I went with a good friend of mine on one of his wildlife workshops . This was at the British Wildlife Centre in Surrey . The centre is open to the public at weekends and bank holidays . However , if you have a few people going , you are able to have the place to yourself , with a guide to take you around . The guide will also encourage the various animals to pose for the camera . So much so , that the Female Red Fox came very close to me . I made a squeek noise with my mouth and she came over and stuck her tongue in my ear !!! That sure made my day .
We were lucky enough to photograph the following on the day . Red Squirrel's , Red Fox , both male and female , Otters , Red Deer (which sadly got spooked by someone in the group , and wouldn't come back to pose for the cameras) , Field Mouse, Polecats, Stoats , Badgers , a gorgeous Female Hedgehog and a very well camouflaged Scottish Wild Cat . The wild cat really didn't want to play for the camera's , so she was left alone to hide amongst the undergrowth .
Our group consisted of nine photographers . With cameras ranging from Lumix , Canon EOS 1D's and various Nikons . This was interesting to see how the various cameras coped with situations . The Canon's certainly have better servo auto focus and cope better with a subject coming at speed towards the camera . Where , Nikon show less noise when the ISO has been cranked right up . I was shooting at 3200 ISO on a few of the images .
The weather was fairly kind to us . It was overcast for most of the day , which made for lovely light . There was a short sharp rain shower . But as i was laying on the ground when it rained , i decided to stay there , get wet and carry on taking great photos of the Fox's .
The facilities at the centre are fantastic . A lovely log fire to keep the main room warm , good tea and coffee to warm us up when coming in from the cold . Plus the sandwiches were freshly made and very tasty !! You can also use the projector screen in the main room if you want to do a bit of classroom work before you take any photos . The staff were fantastic . Nothing was any trouble for them . So as i said a great day out , highly recommended , even if you just go at weekends or bank holiday. You will still stand a good chance of getting some cracking photos .
As i had a wedding and another evening event on the Saturday , i have not had time to process all the images . So there are some Fox and Otter photos to wet your taste buds . I will try and get some of the other images done in the next week or so and post them up .
You will find more of my wildlife and landscape images on my face book page here . Or if you would like to have a look at my wedding , portrait and event work you can look here .
