Hello to all members, This is my first post, but i have been following AR for about 7 months now, u guys have alot of experience and i love the input you guys give each other, some of you may know my dad as the user JackdBold,

He was going on a elephant hunt in Zim next month and he decided to buy me some tickets!!!!

I have been to Zim once before and i have the itch, now i get to scratch it....

I film all the hunts we go on together and put together films for friends and family to enjoy. Since this is such a awesome hunt i want to get everything perfect.

I have a little sony HD 10.2 megapixel, hardrive, camcorder that takes great film and tripod to go with it.

Can you guys who have hunted elephant before give me some advice, any little piece of advice would be great as i am trying to make this movie perfect,

I will be doing my first ele hunt this year, and we are filming it, so I don't havve specific experience here, but I know a little about filming hunts.

I think with ele hunts, one of the most important things is to make sure the hunter and ele are both in the shot at the same time when at all possible. It really shows the size, and the intensity. It is the most dramatic footage. If the cameraman is back a bit, it makes the gap between hunter and ele seem even smaller.

Buzz hs told me that tripods on ele hunts are useless and are just in the way, so be advised on that. Buzz knows what he is talking about. Shots from a tripod are obviously better, but you are going to have to be mobile an dflexible when after ele, so I have to agree with Buzz, that the ele part of your trip is no place for the tripod.

In general, film finding tracks, interaction between hunter and PH, film some of the tracking, especially if you cross streams, etc.
Tell a story with your footage - don't just take video of things off the truck and kill shots. It is the whole experience that will all want to remember, so don't short yourself there.

Also film around camp, campfire, set up your camera on tripod, hit record, and film a sunset or two, etc. If you have a drive with you and can dump footage every evening, film everything you can. You can always edit out what you don't need.

YoungGun,
I can't give you advise on the video but I would like to congratulate you for the opportunity to make life memories with your dad. I was fortunate enough to personally meet him at Reno and he's a class act. Enjoy your time together and take lots of footage...DAN

Welcome to the forum...

Aloha!

Roland

get a good monopod it will steady your footage as well as a tripod once you have experience with it. You can also learn to pan with it just like a fluid head tripod. They can make a decent walking stick as well and take no time to use. On an elephant hunt hand held footage will be shaky at best.

Look into bogen monopods you can get a good one for less than $100 this will be the best investment you can make for good footage on a hunt. Just keep your camera attached to it the entire time you are walking. You can get some good smooth footage while walking using it like a glidecam, just shorten the monopod and use your arms like shock absorbers to keep the footage smooth while walking.

quote:

Originally posted by Tim Herald:
I will be doing my first ele hunt this year, and we are filming it, so I don't havve specific experience here, but I know a little about filming hunts.

I think with ele hunts, one of the most important things is to make sure the hunter and ele are both in the shot at the same time when at all possible. It really shows the size, and the intensity. It is the most dramatic footage. If the cameraman is back a bit, it makes the gap between hunter and ele seem even smaller.

Buzz hs told me that tripods on ele hunts are useless and are just in the way, so be advised on that. Buzz knows what he is talking about. Shots from a tripod are obviously better, but you are going to have to be mobile an dflexible when after ele, so I have to agree with Buzz, that the ele part of your trip is no place for the tripod.

In general, film finding tracks, interaction between hunter and PH, film some of the tracking, especially if you cross streams, etc.
Tell a story with your footage - don't just take video of things off the truck and kill shots. It is the whole experience that will all want to remember, so don't short yourself there.

Also film around camp, campfire, set up your camera on tripod, hit record, and film a sunset or two, etc. If you have a drive with you and can dump footage every evening, film everything you can. You can always edit out what you don't need.

i am worried about flinching on the shots, a tree or bush might not be around to rest on, what do other people do for that?

the monopod sounds like my best bet,

thank you filmit

I think the video where the cameraman is not right over the hunter's shoulder provides a more realistic perspective. Where the cameraman hangs back 10-15 yards and uses the zoom makes for really nice footage. Where the cameraman is right behind the hunter's shoulder, you loose depth perspective. Problem is that by using a cameraman other than the PH's normal cameraman, the PH is going to want to keep everyone together in a group so that he does not have to worry about someone not right next to him if the situation starts to turn to crap.

YoungGun90

Wear ear plugs it will help a lot with flinching. Tripods are no good for hunting ele's. Filmit is right use a monopod but if you are in a situation where you cant use the monopod such as being in very thick jess, wearing ear plugs will reduce flinching a lot.

Mike

Ditto on the Monopod, although you will probably find you won't use it extended, but just held at the compact length as a handle. On close quarters stalk/shooting situations, you can hold it slightly above head height and not worry about your position in relation to the shooter. Ear plugs are also huge. The guys above have it covered.

Monpod, earplugs and learn how to do manual focus thats very important IMO.

