The Key to Great Wildlife Photos? A Two-Tiered System of Patience.

There are days where my best photo is one of the first photos I took over the course of an entire day, and there are days where I spend hours and hours looking for great photo opportunities and come home empty handed. When I say that the key to taking great wildlife photos is patience, I don’t just mean that the longer you wait in a given spot, the more likely you are to get an amazing photo. There are really 2 tiers to the patience that is necessary for photographers who want to capture great images. The first tier is the patience required to accumulate knowledge - your “pre-knowledge patience”. The second is the patience required of you once knowledge has been obtained - your “post-knowledge patience”.

The patience to accumulate knowledge refers to the many trips to a given area it will take to figure out where certain animals frequent, gain tips from locals, and figure out the best spots to be in for a given time of day. For example, if I want to photograph birds of prey potentially catching fish in the morning, I’m going to need an area where the light is the most favorable (not too harsh but also bright enough for high quality photos), a vantage point that provides a pleasing composition, the knowledge that the birds are in the area, and a spot that is close enough to where the action might happen that also maintains a respectable distance from the animal, as not to scare it away. While apps, trail maps, social media forums etc., can help speed this process up, you shouldn’t expect to just wonder out into a new area and come home with your new best photo.

Once you have a base of information, you can then move into the “post-knowledge patience” that is required. I frequently visit a park close to our home where the example I previously described is a photo I am still chasing - an amazing photo of a bird of prey catching a fish. Do I technically have a photo of this happening?…..I do, but not one I’m in any way pleased with. However, a sure fire way to never get this photo is to show up at the park and sit there for 20 minutes and then leave because nothing has happened. While we all will certainly get lucky at times and just happen to be in the right place at the right time, we shouldn’t bank on luck to build our portfolios. That will take multiple lifetimes to achieve.