I've been going through some old hunt reports and I think that since I joined AR in 2001 there has been a bit of a shift in what is posted, photo wise, of a safari. It used to be just a hunter behind a dead animal, now there are more photo's of the little things one see's on safari. Saeed's safaris are a case in point. Saeed gives you a camera and says "take photo's" and you do, everything that catches your eye. I actually find hunt reports more interesting when they contain lots of photo's of various animals and people than just the old dead animal/hunter shots.

yup

There are many reasons for the shift Tony.

First and foremost is the availability of digital cameras.

Many years ago, I remember taking a film camera and something like 60 rolls of film.

One had to time his use of the rolls of film, as one does not want to run out before the safari ends, not does one want to end up with some unused rolls at the end of the safari, missing opportunities.

With digital this does not happen, and one can take as many photos as one wishes.

The same goes for video on safari.

I think even when digital became common a lot of folks still went the the same old "trophy" shots. Sites like this one and hunts like yours Saeed I believe made people look around whilst on safari and take those photos that they wouldn't otherwise take perhaps?

There is so much more to a safari than just the hunting.
My favorite memories are of the people we have met & interacted with.

quote:

Originally posted by bwana cecil:
There is so much more to a safari than just the hunting.
My favorite memories are of the people we have met & interacted with.

You are so right of course.

But, many people seem to just want to enjoy it while there, completely forgetting the photographic part of it.

A few years ago we were on a photo safari in Kenya.

At were at a national park, and as luck would have it, what looks like a thousand elephants were heading our way.

A friend was with us who had a camera. I asked him to take photos, and I will take the video.

I remember he picked his camera from his lap, took a couple of photos, and put it back down!!

I decided to use both my hands.

I turned the video camera on, kept it in my left hand, and used my right to take photos!!

quote:

Originally posted by Saeed:
[QUOTE]Originally posted by bwana cecil:


I turned the video camera on, kept it in my left hand, and used my right to take photos!!

That sounds like me!

with digital cameras, a person can take a few and extra memory cards.

looking at 2,000 to 6,000 pictures is the issue when you get home.

with small cameras and extra batteries you have a difficult time using up your storage space.

you have the ability to give one to the tracker and keep a few your self.

i always have one in a pouch on my belt now, or in my front pocket.

Some of my favorite days were just riding through villages visiting with people & taking photos of them & the beautiful scenery.
I certainly don't take the number of photos Saeed does, maybe 600 or so, but with digital cameras I don't have to have them all developed to see what I want to keep or trash.

Wherever I go in the world I take thousands of pictures of everything while I am there. I have often come home and while going through the photos discovered many interesting and exciting pics that others have later commented that they did not notice or see the things in the pic. I am like Saeed, I take more pics than anyone else on the trip, and it has paid off every time. I remember going to Africa the first time and my hunting companion laughed at me because I had 25 rolls of film. Well, I used 23 rolls and he borrowed the other two and still didn't have enough. With digital, you can always erase what you don't like, but you can't go back after the fact and take a pic of something that you wished you had taken or that you missed.

How could you not take pix of all the fascinating stuff you see everyday on safari? I just love the shots of bugs, birds, flowers and all the neat stuff.

Mark

Photography was the part of my job as an outdoor writer that I absolutely hated. My newspaper work alone called for having three to five images published every week for more than 1,500 weeks.

Nearly everything I wrote had to be illustrated with professional quality images, and to get these I had to lug around cameras, lenses, filters, flash attachments, both black and white and color film, and light meters virtually everywhere I went.
,
Fortunately, over more than thirty years as an outdoor writer, my equipment went from heavy Speed Graphics with 5x7-inch film packs to pocket-size point-and-shoot 35mm Nikons. Nonetheless, I still had to produce images that were more than just ordinary snapshots.

Digital cameras were just around the corner when I retired in 1999 and I vowed to never again take another photo. It was a promise I have managed to keep. My cameras, lenses and several bags of stuff were given to a journalism student and I never looked back.

