Composition in the Wild E2/4: How to prepare a wildlife shoot (without over-thinking it)

Have you ever packed for a wildlife photography outing and felt slightly overwhelmed before you even left the house?

In this episode, we simplify the process.

Preparation should create calm — not stress. And yet many photographers overthink wildlife shoots, worrying about settings, gear, missing the moment, or not knowing enough. The result? Mental clutter before you’ve even taken your first photograph.

Wildlife photography isn’t about knowing everything. It’s about knowing what matters today.

Next Friday, we’ll explore why many wildlife photos feel random — and how to add real purpose to your images.

It's time for another podcast...

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hello again and welcome to another podcast. Now, last week we looked at the importance of practice and how, when it comes to wildlife, actually just how accessible wildlife really is for most of us. So, in this episode, we're going to take it a step further and look at how you prepare for a wildlife shoot. And this applies equally to your practice sessions as well as let's say doing it for real. And I particularly want to focus on not overdoing it, not overthinking it, because that's really easy and it really sucks the fun out of it. So, um I'm going to ask you a question. I think I might know the answer, but I'll let you answer anyway. Have you ever packed for a wildlife outing and felt slightly stressed before you even left the house? This is a common experience, I have to say, and um the kind of things we end up doing, we we're just checking gear repeatedly. We worry about settings. Do we know what the right settings are? Um, we're wondering if we'll miss something. And there's some of us, I've kind of included myself because I used to be a bit like this. Uh, I'm not anymore, but it's some of us think we need to know everything. The important reason for putting in the preparation is that the intention is that creates calm, not tension. And overthinking what we're doing is one of the biggest hidden obstacles in wildlife photography, and really in anything, it's not just wildlife photography, but we'll keep it um focused to that. So, what I'm going to do in today's podcast is just share some very simple ways that you can prepare. And particularly, I'm going to give you a method of preparing that keeps things structured but relaxed. What you really don't need complexity, what you need is clarity. So, the first thing I'm going to look at is why we overthink. And it really comes from there's a couple of areas where it comes from. One is that we put pressure on ourselves because we really want to get that great image. We can maybe we've been looking at other people on Instagram or on other photographers' websites, and they've just got amazing images, and we want to shoot something like that. Probably there's the doubt that we're able to do that, but whatever it might be for you. So there's one to that great image. There's also that fear of missing out. Um, you might have really overdosed on watching too many YouTube tutorials, so that's a great way of creating stress, actually. And just comparing ourselves to professionals. So the thing to remember about those amazing shots is that these people have probably been shooting for years, they will have hard drives full of really bad shots, and obviously, what we do is we put out the good ones. Another thing that can really trip us up is to just think that we should know more by now, particularly if you've been doing photography for a while, and for whatever reason, you're not getting the results that you hoped you would at this point, and that's obviously the reason for doing these podcasts, and possibly a reason why you're listening to this podcast. Um, I would recommend looking at my online course anyway, or at least finding a course that will take you from the absolute basics right through to where you want to be, but nevertheless, knowing that you should know more by now is something that a lot of people feel. And the truth is that you don't need to know about everything. Um, wildlife photography, any type of photography is just understanding some key things, and with that understanding, so for example, let's say exposure triangle, things like that, once you understand how it works, you don't need to remember all the settings because you're able to just work with what you have on the day, and that's really important. So, the key thing really is to know that whenever you're heading out for your shoot, it's about knowing what matters today. That's the really important thing to focus on. So, we're going to talk about that. Um the problem with overthinking and creating too much stress is that you get decision fatigue, suddenly, you don't even know whether to make it brighter or dark, you know, just really simple things you wouldn't think about. Suddenly, you're struggling with, you're constantly having to change settings, or you're constantly changing settings, and maybe there's no need. Um you might be chasing movement once you're there, and you may well be getting frustrated for whatever reason. So, the idea of preparation, again, proper preparation is that it reduces the number of decisions you're making once you're out in the field, not multiplying them. So the idea is that once you're there, you can really just focus on what you're seeing, on where you are, what you're seeing, and think about how to just capture that moment. So, I'm going to give you um a very simple four-part preparation framework. And this is a very simple check, checklist, if you like, that you can use before heading uh heading out, and it's pretty straightforward. It's know your subject, know your light, know your location, and