Wildlife Photography: 6 Ways to Make Sure You Never Miss a Shot 

Discovering the natural world through wildlife photography is my favorite activity, and that is why I can regularly be found out exploring with my camera.

While success is never truly guaranteed on a wildlife photography shoot, when heading out to photograph my favorite wildlife, I always go well-prepared and make sure I have the right equipment.

There are vital steps you can follow and apply to your own work to help ensure you never miss a wildlife photography shot, and in this article, I will share some tips and tricks for when you go out in nature for your next wildlife photography shoot.

We’ll cover what equipment to use and why it is important, camera settings for fast-moving animals, fieldcraft tips, and more!

1. Prepare before your shoot

You should always prepare well before going out in nature. Wildlife photography shoots may require you to set out very early in the morning, and you don’t want to be scrambling to find your gear on the morning of the shoot and miss out on an essential piece of equipment!

Planning and preparing in advance can only help you achieve your photography goals. Think ahead about what equipment and accessories you will need:

• Do you want to use a tripod, a monopod, or a beanbag?
• Charge all of your batteries and make sure your memory cards are empty.
• Repack your bag to ensure nothing is missing. I repack my Gitzo Adventury 45L bag every time I go out to make sure I don’t forget any essential items!
• Take extenders with you if you have them, as you never know exactly at what distance you will find the animals.

Below you can find a summary checklist of what is in my own wildlife photography backpack for every shoot:

• Canon R5 + battery grip
• Canon EF-RF Mount Adapter
• Canon EF 400mm f/2.8 III
• Batteries
• CF Express memory cards
• SD cards
• Extender 1.4x
• Extender 2.0x
• Card holder/reader
• Rain cover
• Poncho

It may help you to create your own list of essential equipment and keep it somewhere you can easily refer to as you pack and plan for your next wildlife photography shoot.

Read more: 10 Important Things to Keep in Your Camera Bag

2. Do your research

While your fieldcraft and technical skills are important for ensuring you get the wildlife photography images you’re after, don’t underestimate the importance of doing ample research in advance of your shoot.

Animal behavior: I always recommend researching the behavior of the animals you want to photograph. Knowing more about their behavior will help you predict and pre-visualize your images, and plan the time and locations for your shoots.

Investigate what times of day the animal you want to photograph is most active. For example, if I am looking for deer, I will go out early in the morning during sunrise or a few hours before sunset, as this is their most active time.

On the other hand, Kingfishers are active all day long, so I don’t necessarily have to leave early in the morning to photograph them.

Weather: I would also always recommend checking the weather forecast. This may impact the lighting in your images.

For example, on a sunny day, I don’t take photos in the middle of the day as I find the light too harsh, and I get too much contrast in my photos, which I don’t like. I would then go out to photograph during the first or last hours of the day.

Read more: How to Photograph Wildlife in Extreme Weather

3. Know your camera

It’s very important to know exactly how your camera works so that you can react quickly when necessary. Amazing wildlife moments can be fleeting, so you want to be able to easily adjust your settings to ensure you don’t miss the shot you’re after.

It’s worth exploring the ways in which you can personalize the settings on your camera – many cameras offer shortcuts for certain settings that you can set up to suit yourself.

Knowing your camera will also come with time and practice. Use your camera as much as you can, and practice switching between certain settings in different lighting situations.

Eventually, you will instinctively know how to find the buttons you use the most, such as focusing, adjusting shutter speed, adjusting ISO, adjusting aperture, switching from photographing to filming, and putting your camera in sleep mode.

Top tip: Wildlife photography shoots can last for hours, sometimes with nothing happening for long periods. I photograph with the Canon R5, and most of the time, I use my live view while photographing.

If I leave my live view on all the time, my battery will drain faster, or my camera will overheat more quickly, so as soon as I am not photographing, I turn off my live view screen. This way, I will often not miss a moment of photography.

Read more: 6 Essential Camera Settings for Wildlife Photographers

4. Prepare camera settings for fast-moving animals

Wildlife moves quickly, and to ensure you never miss a wildlife photography shot, you should understand the best settings on your camera for capturing fast-moving animals.

AI Servo/AF-C Mode

I always have my camera set to AI Servo/AF-C mode. With this setting, the camera continues to focus on the subject as long as you hold the focus button down. The camera also continues to focus while pressing the shutter. AI Servo/AF-C mode is essential for photographing moving animals.

Eye detection

I would also recommend using eye detection for focusing if your camera has it, as it works well in most cases. The advantage is that you can quickly change your composition without having to adjust your focus point.

If you want to adjust your composition when you have your focus on one point, you first have to move the position of your focus point. In wildlife photography, without this feature, you may miss the moment because sometimes you only get one chance!

Burst mode

If you need to capture a moving animal, such as a running deer, a bird in flight, or an insect on the wing, you should set your camera to burst mode with the highest speed. This setting allows you to take the most images per second, which can be crucial in wildlife photography.

It gives you the best chance of getting a sharp photo, and since the position of a moving animal changes quickly, you also have a better chance of capturing exactly the image you have in mind.

Shutter speed

Which shutter speed you use depends on the situation and lighting conditions. With a moving animal, you may want to use the shortest possible shutter speed, but this depends on how much light there is at that moment and what ISO you can use.

