Self drive in the Kruger National Park

1. Planning

There’s a well known quote by Benjamin Franklin: “By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.” As an Airline pilot by profession I like to go in with a plan, driving around aimlessly in the hope of spotting animals is always a gamble. You want to spend as much time as possible on the most productive roads!

I use the book Kruger Self Drive, Routes, Roads and Ratings to scout out the roads with high animal densities. I then make a detailed plan of the roads I plan on driving, what animals I expect to see on those roads. Any waterholes I might want to stop at and spend some time scouting out and also hotspots where I need to drive extra slowly to look for animals that might be hiding in the thickets.

2. Research your subject

I spend time learning about the animals I intend to photograph before my trip to improve my chances of not only spotting them in the wild but also capturing unique images of them exhibiting interesting behaviour.

Leopards are often found up in trees, on rocky outcrops and in riverbeds. Scanning these areas closely when driving past will drastically increase your chances of spotting these elusive animals.

Elephants often dust themselves by throwing sand up on their back with their trunks, making for amazing photos in golden light, they love swimming, so waiting at a waterhole for elephants coming to drink can be very rewarding. Birds often poop just before taking off, giving you a heads up for that epic bird in flight photo. Rhinos also enjoy water and can be found at waterholes coming for a mud bath. The rare black rhino is often found in dense bush and thickets as opposed to white rhino that prefer grasslands and savannah as they feed on grass. Alarm calls by primates, Impala looking uneasy, warthogs running with their tails up and vultures circling are all signs that a predator is nearby. Use all your senses to spot animals. Look for tracks in the soft sand. These can all lead you to that epic predator sighting that can easily be missed.

3. Patience, drive slowly. Scan rocks, trees and in the long grass.

Animals are naturally very well camouflaged and while the speed limit in the Kruger is 50 km/h on tar roads and 40 km/h on gravel, travelling at these speeds will make it very difficult to spot animals. When driving past riverbeds and rocky outcrops slow down and look carefully. Look under trees for lions taking shade and having a nap. Lions can sleep for up to 20 hours a day and are most often seen lying under trees or in open grasslands lying in the long grass.

Once you find the animal, stay with it. Don’t just snap a few pics and move on hoping to tick off the next animal on your list. This is a common mistake made by amateur wildlife photographers. They take a few photos and move on and end up driving for hours only to find nothing. Your time spent with the animal should be intentional. Sit and wait for the animal to display the behaviours you’ve researched. If you find lions sleeping during the day, chances are they will be there for a few hours. Move on and be sure to come back before sunset when they become more active.

4. Camera Gear

This is highly debatable and also a matter of personal preference, however the best camera is the one you have with you. You don’t need the latest camera with eye tracking and the most expensive prime lenses.

This being said there are a few things to consider. And this is something that is most often missed. You’d think you need the longest lens you can get your hands on. 600mm should do the job right? Well, yes and no! For photographing a Martial Eagle in a tree, 600mm is great, however elephants are BIG, and they come very close to your car. So a second lens that can zoom out to at least 70mm is a must. This also helps with taking wider angle photos and including the environment to tell a story.

Should you pack a tripod? Short answer, no. You’re not going to use it. You are going to be shooting from inside your car. And if you are on a safari vehicle there’s no space for a tripod. What does work really well is a bean bag. You can open the car window and place the bean bag on the door to provide support for the camera when shooting at lower shutter speeds.

Pack light. Camera gear can get really heavy. Only take what you really need.

The basics:

• Camera (and a spare if you have)

• Lenses (telephoto zoom and super-telephoto)

• Spare batteries and spare memory cards. You don’t want to be driving around with a camera with a flat battery or a full/failed memory card.

• Chargers to keep everything charged.

• Cleaning equipment. Rocket blower, lens wipes, brushes to keep your lenses clean

5. Shoot wide and tell a story. A picture about a leopard is much better than a picture of a leopard

Wildlife portraits are amazing and there is something incredibly awe inspiring of a close up of an elusive leopard staring down the barrel of a lens, however it doesn’t tell much of a story. Photography is all about storytelling. What is the leopard doing? Where does he live? What does he eat? These are all things to include in your photograph that make it more compelling.

I personally carry two camera bodies in the field. One with a Nikon 180 - 600mm lens and the second with a 70-200mm f/2.8. Having two bodies allows me to quickly swap from taking tight portraits to zooming all the way out to capture the animal in the environment. Having the 2 bodies also means I am not constantly swapping lenses and getting dust on my camera sensor.