know your goal. So let's go into these one by one. So know your subject. So I always like to research the animals I want to see, but this doesn't mean I'm studying for hours and reading um endless articles online or books or whatever. What I'm really thinking about here is just asking a few more questions. What am I likely to see? So, for a given animal in a given place, in a given situation, what am I likely to see? What is the typical behaviour of that animal and what time are they active? So, I mean, let's take whale watching, for example, which is something I do a lot of uh when I was living in Sydney before, and now I'm back again at the time of recording. So, what am I likely to see? Well, I'm like if I'm lucky, I might I mean, one thing is I might not see any whales at all, because that's always a possibility, of course, with wildlife that you don't see anything. If I do see a whale, well, I'll get a um a blow or a spout so I know where it is, or somebody else will spot it if I'm on a boat with other people. What am I likely to see? Well, they're gonna be swimming, so I'll see the dorsal fin when they dive down. So, what I what I do know is that when they're swimming, they'll generally come up four or three breaths. So it's a bit like us running. We need to, if they're going fast, they'll be up more often. Um, but I know that it'll be up for three breaths. So the first two, I'm probably just gonna get the dorsal fin only, because they don't really reveal much of themselves. But on that third uptime, that third surfacing, at the end of that, they might might decide to might decide to dive deeper. And if you think of how you swim on the surface of the water, when you want to go deeper, you pull your you put your feet up in the air. So that point that makes the front of your body go down and then you you go down. Whales operate pretty much the same way. If they're gonna do a deeper dive, they'll often fluke up. So that tail fin is also known as a fluke, and that's when you get those shots of the underside of the fluke. So I know that that is probably a fair demiddling chance I'm gonna get at least one or two flukes to photograph. What else am I likely to see? Well, I might see a breach, of course, which is amazing. That's for the jump out of the water. I there are other things. So without going through all of them, it doesn't take a lot of research to come up with a little list, a short list of different types of behavior that you're likely to see, or if different types of photograph you're likely to get. And this is typical behavior. So what you're likely to see will be heavily based on um typical behavior. The other question to ask is what time will they be active? Well, if I'm just using a regular tourist boat, hopefully they're active at the times those boats will go out. Typically they are, because tourist people that these organizers want to give people a good time, have that experience because then they'll come back, they'll recommend them and all that kind of thing. But just keeping it simple, if you're looking at a duck, for example, well, what do they do? They they feed, they rest, flap their wings, they preen. There's those kind of things that they do. If you're photographing garden birds, they tend to return to the same purchase, they'll move in a predictable way. So even spending five minutes of just getting a bit more aware of what you're likely to see, the behaviors, that will change how you shoot. So you're moving from just reacting, not knowing what's happening in the next moment, to anticipating because you now have some idea of the behavior patterns and what's likely to happen when you're there. So that's the very first thing to do. Just spend a bit of time researching your subject, but you know, you're not going for a degree in it or anything. The next thing is to know your light. So, again, when will when will the light be soft? When will the sunrise or when will the sun set? Can we make use of golden hour or blue hour? Or will it be harsh midday light? So keeping it simple, early morning and late afternoon, late afternoon light is easier. Um, you've got softer light, and in fact, if you've got an overcast, that can give you a more diffused light, which can also be very handy actually. Um if it's harsh light, you've really got to adjust your expectations. Uh, you the because you're going to get very burnt-out images if it's in that harsh light. You might be able to get some shade if you're able to position where an animal may be in shade, but you are likely to have some limitations on the kind of results you're going to get. The sort of thing you might be able to get is backlighting, but definitely in when the sun's lower, you can get some amazing backlighting. And if you're in golden hour, then you can get some really amazing colours. So think about the lighting and just be prepared. So, what you're really doing in this part of the preparation is to just reduce disappointment later on, because you know, you could I think the important thing with wildlife, one of the key things is to just keep your expectations fairly low because as I've said, they may not even turn up, you might not even see some animals. Um, I've been out, and um, I know I'm a lot like I'm not likely to see them every day, and in fact, any kind of sighting is a real bonus. So, do keep your expectations low and just take that pressure off. The next thing that I mentioned is knowing your location. So, if you visited before, where are the best backgrounds? Where can you get a clean background? Where are the distracting elements? And where can you position yourself so that you're safe and you're comfortable? If this is a new location for you, and I'm assuming that you're on foot, um, arrive early, walk slowly, observe before