Second Nature: The six-point capture checklist (Part two)

This is part two of a two part six-point capture checklist. You can see part one, from last week, here. 

4) Can I use the light better?

Because we all fall into the trap of seeing what’s in our mind’s eye – what we’d like to see and not what’s right in front of us, a swift lighting ‘reality check’ pays off.  We’re super-conscious of available lighting conditions as we go because things change fast. Always keep light under review before pressing the shutter release because, if nothing else, you’ll need to increase your ISO when levels fall to ensure you have enough speed.

Always ‘read’ the light before you click for its aesthetic possibilities as well as for technical exposure considerations. Clever use of lighting can turn an okay nature shot into a magical one. Before you click ask yourself what the quality of the light is and how you can turn the available lighting conditions to your advantage – even when they seem unpromising.

Flat, seemingly uninteresting light, with little shadow, for example, can be extremely helpful in wildlife photography; it’s great for portraits, for ‘animalscapes’ in normally contrasty settings like woodland, or where you want to showcase lots of intricate, close-up detail.

As with viewpoint selection, work the angles. Double-check not only the direction of the light, but exactly how and where it’s striking your subject. What are the shadows like? Moving your position in relation to your subject and the direction of the light can produce subtle or even quite dramatic changes to your image.

A very basic illustration of this would be achieving a catchlight in a subject’s eye. Always stop and check you’ve got one before you press. If you can’t see that bit of sparkle often all you need to do to is shift your position to the left or right a bit.

A more extreme example would be moving right around your subject so you’re photographing it against the light. Back lighting subjects produces quite dramatically different wildlife pictures, making it particularly worth considering when you’re dealing with common or often-photographed species.

Once you’re proficient at reading the light in each situation there’s lots of scope to control its effects further, at the capture stage, through creative use of exposure compensation. Try taking things a fraction or so darker on the minus scale for a more dramatic mood. Alternatively for a lighter, softer feel, try going up in small increments on the positive side. You’ll soon learn how taking a bit more personal control of lighting can impact your shots the more, or less, crazy you go.

5) What pitfalls lie in wait for me?

One of the great things about slowing down before you commit to a picture is that you start to see the problems as well as the positives – the stuff that’s overlooked if you simply shoot from the hip.

Alarm bells will ring instantly, for example, if your subject is obstructed by something substantial in the foreground, but, in the heat of the moment, you might not notice a single, but critical, blade of out of focus grass that’s obscuring its face or bisecting its eyes.

Make it your routine to check that everything you see in the viewfinder, or on your LCD screen, is A1 before firing. Minute corrections in the moment matter. A predator with its ears back rather than pricked, clipping bits of your subject’s feet, not getting enough isolation between individual animals in a group shot. Such things are easily corrected if spotted.

Pay particular attention to backgrounds – they’re often neglected when you’ve a juicy subject in your sights – yet they can make or break your picture. Are they clean enough? The eye cancels out stuff in the frame we don’t want to see, like ugly man-made structures in the distance and so on, but the camera doesn’t lie. Make doubly sure before you fire the shutter.

And last, but not least, be wise to possible exposure problems. Spotting them is half the battle so check your histogram as you go, particularly when you’re confronted with red flag situations like dark or pale subjects or ‘magpie’ ones combining the two. If you’re unsure in the moment expose for the highlights. Make extra sure they’re not clipping because you can’t recover detail in these areas in post if it’s not there.

6) What’s so special about this one?

Last, but not least, when you’ve got all your ducks in a row; there’s one final question to face. The harshest of all. Is the picture worth taking? Certainly, if you aspire to the next level it helps to be honest with yourself. What will the shot add to your portfolio or your overall development as a photographer. Could I do things differently or better?

Very often we put the time and effort in, then are forced to admit the picture isn’t going to be special or different enough after all. Knowing when not to press can be as helpful to your progress as knowing when it’s right to hit the button.

So, if you can’t make the situation work to your advantage it may be wise to look for something else to point your camera at. Otherwise, checklist completed, head now totally aligned with heart and gut… go for it. ❂

About the authors: Ann & Steve Toon are a UK-based, husband and wife team of award-winning, professional photographers with a specialist interest in the wildlife and wild places of southern Africa where they spend several months each year photographing and running photographic safaris.

Their work is published in a wide range of magazines and national newspapers, both in the UK and abroad, and they are reprepresented by several leading photographic libraries. They've also written three books, two on wildlife photography and one on rhinos. You can see more of their work on their website at toonwildlife.com.