6. Get up early

Animals are most active in the early hours of the morning and in the last few hours of the day when the temperatures are cooler. So getting up early not only improves the chance of spotting animals it also means you have great light to shoot in. In wildlife photography the only light we have to use is natural light, and the times just after sunrise and just before sunset give us that magical golden light that is soft and pleasing to the eye. In the middle of the day animals are resting in the shade and you won’t see much and if you do see anything the light is super harsh and shadows on the animals are really dark.

7. Light

Use the natural light to your advantage. During midday you’re going to get hard light which will give you bright highlights and dark shadows and a very directional light which doesn’t work well on a photograph.

What we’re looking for is soft warm light found just after sunrise and just before sunset. Fortunately for us this is when animals are most active. Overcast conditions also offer soft light although if it is dull and dreary your photographs can often look a little flat. Small gaps in the clouds letting some light in works very well to add contrast to the image. This is when wide angle shots showing a storm brewing are incredibly powerful.

How to use the light:

• Front lighting is where the light is in front of your subject. You often get photos where you can see the animals face with very little shadows but it can look a little flat and boring.

• Side lighting is where the light is coming from the side of the animal. This adds more depth and contrast to the image and makes it more interesting.

• Backlighting, now this is where your creativity comes out. Silhouettes against a setting sun or rim lighting where you get a golden halo around the animal creating a more artistic shot.

I generally head back to camp during midday for a relaxing lunch, I’ll also backup the photos I took in the morning and go over my plan for the afternoon.

8. Camera settings

When on safari things happen fast. There is little to no time to fiddle with settings. Animals don’t wait and pose. There are no second takes. Knowing your camera and camera settings are vital. Know the basics, exposure triangle, aperture, shutter speed and how changing those affects the final image.

Animals are most often not sitting still, they are moving, so you need a fast shutter speed to freeze the action and get a sharp photo. However you are often shooting in low light and need to lower you shutter speed or you’ll have an image with really high ISO.

DON’T BE AFRAID OF HIGH ISO.

Modern noise reduction software is incredible and you can get really good results with ISO as high as 20000. You, can always fix a high ISO shot, but you can’t fix a blurry shot when the shutter speed is too slow.

Saying that if the subject is not moving. for example a leopard in a tree, you can drop your shutter speed to as low as 1/50th sec as long as you keep the camera still to avoid camera shake. A bean bag on the car door works great for this. Vibration reduction in modern cameras is also really good. If the animal is stationary, experiment. Shoot at various shutter speeds and see where you get the best results.

I personally shoot in Manual Mode with auto ISO. This allows the camera to control the exposure when moving from bright to dark areas. Use Exposure compensation to fine tune the exposure depending on what you are shooting.

Use the histogram on your camera to ensure you have got the exposure right. Overexposed photos with blown out whites cannot be fixed in editing. These details are lost.

9. Composition and positioning

Composition and positioning yourself in the right spot are what can make or break your shot.

Learn about how to compose your shot. The rule of thirds, when to centre the subject in the frame. How to draw the viewers eye through the frame. Do not place the edge of the frame up against the animals nose. Allow space in the frame for the animal to walk into.

Look at the background. Is there a bush directly behind the animal? Is it possible to reposition yourself so that there is nothing behind the animal so you can blur the background and create better subject separation making your subject pop.

Look out for distractions. Is there a branch sticking out of your subjects head. Often moving one meter left or right can drastically change the outcome of the photo.

Get low. Always try and photograph your subject from eye level. This creates more intimacy with the animal creating a better connection with the viewer. If you are photographing elephants from a low angle it can also emphasise the sheer size of the animal making them look even more impressive. Low angle also gives you better subject separation blurring out the background giving you more pleasing images.

10. Focus settings and where to focus

Modern cameras have eye detect functions where the camera will automatically focus on the animal’s eye. This is incredible technology however it doesn’t always work as well as you think. It uses AI and is designed to lock onto the eyes of humans, cats, dogs, birds etc. However it might battle with an elephant or rhino. Leopards can be tricky as the spots can confuse the camera, especially if you are far away. Always have one of your shortcut keys on the camera set to a single point autofocus. So if the camera is battling to lock on you can place the focus point manually.

And where to focus? You guessed it, the eye. The eye is the connection to the soul and having the eye in focus will grab the attention of the viewer.

As an added bonus if you can get a catchlight in the eye (the bright reflection of light from the sun) this brings life to the photo and transforms a photo from one that is flat and boring to one that is full of life and connects to the viewer.