shooting. So essentially get yourself oriented, just think about you know, look at look at where the light is, look at um um what impact that might have. Are you essentially shooting into the light, or can you get a nice light behind you? Um just have a look around and start anticipating what those light conditions are likely to be, and then how you can start to compose uh your images. Because you I've been in a hide, for example, so not too much movement there. So I'm just looking at uh what else is around, um, what's my range of view? How can I, you know, zoom in in, zoom in out, what's getting light, all those kinds of things. So it does depend where you are. If you're in a four-wheel drive, somebody else might be calling the shots, or you might be, but again, think about where you are, and again, the things that are gone it have the ma the biggest impact on your images. Okay, and then finally, the most important thing is to know your goals. So I would recommend that you choose one intention, particularly if you're doing some practice sessions, and the kind of thing I mean, and these are just a few examples here. You're um today, it might be today. I'm focusing on clean backgrounds. Today I want to capture behavior. Today I'm practicing patience, that might involve a lot of practice for some of us, and today I'm working on light. So if you start with one goal, it really does tend to simplify things because the problem is, and I don't I don't want to, and the point of setting a goal is not to exclude other possibilities, but basically it's to stop us chasing absolutely everything because that can be overwhelming. And quite simply, the the reason we get overwhelmed is we're focusing on far too many things at one time, we're imagining all of the possible things we could be doing, and of course, you can't handle that, so we start to go, we get overwhelmed, we get stressed, all those things. So, having one goal is a great way of just pulling it all down to one thing, and that overwhelm will go away, and from there, it's much easier from the position of having one thing to do to add in one or two more than having 50 things to do and trying to pick one, you know. So, this is um really important. This is just how we operate. Okay, so just to recap on those four things that I've just um stepped through, know your subject, know your light, know your location, and know your goal. Now, what I'm gonna briefly go through here is to go through the what not to do's because these are really important because I'm pretty sure um probably all of us at one time or another have done most of these, maybe all of these. So the first thing is don't bring everything. If you've got too much gear, it becomes a distraction. The other thing is if you've got a hike a distance, now I'm speaking as someone who hiked for three hours each way to see mountain gorillas in Uganda, and they're called mountain gorillas for a reason. So, and I made the mistake on the first trip of taking too much gear, which I had to carry in a backpack. So you get fatigue, you it's you know, it's unnecessary, and you've also got too many things to choose from. So the thing to do is really to take one body, one maybe two lenses, but really keep it simple. If you've done the earlier prep, you've got an idea of what kind of behaviors you're likely to see, what the lighting's likely to be like, all of those things, and that should dictate your priorities when it comes to selecting gear. And comfort ultimately is more important than variety, and I can testify to that because I'd also hurt my back a few weeks earlier. So six hours hiking with a full backpack was not my idea of fun. Okay, the next thing, the next mistake that people make is that they change settings constantly. So just don't do that. So a lot of photographers will shoot, check, adjust the settings, shoot, check again, adjust again. The important thing is to really you could you've got a lot of mental noise. The important thing really is to just set up once and then focus on what you're doing. And this business of taking a picture and then immediately looking at it, I found out a while ago now, but it was a new thing to me. It's called chimping. And the classic is when you're looking at what you shot, what you've just shot, that's when you miss something amazing that's just going on. So the thing to do is to set up once, do some test shots, make sure that uh so I'll tend to be in aperture priority or shutter speed priority, depending on what I'm doing. So I'll use one of those, make sure I've got a good rate, the range that I'm likely to use, if it's varying aperture or varying shutter speed, I've still got a good exposure, and then I'll leave it for a while. Uh, I'll check it more often if I'm in a situation where the light's changing rapidly, whether it's beginning of the day, sunrise, sunset, or it's sunny and cloudy. You know, you get those days where there's cloud, you get uh periods where it's bright, and then you get the cloud coming over, and that'll impact the light. But that's it. You really want to keep this simple and um do a check initially when you first get where you are, and then just periodically check, but not every shot. The next thing is don't chase every movement. So well, wildlife usually moves, um, but you don't have to chase everything. So choose a subject, stay with it, and let the moments come to you, and those moments are just observing what it's doing. If these are animals that you haven't had the chance to observe before, so if you've gone away, what I'll tend to do, I might shoot one or two. I think of them as contingency shots, they're just so that I've got a shot of something. But once I've got a few, and if the animal's not really doing anything significantly different, I might just observe