AD

couple things i usually mess up is panning to fast, zooming in and out to fast, and now talking explaining enuf

thanks for all your help, ill make sure to bring my earplugs and start shoppin for a monopod

has anyone used wireless mics, any tips there would be great

YoungGun,

Congratulation on your adventure with your Dad...we'll be expecting a full report.

Re: Monopod. I bought this model about 5 years ago and really like it's weight, construction and the quick adjust for the price. Can be used for shooting as well as a camera mount. the quick release feature would be nice while you are moving but easy to deploy though it is not very heavy and I usually carry it extended.

See LevelLok Monopod

quote:

Originally posted by A.Dahlgren:
Monpod, earplugs and learn how to do manual focus thats very important IMO.

Very important point.

quote:

Originally posted by YoungGun90:
thanks for all your help, ill make sure to bring my earplugs and start shoppin for a monopod

has anyone used wireless mics, any tips there would be great

...a good place to start would be to peruse the www.bhphotovideo.com website...in addition to the recommended monopods, they carry shoulder/waist mounted pods for video...

My wife (who is a hunter) filmed my hunt for a tuskless cow. I have two pieces of advise. Make sure the camera is off when you are running like crazy to get away from another pissed off cow that is trumpeting loudly, and secondly,try to drop it cleanly with a head shot vs. multiple body shots. It is a traumatic
experience and the sobbing of the camera person
does not sound too good on the film. Other than that is a fairly awesome video.

lol ill make sure not to break down like that

Wireless mics on PH and hunter are really the best way to get quality audio. Then you need to wear some ear buds to hear what is going on with the mics. If they are rubbing on clothing, etc, they can ruin things, and if the batteries go out, you need to know it, but they really make the audio more professional.

You're probably better hiring a cameraman and playing backup, and learning by seeing.

Not all cameramen are good but it is a helluva lot more difficult than it looks.

Just remember I warned you!

Excellent advise Will.

X 2 on Wills comment. Osprey filming company is a great place to look. Tim Martin and Zig Mackintosh are both excellent cameramen and about 1/3 of the price of some of the guys in the US.

There website if you are interested: www.ospreyfilming.com

Greg

Young Gun

Congrats on booking your ele hunt. Early season is my favourite time of year to be hunting ele bulls! I am sure you will have a great hunt.

Ref the camerman- some advice for this time of year is to bin the tripod/monopod which just get in the way espcially in the Jess. All the top ele camermen, lead by Brian Ashby(whom I concider the best of the best) never use them.

Be sure that you are on top of the manual focus as the automatic focus in the thick bush which you will be hunting in will mean that the ele will be out of focus.

Regards of position of the camerman. Hedge your bets and get the camerman directly behind your shoulder. He then needs only to take a step back and get a portion of you (1/3) and the majority of the ele (2/3) in the frame.

Standing several yards back behind the hunter is wonderful when it actually works. The problem with this is if at the last second the ele moves 2 meters either side then the camerman has to run 10 meters to get the same angle again otherwise the ele will either be out of frame (if you hold tight) or more probably behind some bush. A classic example of this was with Rob Jolly with whom I was with last year and if you read this Rob it would be great if you could post the kill clip as the pictures better describe then words!

Wills advice is very good indeed. My camerman Justin is annoying me in town at the moment so if you decide you want to use a decent camerman let me know!! Alternatively Osprey are excellent also.

Good luck on your hunt!!

And then there is the fact that you are unarmed in elephant country.

Do you want to be as low on the IQ scale as a cameraman?

Hired the cute little blonde who was at Dallas this yr!!!!!! she's cuter than Dave. seriously you do need a professional if at all possible. I have seen lots of film done by amatures and it usually turns out bad. Just mt 2 cents worth

YoungGun90,

Welcome to the forum.

If you are serious about filming hunts in Africa, my suggestion is to get a video camera that has manual focus. As without it you are going to have a very difficult time getting a clear picture of what you are after.

Take plenty of footage, you can always delete the parts you don't want. That way you miss some of the action if you were not filming.

thanks for all of the advice gentleman, we will prob be not hirin a professional, as i like to think i can make more interesting shows than those ones on versus and what not, man we are leavin in 3 weeks and im allready losing sleep!

1.When moving in, don't put your camera on steady shot. This will cause some weird effects.

2. You should get a good shotgun mike, for "set" shots. Otherwise you can't hear what your subject is saying. When hunting, you won't have time for that. The camera will tend to pick up the cameraman's breathing if you use a normal mike, esp if you use the viewfinder (to save batteries .. using the LCD doesn't work very well esp in harsh light.) Learn your camera's sound settings ... attenuation etc. Make sure your camera doesn't hum when there is not much background noise.

3. Manual focus at all times. Learn how to pull focus from hunter (close) to animal (distant), while also zooming in or vise versa.

4. Spare batteries. Get the big ones, and get plenty.

5. For low light, you MUST USE A SONY WITH NIGHT SHOT. Anything else comes out jerky.

Practice plenty before you go. It's a good idea to have removeable media, that way you don't lose it all if some electronic gizmo goes tits up on you.