For example, with a walking fox, I use at least a shutter speed of 1/640, but if the light allows it, I prefer to photograph with a shutter speed of 1/1000 or faster. To photograph something like a flying hummingbird, however, I need to use a shutter speed of at least 1/4000.

Capturing movement

Sometimes you may still want to capture movement and consciously choose a longer shutter speed. With this shaking short-eared owl, for example, I chose a shutter speed of 1/400 so that the bird’s eyes are sharp, but movement is still visible in the feathers.

Even with a bathing sparrowhawk, I don’t mind if a little bit of movement is visible in the photo. In that case, I use a shutter speed of 1/640.

Read more: How to Photograph Fast-moving Mammals

5. Have the right equipment

Having the right equipment is absolutely essential to ensure you never miss a wildlife photography shot. Wildlife is rarely found at close range, so you will need a zoom lens capable of covering a good distance.

The minimum focal length you need for photographing wildlife depends on the situation, which animals you want to photograph, and whether you want to capture the animals in their environment or take more close-ups. The minimum distance I would recommend is 300mm.

The advantage of using a zoom lens is that you are not tied to a fixed focal length but can change focal length as needed.

I use a 400mm prime lens, and the advantage is that you have a wide aperture and can therefore continue photographing longer in poorer lighting conditions. I also like the bokeh I can create with my f/2.8 aperture.

To extend the focal length, you can choose to use extenders. You must realize that when using extenders, you lose light, the autofocus works less quickly, and the sharpness may decrease a bit.

Also, the autofocus of a lens does not always work in combination with an extender, so find this out in advance.

In addition to my camera and lens, there are other products that are essential to me while I am photographing, and I will share them with you here:

• Gimbal swing head tripod: I regularly use my tripod with a gimbal swing head because it allows me to create much more stable images and use a longer shutter speed. The gimbal swing head gives you the ability to quickly respond to any situation and move both horizontally and vertically.
• Fast memory cards: To use the burst mode of your camera, it’s essential to use fast memory cards. Even if you film in 4K quality at 120 frames per second, you will create images with a large file size, and it is important that the buffer of your camera is quickly cleared by a memory card that can write the images at high speed. I use the Sandisk Extreme Pro CF Express Card Type B with a write speed of 1200 mb/s in combination with my R5.

Read more: What’s the Best Lens for Wildlife Photography?

6. Use a photography hide

Fieldcraft techniques are important to learn and apply to help ensure you never miss a wildlife photography shot. However, if you can get yourself to a hide, this can yield even greater results, as your disturbance levels will be minimized.

I regularly use photography hides specifically designed for taking photos, where you take photos through mirrored glass or from behind a camouflage net.

Wear dark clothing

I would still advise you to wear dark clothing so as not to attract attention in case any part of you becomes visible through the hide.

Camouflage your lens

If you have a white lens, I would also advise you to camouflage the lens by using a lens coat or a dark sock. When the sun shines on the hide, the animals can still see you, even if you are behind mirrored glass.

Move slowly

It is very important to move your camera calmly when an animal appears in front of the hide. It’s never wise to make sudden, unexpected movements with your lens because if the animals notice this, there is a good chance that they will react and leave.

Sometimes you have to wait a while before moving your camera until the animal is comfortable, as they are often very alert when they first arrive at the setting.

Put your research into action

It is important to prepare yourself for the behavior of the animals you can expect in front of the hide.

For example, with birds of prey, you can research the sounds they make because it sometimes happens that you hear a buzzard or a hawk calling before they land on the setting.

In such a moment, I don’t move my camera all the time, but I focus on a branch for them to land on or the center so that I don’t have to move my lens all the way from left to right once the bird of prey has landed.

Pay attention to the surrounding wildlife

You can also often see from the behavior of other animals in front of the hide that something is coming. When a bird of prey is landing on the setting, all the small birds suddenly fly away at the same time and make a high-pitched sound.

Recently, I went to Spain to photograph the Iberian lynx. There are many rabbits, partridges, and magpies in that area, and every time a lynx was coming close to the hide, all the other animals ran away. That was often the moment when the lynx came to drink at the waterhole.

Explore the hide before your shoot day

In the hides I visit, there is either space for your tripod, or there is a slider system where you can put your tripod head.

I advise you to prepare well before going to a hide and research in advance whether you need your entire tripod or just your tripod head.

In my opinion, the biggest advantage of photographing from a hide is that the animals can approach you without being disturbed. This gives you the opportunity to photograph animals up close, which would be impossible without using these hides.

Read more: How to Build a Photography Hide

In conclusion

Patience and preparation are both essential factors in wildlife photography. You can apply the tips above to help give you a greater chance of success in the field. While there will still be many times when you don’t achieve success, when you do, it feels great.

Of all the information we covered above, I think one of the most important things to do to ensure you never miss a wildlife photograph is to delve as much as you can into the behavior of the animals you want to photograph. This understanding will help you make the most natural images without disturbing the animals.

Ultimately, my advice is to enjoy every moment in nature, respect nature, and always keep looking around to see what is happening. Expect the unexpected, as you never know what amazing wildlife moment is coming your way next!