Bokeh for Wildlife Photography - Wildlife Photo Chat Video Podcast

Weekly Catch-up:
Ray hasn’t been shooting at all but visiting friends of his and Emilie’s along the northeast of the US. He spent a few days in a wonderful small town in New York called Long Eddy and did some beautiful hikes and even astro photography one night! He has also been spending time working hard on a series of short videos of wildlife photo tips he hopes to start sharing soon.

Brad has been having fun photographing a small flock of Sanderling at sunset and observed some unique and interesting behavior. He has also been battling trying not to ruin his camera with salt water during his shorebird outings.

Follow up:
Magnus Wahlin’s Green Sea Turtle was Brad’s choice for episode 8’s Wildlife Photo Chat Challenge for non-bird wildlife - It was taken at 500mm with the sunset and some waves crashing behind. Magnus shared “I waited for the biggest wave so that I could include the most bokeh behind without having to angle the photo down and loose depth of field.”

Photo News:
Canon released the C50 video camera

What Would you Choose:
Would you choose to shoot only the same subject in any light or any subject in only overcast light?

Topic - Bokeh for Wildlife:
Let’s talk bokeh for wildlife. We start with how to get that clean smooth background look and how important background distance is for these types of photos. Next up is adding subtle textures and patterns, then more in your face textures. We move onto how to capture bokeh balls in your backgrounds including using trees, sparkling water, rocks, sand, wet vegetation and more. Then it’s on to when it gets darker out and adding in urban lights as bokeh in your background, especially how important it is to balance the ambient light and the urban lights to get this style of image. Lastly we wrap up touching on adding in foreground bokeh as well as specialized lenses like the TT Artisan 250mm reflex lens for creating donut bokeh.

Gear used in this episode:
Nikon Z9
Nikon Z8
Nikon Z6iii
Nikon Z6ii
Nikon D850
iPhone Pro 11
iPhone Pro 16
DJI Mini 4K
Nikon 500mm f/4 G
Nikon Z 400mm f/4.5
Nikon Z 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6
Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8 G
Venus Optics - Laowa 10mm
TT Artisan 250mm f/5.6 Reflex Lens