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Wild Things: Shooting in the Wild

Shooting in the wild changes how videographers would normally capture events. You have to slow down, take your time... and wait... and wait some more... and wait even more. But the video is well worth the time.

With an old Hi8 video camera and a clunky underwater housing, I began my career as an outdoor filmmaker. I'd take the gear with me for fun on scuba dives off the Southern California shore. Once I felt comfortable with it, I started thinking, "What is the most unlikely thing I could make a film about? How about diving at night? Great idea! No one has done it before, so it will be unique." As is so often the case, the idea of something and the reality of it are two entirely different things. Dive after bone-chilling, nightmare-inducing dive, I got footage of only sandy bottoms and ugly, gray fish. But then, after the tenth time out in the cold and dark, a bat ray bolted from the sand and glided over my head, glowing like an angel in my light. That magical shot gave me the boost to keep going, to keep searching for those little moments. I realized that I may only capture one quick shot like that once in a while, but that enough of those would eventually add up and, if I strung them all together, I'd have a halfway-respectable film.

Most people won't go to such extremes just to capture video. I still have dreams of large things swimming up behind me in the dark (in fact, I did get bitten in the behind by a curious sea lion pup one night).

For my next film, I chose a very different subject: the desert. However, I was faced with some of the same challenges I encountered in the ocean. Animal sightings were fleeting and far between. By the time I'd spot something, get my camera out and set up, the critter was gone. It took me a long time to figure out the solution to this. But I'll get to that later. The first thing I had to do was streamline my equipment. I almost always worked alone, since I usually had a zero budget and couldn't hire anyone to help me, so it was imperative that I could carry everything I needed by myself. Based on my experience, here's what I recommen…