Floating Hide Photography: Floating Hide Photography Preparation

The purpose of this article is to show the thinking process involved in the preparation and pre-visualization of a Floating Hide Photography photo session. These notes relate to the work in the field where the photo shoot will take place.

In photographing action shots, it’s best to pre-visualize the actual session. These questions will help the process:

1. How to camouflage and where to position the camera?

2. What’s the direction of the light and wind?

3. If there’s a choice of lens, which one is best for the task?

4. Is there enough light to freeze the action? Is that what you want to do?

5. What’s the background like, the texture, the colour?

6. Will separation between the subject and background be achievable?

7. Can the background be made sufficiently blurred so as not to be a distraction?

I carry a homemade floating hide made up with camouflaged cloth; it’s lightweight and inexpensive. I also take along some refreshments, my laptop and lots of backup space – my wait usually lasts for at least 4 to 6 hrs.

When everything is set up, I take my first shot with the camera to check the exposure looking at the histogram. My goal is to get the histogram lines as far to the right as possible without crossing over the right-hand side border

Reviewing is an important step. Finding out what worked and what didn’t work is a valuable exercise and should be done at the end of every photographic session – the positives go forward, the negatives are corrected.

Photographing the water birds

My plan was to photograph a comb duck while taking off and water birds in action. It soon became apparent that there were a number of constraints. The local fisherman would not allow me to get in the water, too much depth of the lake, too much vegetation growth on the banks of the water body.

1. Arrive at a location before the birds start flying.

2. Stick to the plan – unless forced to do otherwise.

3. If plan is changed, study its suitability.

4. Select a good camouflaged spot to photograph from.

This article focuses specifically on Floating Hide photography. However, with a few minor adjustments the principles apply just as well to other types of photography.