Bill Quimby

I was in the Louvre several years ago and overheard a woman lamenting all the people walking around with cameras. She said, "I came to enjoy art....not document it". I really agree with her. For me, while it is important to preserve memories of safaris (and art), I don't want to come home from a trip realizing I had witnessed most of it on a digital screen or through a narrow viewfinder.

Some of my most cherished pictures are my son posing over gut piles.

Brings back memories that no one but the two of us would ever understand or appreciate.

Pictures of thorns and bugs really triggers memories.

quote:

Originally posted by Use Enough Gun:
Wherever I go in the world I take thousands of pictures of everything while I am there. I have often come home and while going through the photos discovered many interesting and exciting pics that others have later commented that they did not notice or see the things in the pic. I am like Saeed, I take more pics than anyone else on the trip, and it has paid off every time. I remember going to Africa the first time and my hunting companion laughed at me because I had 25 rolls of film. Well, I used 23 rolls and he borrowed the other two and still didn't have enough. With digital, you can always erase what you don't like, but you can't go back after the fact and take a pic of something that you wished you had taken or that you missed.

UEG, in the old days the cameras were so big that in most cases I simply left them in the hunting car, or in camp. The cameras that were small enough to carry in my pocket left a lot to be desired in the quality of pictures, and the development of the film was a bother as well. Then I started hunting Alaska where it rained constantly in the fall, so I bought a 35 mm under water camera, which was even bulkier. That camera hasn't been used in several years, and it still has an unfinished roll of film in it!

Saeed is right, the digital cameras have changed everything but I got those too late so the pictures I do have are film shots that have not stood the test of time, and most are trashed over the years, and in many cases I went hunting and about the only time I took a picture was when an animal was down, and the picture was only of a dead animal and because I was taking the picture I was not in it.

Now that the very good digital cameras are available, I'm too old, and retired and can't afford the serious hunting anymore.

Top that off I have zero idea of how to go about posting a paper picture on the internet forums, so I simply don't post hunting reports that are from times gone by!

......................................................................

Years ago, it used to cost an arm and a leg to make copies of the safari photos.

What we used to do was make a copy of every negative, then pass the prints around, for each person to mark on the back which one he wants copies of.

Then send them all back, suitably marked as how many from each negative.

Nowadays all we do is just copy everything onto USB drives and be done with it.

quote:

Originally posted by Bakes:
I've been going through some old hunt reports and I think that since I joined AR in 2001 there has been a bit of a shift in what is posted, photo wise, of a safari. It used to be just a hunter behind a dead animal, now there are more photo's of the little things one see's on safari. Saeed's safaris are a case in point. Saeed gives you a camera and says "take photo's" and you do, everything that catches your eye. I actually find hunt reports more interesting when they contain lots of photo's of various animals and people than just the old dead animal/hunter shots.

I actually prefer to see hunters behind live animals, like Johnny Weismuller used to do it.

... far more interesting

The technology has made a huge difference. Dealing with large cameras, film, printing and so on was a huge speed bump. Now with digital, I can snap away whenever something strikes me as memorable. Seeing all those photos makes the hunt report sort of write itself.

"Hunting" has always been about the little things ! This is not new at all ! Nor has the use of any camera digital or otherwise had anything to do with the hunt or the value we gain from it.

Though a dead animal is the logic conclusion of the hunt it is never the prerequisite for a successful hunt.

This is the difference between hunting a shooting and between hunters and shooters !

Having hunted with so many people, I have found that some ARE interested in other things one sees on safari other than animals.

While others seem to not give it any thought.

I enjoyed the tracks in the dirt and would get Coster to name them for me. I suppose that's why I took a fair few photo's of them. We found the track of a big python and being a snake owner I would've loved to have found it, but I didn't want to stick my hand down the hole that Dylan said it was down to pull it out

The coolest track I reckon was the track of a wild cat. It was tiny, then you came across the track of a lion!