P#8 Q6C: Getting Eye-to-Eye with Wildlife

More great tips for wildlife photos

Roy Toft: Another one that is just not a big secret, it's not a huge light bulb above your head, but it is something that people don't do very often is shoot at eye level of the animal.

I see people with their tripods everyday in the field, with their tripod six feet high (or five foot high depending on how tall you are) because they want to shoot from a comfortable standing position.

They'll be shooting a ground squirrel that's 20 feet in front of them or a fox. They're shooting down at the animal. It really puts the photographer or the camera in a dominant position. You're shooting down at the animal and it's not the most flattering perspective to shoot wildlife.

You really want to put wildlife up on a pedestal. They should be in a dominant position.

I always try to shoot wildlife from an eye-to-eye perspective.

That means for everything that's standing on the ground or lying on the ground, I'm going to be on the ground. I'll be on my knees -- I do most of my mammal photography shooting from a tripod on my knees so it's eye level.

If I'm shooting a frog on the ground, I'll be on my belly so I'm eye level with the frog. It really creates an intimate perspective. The change in the imagery is night and day.

If you shoot a frog -- if you're standing up six feet tall and shoot straight down at a frog, that's going to be pretty boring.

But if you're right down on the ground and shooting eye to eye, you can see how bold that would be. Just think of eye level when you're working with your animals.

Crop Boldly

A third tip would be to crop boldly. If you have a chance and you're working close to certain animals, and they're relaxed, go ahead and do interesting crops in camera.

Don't always try to get the whole animal in your picture. Oftentimes there are many parts of that animal that aren't very interesting.

If you shoot an elephant and you shoot the whole animal, you don't get to see the eyes of the elephant. You don't get to see the trunk very well because they have a huge body.

But if you're close to an elephant, and you just go tight on the eye or the trunk, it becomes quite a bit more artistic that way and the photos are more impactful.

Audri Lanford: When we were shooting some flamingoes, you suggested to Jim and me "Just shoot the legs." That was actually one of the more interesting pictures Jim took. You really don't see pictures of just a flamingo leg.

Roy Toft: It's thought provoking.

Think of the person seeing that photo. They're such interesting legs -- if you have the whole flamingo in the picture, they wouldn't even look at the legs because it's like, "Oh, it's a flamingo," and they move on. But if you have just the legs, now they have to think.

The viewer of the photo has to think, "What would own a pair of legs like that?"

When I'm looking through the viewfinder for composition, I'm always thinking about, "What's interesting in this photo? Is the whole animal that interesting or is it just the tongue of the giraffe coming out and wrapping around the leaf that's interesting? Do I have the technology and the distance to go in and crop that tight?"

If I do, that's where I'm going to go in. I'm going to go in and just show the interesting parts because that's what the viewer wants. They don't need to show everything.

I'm always thinking of that with composition: "What's interesting here?" You should too. Whenever you're looking through the viewfinder, just think about what's interesting.

In conlusion

When you're photographing wildlife, get down to (or up to!) the animal's eye level. Think about what makes a photograph interesting, and focus on taking a picture of that. You don't have to show the entire animal to take a great photo, and you'll add interest by adding an element of mystery.