Skip to main content

Photographing Brown Bears: Day 2

Lesson 7 from: The Wildlife Photography Workshop

Charly Savely

Photographing Brown Bears: Day 2

Lesson 7 from: The Wildlife Photography Workshop

Charly Savely

buy this class

$00

$00
Sale Ends Soon!

starting under

$13/month*

Unlock this classplus 2200+ more >

Lesson Info

7. Photographing Brown Bears: Day 2

Building on the success of the previous shoot, we venture back into the unknown. With a full day of seasonal elements (hello, rain downpour). Charly discusses her approaches and what she looks for in a composition while shooting wild animals.
Next Lesson: Finding Your Style

Lesson Info

Photographing Brown Bears: Day 2

(gentle electronic music) (man talking on the radio) (gentle electronic music) (seagulls chirping) (river water gushing) Sometimes I just like to go back and review my photos for a second and just make sure I'm doing everything correctly just cause accidents have happened before in the past. So just mainly just zooming in and making sure everything's sharp and in focus. (river water flowing) I think bears kind of sleeping is a nice moment because well, one, it's nice and easy to shoot so it takes a little bit of the stress off. Also the bear's calm. So when you see a photo of the bear you feel calm and there's kind of like a vulnerable moment because they're such crazy, crazy, strong, intimidating beasts that getting to see them in this peaceful moment is really awesome. (ambient acoustic music) So what's unique about Katmai National Park versus Kodiak is the bears are less afraid of people here. There's no hunting allowed in the national park. So they're, they're kind of comfortab...

le around us as long as we don't do anything wrong and we're respectful. I'm kind of a soft guide. As far as getting people up on the bears. I like to just approach a little bit slowly. You gotta watch how they're reacting to you whether they stop focusing on their natural behavior which is feeding or resting and look up that's the time to stop and back off. Moms with cubs especially you have to be really sensitive. They've got a lot of issues, you know, with keeping an eye on things going around them. So if you're adding to the problem by moving too fast or acting like you're stalking up on them, you're not, you're not being respectful. And so I think the key with my guiding is being respectful to animals and trying to really cue off of their, their body language, which is really clear. It's pretty obvious. If you have a dog you're gonna see a lot of the same behavior. (ambient acoustic music) So another important thing that if you're getting pretty serious about photography or if you've been doing it for a long time absolutely make sure you have gear insurance because anything could go wrong, you know. For me there's a highly likely probability that I could trip and fall on one of these rocks and smash something. So the company I go with they're called Mercer. They're amazing, super affordable. They've always taken care of me whenever something broke. So I recommend them or I believe some entrances just let you add it to your, I think it's your house insurance, home insurance or something like that. But they're a company I go through so make sure you keep your gear safe from protected and then you won't have to stress about it getting damaged so much. (ambient acoustic music) It's been a really long day with a lot of challenges but it's been absolutely incredible. This is a wrap for the end of field day two. I cannot wait to get back edit these shots and show them to you guys. And I'll see you there.

Ratings and Reviews

Sarah Mackey
 

Brilliant and inspiring workshop This workshop was absolutely fantastic. I feel so lucky to have gotten an inside look at Charly's process and how she's developed her style. The videos following her on the photoshoot in Alaska are absolutely breathtaking, they gave me chills. The workshop was filled with so many great tips on how to be a mindful wildlife photographer as well, which is really important for our planet. After having finished this workshop, I definitely feel inspired.

Student Work

RELATED ARTICLES

RELATED ARTICLES