Weekend with European Bison
New year, new resolutions and new plans for this blog ;) Writing looooong posts clearly isn’t my strong suit, so I figured a nice format would be sharing small photo galleries with just a bit of text as an addition. For example: a summary of a weekend trip, a selection of photos from a given month or a collection of frames focused on a single species or phenomenon.
Sooo... lets begin - first up is the latest “expedition” or rather a very short weekend gateaway in search of European bison. You might be surprised but despite the fact that I’ve been photographing for quite a long time, this was my very first "bison trip.” Some of you probably remember that my main weapon at the moment is a 70–200mm lens, so don’t expect any close-up portraits ;)
The three of us set off on Saturday morning - myself, the "small-in-frame" specialist Grzegorz Długosz (https://www.gdlugosz.com/) and the incredibly talented young guy Tomek Michalski (https://www.instagram.com/tomekmichalski.fot). By early afternoon we were already on location and quickly found our first herd of bison. It was a small group, but nicely positioned - the chances for backlit shots at sunset looked promising.
At one point we noticed some movement on the other side of the field and thought another group of bison was emerging from the forest. It turned out to be red deer - bison on the left, red deer on the right… what more could you ask for? :)
As always, nature writes its own scripts and pays no attention to photographers’ hopes. Unfortunately… about an hour before sunset, the bison started moving toward a nearby forest. I can’t really blame them - the temperatures were extremely low (around –20°C throughout the entire weekend), so any shelter and protection from the wind for the night was more than welcome. In the end, a lonely gentleman posed for us, walking against a backdrop of birch trees bathed in orange sunset light.
I wouldn’t be myself if I didn’t shoot at least one tree backlit against the sun.
The next day, the plan was to find a herd we could photograph backlit. –24°C and steaming "cows" - that’s how we imagined it. Unfortunately, every group of bison we encountered was positioned in a completely unphotogenic way. Just when we were losing hope for any successful session, three young bulls came to the rescue, lined up perfectly (far away, but perfectly).
For our second photographic breakfast, we found yet another group - this time better suited for low-key photography.
The light looked incredible on the frost-covered branches of shrubs and trees.
Our plan for the afternoon was exactly the same as the day before and unfortunately, it failed just as completely. But… perhaps as a consolation prize, a fox posed beautifully for us, walking across the endless white fields.
I also had an idea to photograph the bison with the moon (it was a full moon at the time), but once again the animals had different plans. A topic to tackle in the future.
Yes… next to that tree there really should be at least one bison standing.