it for a while. And certainly if I've got a few days, and these are animals I can expect to see regularly. I I might I will definitely have times where I'm not using the camera, I'm just observing what they're doing. I'll have the camera ready to go if something does happen, but I also want to understand them a bit more and understand through observation. So think about patience rather than chasing everything. Don't chase everything. The next really important thing, and the mistake that people make is that they expect every outing to be brilliant. It won't be. Okay, so this, you know, some as I've said, wildlife is unpredictable. Um some animals are really tricky to find. So the typically these more predators, uh, but the mountain gorillas, um, again, we we potentially had this situation where I could have been hiking all day and not seen a sausage, um, or a gorilla for that matter. But you get the idea though, you you can't guarantee with wildlife what they're gonna do, that they're even gonna show up. So you really have to lower your expectations, as I've said before. Some days are really slow. You might have something happen initially, and you think, great, we're on to a winner, and then nothing else happens for the rest of that trip or even that day. Or it could be the other way around. You might be just it might be dire, you're not finding anything, but don't switch off, just be ready. Uh, you don't have to be in this in a state of massive excitement all the time, but re be ready to go when the situation is there, but do recognize that not every outing will be brilliant. What every outing can be is an opportunity to practice. So, this again is just recognizing what's available to you in that situation. Um, I'll tell you something I do if we're not getting animals. Um, if I'm out whale watching and there are no whales, I'll shoot birds. Um, I don't photograph birds a lot, but that's when I'll tend to do it, or I'll just play with ideas on the ocean. I remember just shooting at high speed into the wake of the boat from the the stuff from the propellers, just zooming in. Um yeah, high-speed bursts, uh high fast shutter speed, just to play around. Um, again, when I've been in more remote locations, for example, in India where we were looking for tigers, so we definitely did not see tigers every trip. I'd be just looking at landscapes and just shooting through the trees into the sun, that kind of thing. So I'll I'll just play around and try other things. So I'll always get something from the trip, but it may not be what I was hoping for, and I think that's the the thing to really take away from this. Okay, so um, I'm just gonna talk about um field routine. So, what's um a rhythm, simple rhythm you can use when you get out into the field. So obviously you arrive, but then maybe just spend a few minutes standing still or getting comfortable and looking around, but just taking the place in. It doesn't have to be all in about five minutes, but just take it in. Look at what's what I've already spoken about, the kind of things to look for, lighting, backgrounds, what might be distractions, what might get in the way. Um, generally, what's going on, what's the vibe of the place? Um, you're just observing, so you're identifying your clean backgrounds, think about your goal for the day because once you're there, something might really jump out at you, as that's a good thing to really focus on for the day, and then just ease into it, start slowly. And the the truth of it is if you're feeling stressed and hyper and really worried about missing stuff, the chances are you will miss things. The best thing you can do is to just slow down, set your goals low, and then relax, and it'll be far more enjoyable. And the truth is, you'll also you're more likely to get the shot that you're looking for. So, as a brief exercise, what I recommend that you do is to just write down before you go your subject, your time of day, and just one goal, and do it on your card or on your phone, just something that you can uh keep with you, and maybe refer to it every now and again, particularly if you. Starting to feel stressed, just refer to it, slow down, and just notice how much calmer and enjoyable that trip is once you've changed your aims for that day. So the really where I'd like to close this, and the thought I'd like to leave you with is that preparation doesn't need to be complex, it needs to be intentional. So when you understand your subject, when you think about the light or the range of lighting that you might be encountering, when you familiarize yourself with the location and when you choose one clear goal, you'll probably find that you've removed about 80% of the overwhelm. So that's really important. And I think the the main reason it's important is that it makes that whole experience far more enjoyable. So that's how to prepare without overthinking it. And even when you've prepared well, many wildlife photos still feel a little bit random. So, what I'm gonna look at next week, so this podcast will be out on Friday if you're listening to them live. Next week, I'm gonna dive into why that happens, how you can add real purpose to your wildlife photography. And if you if you're not big into wildlife, these themes also apply to other types of photography. So, preparation is definitely the beginning, and what we're gonna do next time with intention is take the next step. So I really hope you've enjoyed this. Please take a look at my courses, there's plenty of podcasts as well. And uh definitely please give me a like and subscribe if you've really enjoyed it. You can buy me a coffee, and all of that is on the website. And thank you for um spending a bit of time with me. And I look forward to speaking to you again on the next podcast. Bye for now.