took several weeks but in the end I was given details of where I should be able to find them.
I was advised by the warden to only go there at the weekend, for a very good reason. I drove up on the Friday with my dad, booked into a B&B then went to the local pub for lunch. Whilst at the pub we chatted to locals who gave us directions as to where the best spot is for seeing them so later that afternoon we parked the car where they suggested and walked along the dunes where lo and behold there they were! What a sight I thought. All the letter writing and driving had finally paid off. I remember taking quite a few shots but at the same time being mindful that I only had a certain amount of film with me. Seems funny looking back on it in this digital age that you had to consider things like that.
The following dawn we both walked across the beach, which took around half an hour to where the main colony was. The early mist cleared and I began shooting with seals all around. But, the images I was really after were of the seals swimming, perhaps with their heads bobbing in the water, typical of this species. But the North Sea didn’t play ball. It was very rough and they were concealed most of the time by the waves. In my concentration I forgot about the waves and all of a sudden my wellington’s were filled with ice cold sea water. Not very pleasant I can tell you! My dad however, in typical fashion, came prepared with spare socks and bags which I slipped my feet into and then back into the wellies. Arh, warm and dry again. On the Sunday however a kind of estuary occurred between the sea and main beach which the seals seemed to be enjoying. It was like a mill pond. I set up the camera on the tripod and just sat there while cows and bulls swam close by, sometimes so close they filled the frame too much. I looked behind me to see my dad with two pups that had come up to him. Looking back I wish I’d taken a photo of that moment but was too focused on the job in hand. How many others were there to share this? Three at the most. Colleagues tell me it’s a very different matter these days. Donna Nook is a ‘must’ for nature photographers fuelling their need to photograph these animals and for pro’s to further saturate the market with identical looking images. On Alamy alone there are 2746 images if you type in the location and my own agent has 186 images and I’m sure they have a lot more taken here which the author has omitted from the caption. Many thousands now go there and every year there seems to be stories about irresponsible behaviour by photographers, getting too close and stressing the animals.
Nikon F4, 500mm f4P, Kodachrome 64.
I don’t think there were many photographers that knew of that site at the time as within months of me submitting the images to my then agent Planet Earth Pictures they were were being used in newspapers, calendars and magazines and even Getty took a few. Certainly images of them were few and far between and unlike others I didn’t immediately start doing workshops there to make a few quid, one of the main reasons I believe for the surge, even before internet forums. I’m personally very reluctant to give away subject locations these days of those areas that may attract large numbers of photographers and indeed only do so to a few like-minded friends and colleagues. This isn’t because I’m worried that they may take similar or better images and put them in the market place in competition with me but that ultimately the subject may become stressed by the sheer number of others in that vicinity. And anyway, surely by doing your own homework you will benefit from producing your own set of fresh images and the personal satisfaction that comes from doing so.
Last year I worked on a site for several weeks photographing a short-eared owl from my car. Using a hide wasn’t an option as it hunted in a field adjacent to a road. I would sit there patiently most afternoons observing and photographing until one afternoon I turned up and there were at least 8 photographers semi-blocking the road with their cars, standing next to the field, cameras on tripods, noisily chatting to one another. The owl did appear but of course headed for the far end of the field and eventually crossed to another some distance away. A perfect example of inconsiderate behaviour by those that were acting as though they were on an outing, comparing lenses and tripods than actually taking into account the well-being of the bird and observing from a discreet distance, inside their vehicles.
I have to say that I’m reluctant to go back to the same seal colony as I fear it will tarnish the perfect memory of spending two whole days with the seals and my dad on an almost empty beach. Instead, I’m looking for a fresh venue and I think I may have just found one.
Brents
Although north Kent in autumn and winter has an influx of waders and wildfowl, geese, to a certain degree don’t tend to come this far down in the kind of huge numbers you can experience in Norfolk. So every year I look forward to the arrival of the brent geese with its far carrying call of the north. Brent geese are the most northerly breeding geese in the world and every autumn travel over 2,500 miles from their tundra breeding grounds in Siberia. Their route follows the coastline of northern Russia, through the White Sea and Baltic Sea and along the North Sea coast and the English Channel. That’s quite a trip for the smallest goose to visit our shores!
There are two races of brent goose. The dark-bellied form as pictured here, which winters in western Europe, with over half the population in southern England and the pale-bellied race. The latter breed in Greenland, Svalbard and Canada and winter in Denmark, north-east England, Northern Ireland and the Atlantic coast of the U.S. from Maine to Georgia.
Brent Geese (dark-bellied form) in flight.
Brent Goose (dark-bellied form) landing to feed.
Brent Geese (dark-bellied form) feeding on mud-flats.
Brent Goose (dark-bellied form) in flight.
Brent Geese (dark-bellied form) flying over mud-flats.
Over the years I have ammased quite a number of images of this species but I’m unsure I will ever truly be able to do this bird the justice it so deserves, but I’ll have fun trying, that’s for sure. And who knows, perhaps I’ll even get to see them at their breeding grounds one day.
Yet more mushrooms
As I sit here preparing images for my agent and website I’m remembering the glorious autumn colours we HAD! For outside, it’s belting down and what with the strong winds we are expecting over the next 24 hrs Ican’t imagine there’ll be much colour left.
I’ve really enjoyed photographing fungi this year. There has been lots to shoot and locating a few new sites reignited my enthusiasm for these organisms. I always try to pack light but always fail. I’m only after mushrooms and the odd woodland scene but ultimately that means I need everything from a wide-angle 12-24mm to a 300mm plus tripod, reflectors, filters, small umbrella and lunch. Can’t concentrate when I’m hungry! I just know that if I leave something in the car that I’ll need it.
Photographing them is one thing, identifying another. Sure I have books but there are often such subtle differences that if I am at all unsure I generalise….Mycena sp or Coprinus sp for example. Put yourself out there with a firm ID and you get it wrong then someone will always correct you. Well, I’m going to do just that and welcome anyone that wishes to prove me wrong with these two!
Glistening Inkcap
Saffrondrop Bonnet
New website
Well, the new website is up and running. I really hope you enjoy browsing through the collections and perhaps even looking for certain images by using the search facility giving you access to close to 2000 images!
I will be updating the blog as often as I can with new images and any thoughts I have both on wildlife photography and conservation.
Back soon…..
About Robert Canis
Robert Canis is a professional photographer specialising in the natural world.
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