A Little Transparency

My blog posts are like buses.

Generally annoying and widely disregarded by the general public?

Probably, but you also wait for ages before two come along at once. The metaphor almost works but, in reality, no-one is waiting. Still, just as bus drivers amuse themselves by squashing cats and parking on pedestrian crossings with their empty buses, I shall amuse myself by spouting drivel and wearing out my keyboard with my unheeded words.

In the spirit of yesterday's blog post, I have decided to do a little exposé of one of my images:

This image is part of Exposing The Wild's Scottish Project and features in Drama in the Garden, which I produced as part of the project. At the project's climax, Samuel Waldron and I exhibited the image as part of two exhibitions in the Scottish Borders.

Throughout the exhibition, I tried to explain to as many people as possible how the image was produced as I wanted no-one to leave with a false sense of the image. As far as I am aware, everyone was genuinely interested and appreciated me sharing what many thought I might consider a trade secret.

How then did I produce the image? The image shows the same Blue Tit in six different poses. The bird was nesting nearby and, when I noticed it visiting a suet-filled hole designed to attract woodpeckers, I decided to try to photograph the Blue Tit as well.

Initially, the bird flew to the suet from varying vantage points making it almost impossible to anticipate its flightpath. I placed a stick just out of frame, which the bird started using instead. Once the bird was using this new and more direct route, I placed the camera at 90 degrees to the flightpath and manually focused upon it so the bird would always be in focus when flying between the stick and suet.

I decided to used a 60mm macro lens as it produced a brilliantly sharp image whilst blurring the background but keeping enough definition to give the image context. This meant I had to use an remote trigger and sit a few meters from the camera so as not to spook the bird. I simply fired the camera (and attached off camera flash) every time the bird used the flightpath.

After two days I had taken over a thousand shots. The vast majority did not contain the bird at all and many of those that did only showed the tail; but, within the 100 or so shots that survived the cull, I found five which together produced a realistic looking image of a Blue Tit flight path. I edited these together in photoshop. The final image is actually a composite of six images: five of the bird and one of the background.

The image is not a true flight path, it is the illusion of a true flight path. No photograph can presents an truly accurate view of reality. All we can do as photographers is strive to replicate reality as accurately as possible. We are, as I recently heard BBC Producer Barry Paine say, are in the business of creating the illusion of truth.

I do not think any visitors to the exhibition minded having their illusions shattered. Most were simply fascinated by the effort behind this single image, regardless of whether I used the ethically questionable practices of baiting and severe editing. I would much rather fascinate and inspire by explaining an illusion than by presenting an illusion as truth.

WildPhotos Ethics Declaration

"Excuse me, can you tell me how to find the Royal Geographic Society?"

"Shouldn't you be asking them that?"

I would probably have found this a little funnier had I not spent the previous night poised over a relative's toilet bowl following an unfortunate reaction to a Chinese takeaway. My comedic advisor, however, probably assumed my dehydrated and tired appearance was the result of a late-night schmoozing session with a high-flying executive. I was, after all, in London.

I had ventured to the capitol to visit WildPhotos, an annual program of talks and debates where the Bence Mates of this world explain spending the last year blow-drying leaf cutter ants while Klaus Nigges justify dressing as a pelican and photographing urinating jet-skiers. If you are in any doubt that wildlife photographers are an odd bunch, this is the event for you.

Somewhere though between Chris Packham assaulting an Andy Rouse effigy with a super soaker and Stefano Untertheiner recalling his love for an albatross, the organisers somehow managed to find time to fit in a relatively sane debate on photographic ethics.

"Photographic Deceit: How far is too Far" was chaired by Mark Carwardine and began with a survey. The audience of professional and amateur photographers were asked to show their hands in response to a series of questions on baiting, captive subjects, editing, and captioning. The answers regarding baiting follow:

• 95% would leave food to attract birds.
• 70% would feed roadkill to a predator.
• 20% would feed a live mice to a wild owl.

The full results, which are available here, show starkly that everyone has an opinion on how far is too far but that everyone's opinion varies. Over the next hour, many valid points were raised and discussed but I think that wildlife cameraman Doug Allan summarised the mood best. He stated that photographers and cameramen should do only what they feel comfortable with and would be ready to defend, whilst being completely transparent.

Most delegates agreed that photographers are not necessarily the best people to judge their own actions but that they should make it possible for others to do so. This was included in a Ethics Declaration, available here,  which many delegates (including me) agreed to sign and have since done so.

I, as a developer and user of the Exposing The Wild Captioning System, believe that the system is the simplest and most complete way of doing this available. However, if it is not for me to judge my own photographic actions, perhaps it is not best for me to judge my own captioning system. I will simply be fully transparent about my reasons for creating and using it and let others judge whether it is for them.