Heat haze

[Carl Walker]

I'm probably answering my own question here! Don't shoot then! What does everyone else do?

A few months ago I shot half a card on a martial eagle (mid am) that was drinking and resting at a waterhole. There were a number of sequences of him hopping in and out of water with different wing positions and also it's take off. I remember battling to focus at times too and it was around 25m away. Not one of the images was tack sharp and the BG although busy was weird and hazy but I never picked it up at the time.

Yesterday I had a perfect sighting of a male cheetah and took a number of shots but could clearly see the heat waves. It was around 10am and he was lying in the shade. Tried different aperture settings too but nothing worked. With my 600mm combo he was almost too tight in the frame so I was close enough. It was the same with the 70-200. Really disappointing as I really tried everything to create a great image. With all the different poses he was giving me it was too tempting to stop shooting.

thanks

[Doug Brown]

Heat shimmer/haze/thermals are a real problem in nature and wildlife photography. It's not always heat that causes it; I've seen it with temperatures in the 60s and colder. Not much you can do other than wait for it to clear.

[arash_hazeghi]

nothing you can do, unfortunately it means pack and go home or just chill and enjoy watching.

[Jerry van Dijk]

Use it to your advantage and try to create more abstract images, or use it as a powerful element to emphasize the heat of the environment you're in. You need some pretty heavy haze though.
If you are only after tack sharp close-ups, see above.

[Carl Walker]

Thanks Doug, Arash and Jerry. Jerry good idea I'll have a look at that. Yeah I guessed as much. Fortunately for me there will always be an opportunity.

It also got me thinking about those ( especially keen photographers ) that do African Wildlife safaris and that in a short stay there is a lot of luck involved in things coming together from all aspects. I know that most would really enjoy the moment anyway.

Always an optimist I never thought I would say this but we have an insurmountable task in bringing our rhino poaching to a halt. I never thought that I would personally see a species eradicated in such a way. It is an almost certain reality, at the current rate of poaching in SA that I will live to see this happen. Today I learned that we have already exceeded the 100 mark of rhino poached in SA just this month - over 790 this year. When you consider back in the early 1950/60's rhino were on the bridge of extinction then. Might sound a bit dramatic but it is real!!

Sorry a bit off topic!

[Diane Miller]

I shoot at airshows sometimes and heat waves are a major problem there. You can minimize them if you can shoot up at something -- a bird in a tree or flying. They are worse looking horizontal. Getting close will minimize the effect.

So incredibly sad about the rhinos!