Filming ducks in the timber is easy work. All you have to do is decide on the best focal length, ensure exposure is not blown out in the sky yet still bright enough below the canopy, manually nail focus through the limbs, prevent as much shakiness as possible, and finally hope you track the right bird if they break off. Oh and press record…. Yeah that gets overlooked every once in a while.
I have the utmost respect for videographers that can do all of that on a consistent basis. The first time I ever tried to film in the timber was an absolute disaster. I don’t know if I got anything I was proud of. A few years down the road, and it’s still a work in process, but I feel like I’m now able to capture these moments the way I want about 50% of the time. The other 50 is a combination of everything from user error to just wrong guesses on which bird to track.
A new season is on the horizon, and with it will come new opportunities to showcase how our skills have progressed. Until then it’s old social media posts and whatever videos we find hidden away in our camera rolls.
We were looking back through some footage from this past turkey season, and we found this clip from opening morning. I ended up about 10 yards behind the hunter, so we couldn’t talk about what we could or could not see. We had planned on just letting the bird walk around the bend of the road and it would be game over with everything perfectly in frame. Unfortunately that never happened. He told me afterwards that he had a clear lane for a shot, but he waited for a better camera visual. I was fine with it because I didn’t think the camera saw him anyways until we watched this clip back. What do you think? Did we make the right call waiting for the perfect camera visual or should @theronlee12 have taken the first clean shot he had regardless of whether it was in frame or not?
Rocklin & Laken - Wedding Highlight Film
Wedding Highlight Film