So my first time at the rut was yesterday. It was a beautiful thing, I have to say though we did get there early and went up the wrong path for several hours but eventually we found the best place to shoot. The Deer were a fair bit away and I would have perfected them to be closer but I am doing wildlife photography. It is never as you want it.
So we spent most of our time trying to actually get to see the deer. Eventually we found a good place to shoot the deer from which was a small stream with a good tree line so we could be hidden from the deer. The only problem with this was it was quite light by the time we found them so they could easily see us. So the shots I got were a little far away but it gives me something to work on. To try and get mammals it is much harder than birds, although they are bigger they can see you much sooner than you can see them.
I must also explain that I have been photographing wildlife for some time before since I first got my first Nikon D40. Which was some time back. So having done birds for 6 years, not to any degree of success, but it has helped me get to the stage where I am at today. With this knowledge I just tried to get some shots of the Deer and not to try and get close up shots I wanted to study them and figure out their behavior before trying to get closer to them. I have learned this with my bird photography.
